Hi my name is Mike, I am from the Minooka,IL area and a member of Jarc. I have been trolling here long enough and figured I should start a over due tank thread. First off a tiny bit about myself, Im 28 and just got into reefing in february 2009. I took the plung after months of research into keeping coral and the types of equipment I would need. Here is what I ended up with.



I finally decided to go with the nanotuners custom jbj nano cube hqi with 2 18watt pc actinic upgrade. Here are the specs. http://www.nanotuners.com/product_info.php...8sk62o0c5e4mf12

Lighting:

150watt hqi Radium 20k, 2 18watt pc actinics and of course the 4 1watt moonlights.

Filtration:

I run a combo of chemipure elite, Brightwells Phosphat-r and filterfloss in the chamber box. I also occasionally toss in a bag of carbon.

I have a 5gal fuge plumbed into the system sitting on a shelf above the DT. Its in need of a serious trimming. Its packed wall to wall with cheato and some of the biggest amphipods I have ever seen.

Dosing:

I am currently using almost strictly Brighwell products and haphazardly doing the Neozeo method.

Chems include:
Zeolight media Daily dosing of: Microbacter-7 5drps , Reef biofuel 5drps, Replenish 9drps, Koralle-vm 6drps, KoralColor 8drps, Iodion 1drp, CoralAmino 6drps, liquid reef 5drps, Vitamin C 3drps, Zooplankton-L and Phytochrome once a week

Controller:

ACJ with serial port, lab grade ph probe and temp probe. Aquanotes 3.5

Livestock.

Inverts: 1 emerald crab, 1 seahare, 1 pom pom crab, 1 cleaner shrimp, 1 flame scallop, 1 beautifull squamosa clam and the CuC.

Fish: 1 bangaii cardinal, bonded pair of ocellaris (going to new home soon), Breeding pair of Green Mandarins and 1 little bully of a Spotted Mandarin. Today I picked up 2 adorable Red Scooter Blenny's. They never leave eachothers side. The Male has a huge dorsal fin. My Mandarins have been coming by checking them out but have not herrased them.

Eventually I will get my 75gal set up with a divider. On one side will be a pair of spotted and a pair of hybrid green and spotted. I will run a pvc tube under the divider connecting the two tanks and will have a pair of bluespots.....maybe.



And now what you scrolled over all that text for ...Pics!

All pics are alittle older. I somehow managed to break my canon rebel and camcorder in the same week....ok pics in a few minutes my wife keeps whining for me to get back to painting.

Pic's!

My squamosa:




Mandarins:

Mandarin Eggs:




Baby Mandarins:






Prolarvae at 14hrs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_OS8HMW_nQ

Fry at 194hrs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDwQDflcpRw

Coral shots:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvWps6vy_gU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSMDFn__SkQ

Tank and fuge on day one.



Fuge now. (Needs a desperate cleaning)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5g0EINpjzA





Everything was pretty messy in that pic. The shelf is pretty much empty now and all that junk next to the tank is gone.

What do you guys have your mp10's set to? I have mine on short pulse turned up alittle shy of half way. Its enough to get a small wave going and keep the fish down low out of the current.

I absolutly love my new RSB's They never leave eachothers side. Last night when they went to bed they burried themselves right next to eachother. All you could see is four eyes sticking up out of the sand. My Mandarins havnt been messing with them at all either. They swim by and check them out alittle but no signs of aggression. My Male even looked like he was going to flash the female rsb. for a min. The Male RSB has a huge dorsal fin. Looked really cool when he was flashing when I first dumped him into his new home. I cant wait for the night I look over and see both Mandarins and RSB's rising to the surface. I wouldnt be able to tell the eggs apart but would still be sweet. They would be raised the same and look Identical until they start getting colors either way.

Every time I see you in a thread, I catch myself staring at that girl in your signature for at least 1 min+

I wish I could say the same about your avatar....eww..lol I remember that crackhead from a video somewhere just cant remember where.

Here hope this is a big pile of gooey happy for ya all.

Heres a few shots of my New RSB's, Its a full moon tonight and the Mandarins are allready starting to go a it and I seen the Male rsb flashing the female alittle.






They tend to hang out in that little rock cave there. Fortunatly I have a clear view of it from my computer.

THANK YOU

I dig your mandarin pair. Congrats on the spawn!

whos Nautilus is that? That thing is redic! Any trouble taking care of it? How long has it been kept in captivity.

That was a pic I took at the LFS in thier 200. I doubt its still alive. It was just a cute pic I wanted to add.
Even though in the middle of the tank it looks like theres a big turd sititng on the bottom.

Yea poor thing prob didn't eat, or if it did probably not well. The little kid looks menacing too...wants to pet the skate and shake the nautilus

Heres a video of my Mandarins eating from thier feeding dish. Stupid clown had to keep messing up the shot though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTYr_-mL7jU

What are you feeding them. It looks like blood worms?

I love the moving poo in the video also

Nice vid and nice tank.

How old is the tank?

>6 months. It was a combo of bloodworms and Mysis. Both enriched in selcon and brightwells AminoOmega.

There was no spawn tonight...

That's pretty nice looking first reef after 6 months.

I seriously doubt mine will look anywhere near as good as that in 4 more months.

My Female RSB figured out where the feeding dish was this morning. Sally was showing her the ropes and kept taking her by the feeding dish. I feed them as usual in the mornings and first thing sally swims over to the scooter and leads her to the feeding dish and they started eating. The male hasnt figured it out yet. I am very glad that I purchased these little guys. They add a nice color contrast to the tank. Blue Mandarins and Red scooters. The males dorsal fin looks pretty sweet. Kid of reminds me of a cicada wing or something.

Collected a small Mandarin spawn this evening.

Not sure if you've seen this site (sorry it doesn't give much breeding tips):
http://www.meerwasserlarven.de/fische/sync...ndidus_engl.htm

I have been aware of sylvios work but that is the first time I have seen that page. Thank you for the link. I will add it to my Mandarin folder.

whats ur stock list? seems like its 2 mandarins, 2 RSB, 1 clown, 1 cardinal?

how often do you feed? I recently got a mandarin and weaned it onto bloodworms, but it still doesnt pay any attention to mysis. he's still a bit skinny, but is eating! any recommendations?

I just got home from work and the female scooter was dead...=( I called the lfs asking what thier fish policy was. He stated they didnt have one but to remind him next time im in there and he would take care of me...im sad. Dont know what it could of been. Maybe aptasia stung her or she was jacked when I got her but she was eating.

To answer your question my current stock list is 2 Mandarins, now 1 scooter, 1 bangaii cardinal and 1 clown in this tank and another in my fry tank that hopefully are going away today. I am feeding 2 times a day right now. I enrich everthing with a combo of selcon and aminoomega. I just picked up some cyclopeeze today so I will be adding it to the mix Mix consists of bloodworms Hikari mysis (altho they dont like the mysis as much as the worms) I sometimes feed rods but its too messy. I plan on adding a blue spot if I ever have enough money.

sorry to hear about the scooter. maybe it was internal parasites?

i currently have a bluespot in my 34g, and i love him! definitely very entertaining. i currently use vitachem on the bloodworms, hopefully he will gain some weight. how do u feel about ur bioload? i feel like i may be pushing mine a bit: 1 picasso, 1 onyx, 1 cherub angel, 1 bluespot, 1 leopard wrasse, and now the mandarin in a breeder net.

my bioload is half what it used to be. I used to have 3mandarins, a ywg, 2 ocellaris, the bangaii a pom pom crab, cleaner shrimp, peppermint shrimp, seahare and what ever else I may be missing. ..you want to talk about bioload....I just put a little chunk of cyclopeeze in the tank for the first time....talk about a mess! the whole tank is clowdy with that stuff....oops.

I forgot on my stock list I still have the pom pom, seahare and cleaner shri p. I ditched the peppermint when he started going after my feather dusters instead of aptasia.

YAY A TANK THREAD!!!!!

i love your tank you made me a dragonet addict and im happy!!

also very nice RSBs!!

o i just read about the female, sorry

im sad because im getting some of that black bacteria ring on a few of my fav zoas...it started with the 5 color rainbows I got. Now it has spread to a few others. I need to find time to do a good peroxide dip. I cant possibly turn the mp10 up any higher without causing my fish to hide behind the rock work. I got a small wave crashing accross the surface.

+1 to the avatar comment, shes got some biggins!

Ummm ...####...I woke up thinking I was going to have a good birthday. Last night before bed I had noticed a hermit crab spawn so I turned off teh pumps and collected a bunch to put in the fry tank. well I ended up going to bed and forgot the pumps off. I come down this morning to my cleaner shrimp laying on his side the RSB and both of my Mandarins breathing really heavy.....Im worried they are going to die. ...Its not the first time I have forgotten pumps off before. I dont see why this time was so horrible. I tossed in a bag of carbon just in case. My cleaner shrimp is now up off his side but not really moving. The Mandarins are not breathing AS heavy. The scooter still is though. I screwed up and I hope it doesnt cost me my favorite fish.

Yay so far no deaths. The cleaner shrimp recovered and is back in his usual spot. Mandarins look ok and are swimming around. RSB is still breathing hard but not so heavy. Hopefully everyone pulls through...I went in the garage and it looks like my rotifer culture crashed again.

::

Must be something in the air! I did the same thing last week, forgot to turn the pumps back on. I wasn't as fortunate as you were. Woke up the next morning and I lost my bluespot jawfish and a yellow assessor. My picassos did make it though!

Ouch thats some expensive loses. The only thing I loss was a hitchhiker coral growing on a hitchhiker bivale that bleached. Sorry for your losses.

Just left the eye doctor because of extreme pain in my eyes especially when i move them. He thinks it some kind of viral menengitus or something....He kept asking if I had been exposed to ticks or mosquito bites because of lime disease. I didnt mention that the week or two before that rotifer culture water splashed me in the eye...Looks like im taking a few days off work. The only thing he told me to take was advil and to ride it out.

going back to the doctor. My vision is extremly blurry and im really photosensative. I can barely read what im writing. Im kind of scared.

hey demonic, ive been able to get my mandarin to eat bloodworms soaked in Vitachem however he hasnt put on any weight. im not sure whats the case. ive been feeding him almost everyday... if anything, he's gotten skinnier.

i thought it may be parasites, so i dosed the tank with prazi pro...

any thoughts? maybe i need to get him on mysis?

At least see how he's doing first...

Hope all is ok D3monic!!!

Just read your thread. Tank is outstanding. I hope you figure out what is going on with your eyes. Get better!

-Prof

Thanks, It 4am. I just got home. Doctor finally sent me to the emergency room to get a cat scan, spinal tap and a few other tests, 5 hours later they only did a cat scan. I have a sinus infection and both ears infected from when I was sick last week. Nothing explaining the eye pain or vision loss. Eye doctor said that the optic nerve in my right eye was pretty swollen. Once the doctors in he ER saw the infections they didnt even bother with my primary concern...the fact that I cant see for ####.

Try feeding your Mandarin a combo of mysis and bloodworms. If you can find any locally switch to Selcon. I never heard of the product your using. It could be a parasite or the product your using is not nutritious enough. How much do you feed? between 2 Mandarins I feed a entire cube of mysis and a good size chunk of bloodworms once to twice a day. Hope he fattens up for you.

Just curious are all psychedelic mandarins created equal my LFS says he can get me a pair hand picked from his supplier for a bit extra of a price is it worth paying extra he says they have extra bright blue on them ?

I would want to see them first...I have not seen a spotted/psychedelic with blue in it. The ones I have seen have several shades of green and orange. How much extra is he wanting to charge? I would assume that they could come in color variations after all synchiropus splendidus comes in several different colors so I dont see why synchiropus picturatus would be any different. A quick google images search did produce very few pics of spotted mandarins with a hint of blue in the lower portions of the body. I saw one with blue cheeks and another who's belly had some blue in it. They could even possibly be hybrid somewhere in thier lineage.

sorry about what happened demonic. i didnt read ur last post when i posed my question. glad to see ur alright tho!

Hope your feel better soon. I live in Morris so it is nice to find some close nano reefers around here!!!

that sucks hope u feel better