Retirement and forum shutdown (17 Jan 2022)
Hi,
John Howell who has managed the forum for years is getting on and wishes to retire from the role of managing it.
Over the years, he has managed the forum through good days and bad days and he has always been fair.
He has managed to bring his passion for fish keeping to the forum and keep it going for so long.
I wish to thank John for his hard work in keeping the forum going.
With John wishing to "retire" from the role of managing the forum and the forum receiving very little traffic, I think we must agree that forum has come to a natural conclusion and it's time to put it to rest.
I am proposing that the forum be made read-only from March 2022 onwards and that no new users or content be created. The website is still registered for several more years, so the content will still be accessible but no new topics or replies will be allowed.
If there is interest from the ITFS or other fish keeping clubs, we may redirect traffic to them or to a Facebook group but will not actively manage it.
I'd like to thank everyone over the years who helped with forum, posted a reply, started a new topic, ask a question and helped a newbie in fish keeping. And thank you to the sponsors who helped us along the away. Hopefully it made the hobby stronger.
I'd especially like to thank John Howell and Valerie Rousseau for all of their contributions, without them the forum would have never been has successful.
Thank you
Darragh Sherwin
Trigon 190 project begins..
- Pablo (Pablo -)
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Well basically as you can see i decided to jump from freshwater to saltwater and this is more or less what i have in mind...
List of equipment that im planning to use
-Juwel Trigon 190 (No sump)
-Red Sea Prizm Deluxe Skimmer
-RO Unit
-Fluval 305 (1000lph) External Canister filter
-Tunze nanostream 6025 (2500lph) - trying to get this in Ireland so let me know if someone stock this.
-Juwel 600lph powerhead
Basically I'm planning in use Argonite as substrate and about 20-25kg of live rock to start.
Lights wise, I'll begin with the juwel 2x20w T8's and i might add a 54w T5 later... basically the idea is keep low light softies like mushrooms, leathers and zoas... maybe an Urchin!
Fish... I'm planning the mandatory pair of clowns and i will like to get fish that are easy to feed and take dry and frozen food... I was thinking in a few Green Chromis also.
Let me know what you think? any suggestions are really appreciated!
Cheers
Pablo
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- buleetu (buleetu)
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ur set up sounds great
i think u might wanna up grade ur lights in the future though so maybe u can have a look at this thread about modding ur tank brace before u put water in the tank
C:\Documents and Settings\david\Desktop\Reefs UK View topic - More cool Juwel mods.mht
i know if i had the chance i would have done it so maybe u might wanna have a go
kiss my fishy AS S
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- Anthony (Anthony)
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I only have t5`s and mine are thriving. I absolutely love
Torch Corals.
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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How many T5's you have... I though hard corals needed a lot of light + a calcium reactor....
Cheers
Pablo
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- kieronr (kieronr)
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- Anthony (Anthony)
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My Torchs are thriving. I have 5 different ones in the tank.
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- buleetu (buleetu)
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i would give u a couple of months having just softies in ur tank and then u will want to be more adventurous
ive read a fair bit on other forums about why people think t5s are actually much better metal halide lights, its just a matter of getting as much light in the hood as u can
i would say get as many t5s in the hood as u can fit and also some computer fans for cooling, t5s get hot,then u will be able to have torch corals and that too when ur ready to give them a go<br><br>Post edited by: buleetu, at: 2007/09/30 15:25
kiss my fishy AS S
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- gm*333 (gm*333)
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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- buleetu (buleetu)
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hows things
is the tank going good for u
its looking cool, fair play
u dont have the swing arm hydrometre still in the tank do ye??
its not a good idea, it will end up being unreliable after a while because u will have some peices of algae and such growing on it and that makes them dodgey
i would use it only when u want a result, then take it out and clean it off with a paper towel or something, i have read that there not very reliable at the best of times, so anything u can do to keep them up to scratch is a good thing ye??
kiss my fishy AS S
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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In the Hydrometer box sais that you should leave the hydrometer in the tank for 48 hours... thats why i left it inside...

I check Ammonia and Nitrates last night and, theres some of both so i think the tank is starting to cycle... also threw in some shrimps (dead ones


beside that i have a couple of powerheads on top of the rock to create enough current and circulation
So far so good... lights in the tank are off to prevent unnecesary algae as theres no cleaning crew in..
Pablo
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- Didihno (Didihno)
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I think my mate has one going.
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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- lampeye (lampeye)
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lampeye
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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- kieronr (kieronr)
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- buleetu (buleetu)
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my name is david not brian haha
ye it would be best to add all ur rock together
if ur gonna use inert rock u could get some masonary drill bits and a drill and put a load of different size holes into it for all the creepy crawleys and that to live in, i have my dead rock in one tank or another for 2 years now and the bits that the light gets to are covered in coraline,looks cool
u should get all the live rock in now though because as keiron says u will have problems with mini cycles and possibly nh4 spikes and the like if u add more as u go,
but in saying that when i first started my tank i was on a budget so i didnt have the cash to buy it all together, so what i done was get as much as possible at the start and cycled the tank then i added 2-3 lbs at a time every 2 weeks or so, i didnt have any problems at all, but i think that was because when i bought the rock it was well matured in the holding tank at the lfs and i only had a drive of 10 minutes up the road, so there was very little die off of nitrifying bacteria
kiss my fishy AS S
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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nitrites and ammonia is 0 now.. and has been for at least 5 days... i threw in a few shrimps (dead ones


Skimmer is in place and running... not much comming ot of it as theres nothing to skim (i guess) and i should be getting today a Hydor Koralia 2 (2300lph) for circulation... so pretty much everything is up and running..
I'm thinking in getting the cleaning crew during the weekend maybe a cleaning shrimp a few hermits and turbo snails... any thoughts?
SG is 1.021 but i'm thinking is pushing that to at lease 1.024 today... and i'll be going to the LFS with a water sample to test the SG with them too..
Pablo
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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Cheers
Pablo
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- lampeye (lampeye)
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first bring your water to 1024-5. assuming your tank is cycled , and if you are patient i would only add the clean crew, 12 turbo snails and 6 reg legged hermits (the bigger the better) would be perfect (you could add more at a later date. then in a week or so add your first fish. leave a good 2 weeks inbetween adding each fish.
you should qt your fish to avoid any heartache.
when buying the fish be sure to watch them for a while and make sure they dont have whitespot or any other ailments (not too skinny etc). most lfs have a centalised filtraion or filtration in bays so if you see sick fish in the same tank or the one next to it (if i has the same filter) i wouldnt buy them.
hope this helps
lampeye
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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After going through the worst part of wierd algae problem that resulted to be fueled by low alkalinity, the tank is looking better now....
So here a few pictures...
Tank
Pearl Scale Angel
One of my two firefish
Clown and firefish
Pulsing Xenia
Another one of the Angel
opinions?
Pablo
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- Didihno (Didihno)
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The firefish is worthy of a competition entry IMO.
Best colours I've seen on one.
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- Seany (Sean Phelan)
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Its all looking very good. I hope my setup looks as good as yours in such a short time. I agree with Didihno. That firefish looks stunning. No problems with the Pearlscale Angel nipping the invert?
Kind regards
Seany
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- pierce (pierce)
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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No... haven't seen the pearlscale having a go at snails, crabs or the corals so pretty happy with him

As you can see in the picture the firefish was missing the top fin when i bought him but is growing back nicely... I'll submit a picture of him when the fin is fully grow.

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- paulm (paulm)
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- lampeye (lampeye)
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ps how much was the angel?
lampeye
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- Pablo (Pablo -)
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I use an SLR Canon 350D... basically the camera do the jobhow do you guys take such cracking photos

I think 45 from Aquatic Village... I really like him because is quite unusual... you don't see this fellas often on the shopshow much was the angel?

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- buleetu (buleetu)
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looks deadly, love the angel and ur pictures are great too, i think ill have to bite the bullet and get an sLR camera too
kiss my fishy AS S
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