Well I think I have finally realized that it isnt necessary to test EVERY DAY!!!

I used to test my Mg, Alk and CA every single day and then dose accordingly. I took all the data from 4 weeks of daily testing and did some evaluting.... wahooo, I can just dose now and not test every single night... wife is going to love this.

So this is what I have come up with for dosing to keep my alk at 7.5 - 8, my CA at 390 - 420 and my Mg at 1350.

Water change on Friday
Dosing as follows:
Sunday, Tuesday,Thursday - 1 cap A, 1.5 caps B (c-balance)
Wednesday - 3 tsp Tech - M magnesium

I will probably continue to test only on Friday before my water change.

How does this sound? anyone dosing this much? is it too much?

Finally pulled the trigger, picking up my MP10 from will-call later today...

Cant wait to set it up!

++1!

Your tank is looking great! Love the new frags.

I just wanted to add that I'm having really nice growth and color in my stock RSM with pink and green birds nest, and my monti caps (especially the green cap). The pink birds nest has more than doubled in size in about 4 months. I have a bali green slimer that is growing considerably slower, but the color is still great, the same goes for my red cap. Go for it!

Thanks nkUnleashed

Made an unplanned trip to a LFS and the next thing you know.....

ORA Frogskin Acropora




Lunar Eclipse Palys


These pieces will probably be sitting on the frag rack for awhile... Need to find room.

What is that green coral on the bottom of the tank?

The left green coral is a green star polyp covered rock. The right green coral - which doesnt look so green in the photo - is a lobo brain.

I would love to buy some lunar eclipses when they are big enough to frag. Mine all died

If they grow nice and fast I will posting some for sale.

WOW! This is a strange food choice...

Lobo Brain eating a fire shrimp molt. I actually watched it eat half of this before the actual shrimp came and took it and finished it off... So weird

Finally got the MP10 installed and tuned! I love this thing!

I cant believe the amount of crap left on the rocks, the korelia left so much behind.

Well I have officially ran into my first possible disaster scenario.... Montipora eating nudibranchs....

I noticed yesterday that my green cap with blue polyps has a small section being consumed by nudi's! I am not exactly sure what I should do. I have read many different approaches and only some are successful. I have a lot of other montipora in this tank and I cant risk them.

What to do? what to do?

I noticed in the beginning of this thread someone used the name stevie. Who is he?

user name StevieT

StevieT the acrylic gawd.LOL

stevieT TOTM!!!!

Wow do I ever regret putting purple mushrooms in my tank!!!!!

How in the world do you get these suckers of the rock? Their tissue is like firkin leather!

I wonder.... Does any thing eat mushrooms?

i feel your pain. my mushys are getting super annoying as well.
what i do is just rip em off the rock and if possible, take the rock out and iodine the tissue thats left on the rock.

PS.

pictures. pictures. pictures.

Feeding Time...

My mini Acan garden. It needs to do some growing...


Lunar Eclipse Palys grubing on some mysis shrimp. It took this guy almost 12 hours to get this down.


Unkown chalice grubing on some mysis. This chalice has sweepers that reach almost 3 inches long...


Gotta find some more room on me rock... Rack is filling up...

Is there anyway to improve the lighting on the tank?

Can you be more specific? Do you want more light output on your Red Sea Max?

There are some options...
You can replace the entire hood with something like a sunpod.
You could mod the hood with a MH or LED's

I so far do not feel this is necessary, I am having good color and growth in all my coral, including SPS. I do know that with the Red Sea Max stock lighting you have to replace the stock bulbs often, I replace mine every 5 months. These bulbs loose their strength really fast.

There was a site where you could purchase upgraded lighting fot the RSM.

You can get a moded hood for your red sea max here:

http://www.nanocustoms.com/index.php?manufacturers_id=5

The only problem with going with a system like this is alot more heat.

nice tank!

Thanks Nanobuds!

Family is visiting this weekend and I finally get to sample a SLR camera, here are some shots from my first attempt at using it.

Blue Tip Acropora Tenuis



Green Acan
[img][/img]

Green Tip Birdsnest

Green Tip Birdsnest at Night


Purple Millipora


Jeremy's Green Montipora at night






Pocilipora


Red Cap


Ric


FTS with the CurrentUSA powerbright LEDS

Oh wow do I have to get an SLR! Problem is the camera would become its own hobby, which I couldnt afford....

more pichers

My fish

Female leapord wrasse




Coral Beauty


Hidding Fire Shrimp


ORA Jeremy's Montipora


Orange Digitata

awesome looking tank!
If your ever interested in fragging some stuff shoot me a PM.
I'm sure I live close by

Thanks bro,

PM sent.

Who makes the SLR camera? Tell me some more about it.Price,make etc. I am a total noob when it comes to cameras.

wonderful photos.

I too am pretty new when it comes to photography. The camera was a family members, it was a nikon D60 with the stock lens. That camera costs about 500 new. I really would like to get one soon, just way to pricey. Not to mention the camera in itself would become another whole hobby.



Thanks, but I got alot to learn...

I finally am taking a stab at getting rid of the purple mushrooms. I am starting first by removing the big ones, by simply hacking their base with scissors. They are actually coming out pretty easy, unfortunately I know that any leftover tissue will soon be new mushrooms. Man these things are a weed.

I do think mushroom only tanks look awesome! But I will never add another mushroom to a mixed tank of mine.

Nobody

you should'nt be so hard on yourself.... Your that one guy that makes those plastic thingies...

crap IMO

crap! nonsense, they help catch the crap though...

Did you ever end up dosing the tank to feed the SPS?

I do feed my SPS Roti Feast but very rarely, Probably only once a week.

Well I finally went for it and ordered my new lights for the tank . I have gone back and forth over and over trying to decide to upgrade my lights or not. The stock lighting that came with the RSM so far has done me good. I have different SPS that is doing great in my tank, however I know it could be better. So I finally decided to go ahead and upgrade.

Then came the harder question… Upgrade to what! So lately I have been back and forth between metal halide and T5 lighting options. I liked the idea of the shimmer from the MH and with the halide comes the mentality “I can put anything in the tank now”. I don’t think that is the case anymore, I see more and more people running T5 only lighting and doing wonderful things with SPS. With the MH there is more heat and more power consumption so there was another negative for the MH. I could always add some LED’s to get the shimmer, which I will probably do later down the road.

So I decided to go with the Sunlight Supply Tek Light HO fixture, I will be using 2 AquaBlue+ and 2 Actinic+ Giesemann powerchrome bulbs. I will be picking it up tonight and hopefully installing it as soon as I get home.

Now for some questions???

Does anyone recommend acclimating my coral/fish to this new light? I am going from the stock PC lights to this T5 fixture. Can I just plop it on and go from there?

How does my bulb combo sound?

Thanks

Bulb Combo's?

New lights added, Love it!

These shots are just with the actinics on, my point and shoot does not do any justice.

Very nice!

Thanks, I will probably be playing around with different bulb combos soon. I also plan on putting my actinic LED's back on somehow.

Very nice tank man! I also have a rsm but to lazy to start a thread! On the SLR trust me it's worth it, the pics are awesome. I love t5s, I also upgraded from stock to current USA sundial t5 to now ATI pm lightfixture.

Thanks Reefman36,

I love the color's the T5 give, the stock lighting was doing me good things but was just to yellow. Which ATI fixture did you get, I searched but could not find it?

Thanks,

2" 6x24w ATI powermodule. I got them from reefgeek.com
Blub combo
front to back
blue plus
blue plus
auqablue special
blue plus
blue plus
Fiji purple
I'm also thinking about add some LEDs for moonlights.

wow those are nice, but pricey!!!

I am hoping my four bulb combo will continue to support what I have in my tank. But then again if the stock RSM lighting was doing the job I would imagine real T5's would too...

So far I absolutly love the color I am getting using the "real" T5's. I have adjusted the bulb combo a bit though.

I now am running 1 AquaBlue+, 1 Fiji Purple and 2 Actinic+

I will get to use a SLR for christmass this year so more nice pictures are coming.