Tank Thread Tank reached 38 years old...in 2009!

[Paul B]

I am still trying to figure out why the stomatella are attracted to this and would like to do a test by leeping a small amount of electricity going in one area and see if I can get a bunch of Stomatella to come running.
I can't tell if they are curious of if they smell burning mojano. I also wonder if this can be used to trap certain creatures.
I love to experiment.

 

[Paul B]

The tank will be 40 years old this March (I think, maybe 39)and I would like to do some maintenance before then. When a pet shop went out of business I took many of the corals, some half dead, and put them in my tank. They didn't really fit so they are just stuck there in awkward places. I need to move the entire rockwork back to the rear to fit stuff. Some of the half dead corals are recovering but I would like to remove the dead parts so it doesn't look like the tank is dying.
I really hate to move the rocks because I like the aquascaping and there are so many large tube worms that will get burried in the move.
But it needs to be done. I also have to catch the pipefish as they don't do well whenever I do this. I think the detritus clogs their tiny gills.
I hope to have time for this within a few weeks.
I also will probably find a bunch of things in there that hatched from those corals that I have not seen yet.

 

[Paul B]

I moved the left side of the rocks in the tank towards the rear so I could fit more. The rocks were too close to the front. I still have to do this to the left side

 

[Paul B]

I had to remove a watchman gobi today. I have 4 of these, I don't remember how many years I have them but I got them as babies. These two pictured and one almost the same size and a much smaller one. This pair is spawning like they always are and the large male always chased the smaller male but it never seemed to bother him much. Now the male is much larger than the other male and he never stops chasing him. I have seen him cowering in a corner for the last week but I could not catch him. Today the large male chased him so much that I was able to grab him with my hand because he was practically beat to death and could not hardly swim.
I have him in a small tank with some antibiotic because his fins are all torn as is his mouth. I will nurse him back to health and he will live for a while with my burrfish. I hope he doesn't eat him.
Then if he recovers fully I will probably give him away.

 

[Paul B]

Hey, everybody!
This is Paul B's wife, best friend, dive buddy and very rarely his critic. However, this time I must boast about this "Zapper" thing. I can't believe my husband, Paul B, finally got me hooked into this hobby in some small way and it was fun too--much to my surprise. I loved zapping with his new invention. Who would have thought? Our tank is looking better than ever now that I am involved with the clean up. You see fish is Paul's passion and mine seems always to be cleaning up something or another. Anyway, I am really proud of this guy and his latest invention. By the time I was finished, there was not even a hint of a mojano or tentacle in site of our 40-year old reef.

 

[Bumpylemon]

Are tropicals still in down there? Last week they were up here in rhode island. I was thinking of heading down saturday to take some pics and catch some things. Mostly puffers and a pair of horses maybe.

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[Paul B]

I didn't get a chance to go for tropicals and today will be the last warm day. I guess I should have gone collecting today.
I am not sure if there is anything left.

 

[Bumpylemon]

Do you find that seahorses are still around this late? Late in the fall is good up here for horses.

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[Paul B]

Seahorses are here all winter I just don't go in the water to see if I can collect them then

 

[Bumpylemon]

I can't wait to get out there with you guys next year

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[Paul B]

This week I picked up a long nose butterfly. I like copperbands better but they are almost the same fish. I have had quite a few of these and I thibnk I like them for their shape. I am not really crazy about tangs and angels, just too common and they get too large. The only problem I find with these types of butterflies is that I can't get them to live as long as most other fish. If I can get five years out of one I consider myself lucky. It seems that they die in accidents more than other fish but it's probably just me.
They are definately not as hardy as most fish and need a little special attention. Because of their tiny mouth, they need to eat more times than most fish and they can't really bite off any food so they need bite size pieces. Of course I feed mine live worms every day but he also gets tiny pieces of fresh clam along with mysis.
They are an interesting fish and like copperbands they have a definate personality that you don't find in many fish. Each fish is different, sort of like people and you never know what you will get. Some eat anything and others eat nothing. Some hide all day in the coral and others never hide and will eat from your fingers. I guess they have moods which is why I find them so facinating.
In Bora Bora I spent some time with them while I was trying to learn about moorish Idold whom they share the reef with but eat completely different food.
I took this there.

This is the same reef and you can just about see a moorish Idol at the bottom center.
Both fish are not particularly rare.

 

[Paul B]

Yesterday I removed a canister filter that I had running on my reef for a while with carbon in it. I actually forgot about the thing and it was on there for a few weeks.
I opened it to clean it out and found it full of those tiny brittle stars.
I didn't want to throw them out so I spent the better part of an hour picking them out of a quart of carbon with a tweezers. But they were very appreciative.

 

[THEDLO]

lol im like that with my filter socks. every pod i see gets scooped and put into the fuge, (i used to do the DT but my fish would jump on them.

 

[Paul B]

Today I figured I again would do a little maintenance. The 5' algae trough that sits above my water was encrusted with salt creep. I made a mistake when I installed this tank by putting it right up against a staircase so about 4' of the 6' tank is up against a wooden wall with no air space. That area is filled with salt and I can't get to it so eventually the house will fall down from rot. Hopefully that will not happen for a while.
Anyway, I removed the algae tray and cleaned behind it as good as I could. When I removed it, of course the water drained out of it and the amphipod population living in there all started jumping on the floor on the way to the sink. I picked them up and returned them to the tank where they thanked me profusely.
I didn't need to clean the screen in the trough as there is almost no algae in it now, mostly coraline algae. There is very little algae in the tank so all is well.
The next problem is that some of the rocks are again hitting the front glass. I re located them a couple of months ago but my old fireclown feels the need to make large holes at the base of the large rocks right down to the UG filter. By doing that, the rocks tip forward and eventually hit the glass. I have some of them tied back but I again need to remove much of the rock and re position them colser to the back. I can't clean the glass the way it is now.
You can see the wooden staircase wall the tank is against here and that white horizontal thing is the algae trough.

 

[thesauce]

Such a cool tank, and great talking to you yesterday in Westbury.

Tyson

 

[Paul B]

Was that you? Great it was nice to meet you.
I am going back there on Wednesday. They are supposed to be fully stocked by then and I can do all my Christmas shopping across the street.
I go to a mall once a year after I shoot myself with a tranquilizer dart

 

[Paul B]

So far my long nost butterfly is doing great and is a very large (expensive )eater.
Today I also picked up a beautiful dragon wrasse, I never saw one quite like this one and I think tomorrow I will get a heniocus that I also saw today that looks different from heniocuses that I have seen many times. Maybe my eyes are screwing up or I have cataracts or something.
I really shouldn't be putting all of these fish in the tank but the large pair of gobies never come out any more, they just stay with the spawns in the back, the bluestripe pipefish stay in caves, the rainsford gobies kind of stay out of sight and the hippo tang comes and goes. But sometimes if you look at my tank all you will see is a couple of green chromis. Now at least the long nose and dragon gobi swim out in the front.
The pair of fireclowns stopped spawning and a wierd thing happened. I think they both switched back to being males because they both have nests on different sides of the tank. and they don't hang out with each other any more. They are not the most common of the clownfish but I am debating putting another one in there. That is probably not a good Idea. OK, I talked myself out of it.
A few months I got this beautiful red fireshrimp, but of course he stays in a hole.
Too many fish in there anyway.
Oh I also picked up a beautiful, fat gorgonian. I have it stuck in the gravel but I need to cement it to a bottle, they don't grow from the substrait in the sea and I don't like putting them in the tank like that.
I found a nice brand of mysis that is much larger than what you usually get in those mysis packs. For some reason chowder clams are not too available this time of the4 year so I have to buy smaller clams. I don't like to do that because my burrfish can eat a fairly large clam in two days and I like to eat them myself so we fight over the clams.
I would also like to build a larger worm keeper so I won't have to buy them every week. Mine is only 4" wide and about 2' long, I would like to build one double that size.
I still have multitudes of flatworms that just hang out on the rocks and sunbathe, none of them go on any corals, I haven't asked them why.

 

[Ted02]

amazing
congrats!!

 

[Paul B]

I had to remove a bunch of rock to move everything back and make more room for the corals and give some swimming room to the fish and this bottle I noticed had a huge bristle worm in it. When I dumped out the bottle to remove the worm I discovered the hard way that the bottle was filled with hydrogen sulfide. It can stink up a medium size house with no problems. This bottle has been in there for decades and usually the bottles pose no problems but if you don't clean out the detritus every few years it builds up and does not let oxygen in. This bottle was in the back hiding so I didn't even notice it. I am surprised the worm was even able to live in it but he seems fine and is in his new home in my local NY tank.
In doing this of course I had to Re-Re aquascape as I have been doing this a while.
I don't have time to do it correctly by removing most of the rocks so I am trying to do it in small sections. This does not work well in my tank because some of the rocks are 2' long and one is 3' long so what happens on one side of the tank, upsets the other side. I have it fairly good now and the rocks are tied up to the ceiling to keep them from falling forward. Three large gorgonians are stuck in the gravel because I am waiting for their bases to set so I can stick them on bottles and rocks. I don't like them in the gravel.

 

[Paul B]

I finally took a picture of this guy

I got both of them in here, the long nose and dragon wrasse.

And another lousy picture of the blue stripe pipefish