So, MGE now that you will be feeding Paul's way; will your feeder work? I would think that the feeder needs for the food to be very fine.
I am not sure GreenEyes can feed my way. Her tank is very clean and you really can't just pick one thing out of my methodiology and have good luck with it. Especially for mandarins which need a lot of fresh, preferably live food. If she builds that feeder, which I am sure she can do in 10 minutes, and she hatches brine shrimp every day, as she certainly knows how to do, then she may be spawning some mandarins.
As you know, I cheat and dump in stuff from the ocean but your tank has to be very healthy to do that and it may take a while to get it to that point. Fish will live for many years even if they are not in optimal condition but they won't spawn or be in spawning condition. That is the condition you need to get them in before you go and dump in life from the sea or you may have a disease problem on your hands, or on the fishes hands anyway. OK fins.
Which ones are those?
Feeling better and more motivated than ever...I refuse to let anyone or anything take me down...
To try to tackle all of these questions as simply as possible...
Obviously every tank/system is different in the sense that certain things that may work for one system...may not work with another. I understand that and am pulling things that will work for my tank. I'm pulling certain things that spark my interest and curiosity from several systems that I feel are tried and true...aged...mature...beautiful...healthy systems. Paul's is one of them. I'm taking things such as the live black worms, culturing brine, seeding my system with pods...just from my cultures v.s. his source, feeding his fish with the live clams, etc.
In tank related news:
Both 30g refugiums are fishless...the pod population is insane and I plan to seed them on a regular as well as culture some tisbe pods. The 30g's will most likely be stocked with some cool/different inverts. I also feed live phyto to the system in small amounts daily.
I made the pappone recipe last night...it looks insanely disgusting and I managed to gross out the babies and manchild with it which was freakin' awesome. lmao
I pulled tidbits from Paul by using head on shrimp with the guts intact, used the clam/oyster "juice", etc. I gently rinsed the blender after with RO and added it to the mixture to make sure that I didn't lose any of the "good stuff."
I also blended...then chilled...then blended several times until I had the right consistency without "cooking" the mixture. Part of saving the good stuff is by not "cooking" the mixture by over heating it/over blending it at once because you want to keep it as cold as possible. All seafood was live...everything cost less than $10 for about 2L of food. My sodium alginate will arrive on Wednesday which will prevent the mixture from settling.
I finished the continuous feeder tonight and it is kick a$$! I'm so in love with it! Except I wish it was a Pepsi fridge...Coke SUCKS! Lol Keep in mind that the pappone recipe is more of a "coral food" than to feed the fish. I will be implementing Paul's method of feeding my fish the live clams. I already feed my mantis fresh seafood...she loves shrimp...no pun intended, scallops, clam, oyster, mussels, squid, etc.
Tried to locate some live black worms to start trying to culture...which was unsuccessful. I found some info on culturing them that sounds as if it's been successful for quite a few.
So, I will be culturing live:
*phyto
*blackworms
*brine
*rotifers (when it's time)
*tisbe pods
I've also seen that there are many out there that have been successful feeding prawn roe and Nutrimar Ova to their mandarins as well. I've been feeding Ova for a while now and the fish go nuts over it.
The d.i.y. continuous feeder is done! Expanding foam has to cure for 8 hours before I can fire it up. Food for the feeder made.
Drilled a 5/16 hole through the back cover and through the fridge wall. The back cover covers the expanding foam on the outside, so you can't see the ugly a$$ foam. So from the outside...fridge looks unchanged.
Inside:
Foam hidden by cover:
Line for the enternal pump ran through the back cover:
Upgraded my ATO reservoir to a 20g brute trash can...evaporation was a bish! I was having to replace 5g buckets every other day. However, since the sump sits on the floor under my DT, it was gravity feeding the sump through the aqualifter. Talked the issue over with a couple reefer buddies yesterday and I'll be running my ato line into my overflow so that the output is above the waterline in the brute. Problem solved.
