by Saltwater Smarts | May 25, 2016 | Corals, Funny, Reef, Science, Tanks
Recently, the folks in my area got enamored with the topic of “nano‐bubbles” for the reef tank. Being a curious engineer and avid tinkerer of tanks, I jumped right in to test it for myself.So what are nano‐bubbles and what is the concept being prescribed? Well, there are many sources online that talk about the benefits of nano‐bubbles in various applications, from water and food processing to cleaning applications such as wastewater treatment. But with respect to our hobby, one site, Elegant Corals LLC, had been promoting the benefits of running “micro‐scrubbing bubbles” in the reef tank for some time. You can check out their Facebook page for the claimed benefits. Process The basic process, in short, is to produce the smallest bubbles possible and inject them into the main tank via the return pump. Wooden airstones are placed just before the inlet of the sump return pump, and the amount of bubbles is controlled by adjusting the distance from the airstone to the inlet. by Saltwater Smarts | Apr 19, 2016 | Corals, Fish, Reef, Science
The marine aquarium hobby is second only to the US military when it comes to the number of acronyms its members throw around. (Quite fittingly, this past Monday was the 27th anniversary of my DOE. Shortly after that date, I entered BMT as an A1C and did lots of PC under the direction of a TI before going on to AIT where I got an LOR for violating the UCMJ in advance of my PCS.) For today’s post, I’d like to address a somewhat common hobby acronym mentioned in an email I received from one of our readers. He quite succinctly queried, “What the heck does ‘PE’ stand for? I see it used in online forums a lot.”The acronym “PE” has the distinction of representing two terms in our hobby. If you read it in the context of a discussion on foods and feeding, the acronym likely refers to Piscine Energetics, a company headquartered in British Columbia that supplies PE Mysis®, a popular brand of Mysis relicta, among other products. But in hobby parlance, “PE” can also stand for “polyp extension,” which is exactly what it sounds like—the degree to which a coral extends its polyps. Why does this matter
