I second Jamie.

check out craigslist, theres always people selling lr for cheap
ive found it as low as $1/lb around me
or go to local boards and find people who are getting out of the hobby as they always have lr to get rid of

oh and congrats on the tank

if you do want live rock, Reef jungle sells thier Live rock for $4 per pound.

What's over at Ann Rd. and Torrey Pines?

It's the thought that counts? haha

In all seriousness: octopus tank? super cheap and awesome to observe. check out tonmo (i'm sure you've already done so at some point, but just in case)

EDIT

Or just make it a project. Piece by piece. My nano of 8 months is still constantly getting upgrades all the time as money comes in. It's a beautiful tank so definitely keep it.

I could be wrong, but it seems to me that all you need is new lights. You can use the k3 and the palario. Once the tank is lit and you have some flow, you can transfer the contents of your other tank and add on slowly. Yes it would look pretty empty in the beginning but you can add dead rock and sand over time to avoid a cycle.

aren't octopus escape artists? plus you can't keep anything else in the tank

You people ?

Gift horse in the mouth if you ask me !

I have a 120 just like that - non-drilled. The biggest problem is it takes 3 people to lift it comfortably.
It would not cost 3 grand to get that thing set up, maybe less than a grand. You do not need 120 pounds of live rock. Get base rock and seed it with live rock. Get whatever you can afford. Add more rock when more money is available. The tank is 2 feet deep, 2 250watt halides will be cheaper than any descent t5 or t5 retros. Get a cpr aquafuge with skimmer or just slap an aquac remora (no fuge) and call it a day. Add couple of koralias on each side for circulation.

Shop around for used stuff. Looks like people here want to help stock that tank. Don't worry about the livestock just get the rock, add water and run that thing already.

I thought you were a girl?

One more thing to add. The tank might have a very wide center brace like mine so halides would make more sense.

Thats the other cesar, cesar777 or something lol.

there's an empty lot with a couple of big piles of rocks. i used these in my tanks and the rock looks just like marco rock or the stuff that john sells at reefcleaners. some of it is cherry, others is not, but hey, its free.

Oh I thought you were talking about some LFS I didn't know about. lol

Are the rocks safe to use?

after a few years of it, i still don't have any problems with my tanks. feel free to contact me if you wanted to look at y setups. always happy to met another vegas reefer.

I'm sure there is a local reef club, but they're all morans, or so I imagine.

The ginger and I give each other random gifts all the time. Both of us show affection through gifting, lol.


If me being a mod requires me to lead by example I should set this tank up as simply and cheaply as possible, and show that sexy reef tanks come from hard work and maintenance, not from fancy equipment.

And yes, I'll def take some frags some day.


whoa. I'm gunna drive over tomorrow and check it out. less than a mile away!

i'll get you the exact corner on thursday when im out cleaning pools in that area again.

Interesting. Now I'm curious to see what these rocks look like.


There is. It's lame and they're a weird bunch. They also seem to share this common hatred for Nano-Reef for some weird reason hence why there's not a whole lot of them on here.

lol, lfs people seem the same way. strange.

well the offer stands and to you to Jer.i live in green valley though. im trying to find some new batteries so i ca take a pic of the rocks.

and that explains why i cant make any friends on the local site. i'm always pimpin' NR and i let it known for my hatred fo RC. some of them are cool, but agreed on a weird bunch.

here's some bad pics
i didn't clean the glass either




it still better in person

I didn't get a flower.

kidding aside, that is a very nice tank. your guy must love you a lot, is it not what you wanted? why would you divorce him? do you have any kids?

Maybe I'm reading too much into this relationship, but I get the feeling that 1) on some level, you're not all that into him and 2) he senses this and is buying you expensive gifts to compensate.

^ that was your first problem, lol.


or maybe we are so madly in love that we are willing to do whatever it takes to make each other's dreams come true.

stop being so pessimistic.

yeah, but the largesse of the gift tells me that someone is trying to create an illusion of being madly in love where none really exists. It's just how I think.

lol

compensating?

tasha, stop projecting your own possibly faltering relationship on me, thx.


also, the last gift I got him cost almost twice as much as the tank he got me. if we're both compensating, do the illusions cancel each other out and leave us with real love?

i think you're compensating for something else.

lol, that's definitely not the problem, for either of us.

I think if he were compensating for something else he would've bought a nice used C5 Corvette for the price he just paid for his Mazdaspeed3.

well played, ginger. well played.

funny you say that - I had a guy in a C5 try and race me at a light last night. revved his engine, gave me that goofy "I'mma getcha' grin, one hand on top of the wheel and the other hanging out the window. classic. so I revved my engine (lol) and he thought it was a go. light turned green and he zoomed off, I just sat there.

lol, moron.

My reef club is way more RC based, weird since i found them through this site. the first few months I only mentioned it once.


sending you a frag would be a great excuse to my friends when I go to vegas why I cant snort a lot of blow. 'No i have this frag at this big gay guys place that i have to check on.'

lol?




in related news, I am the proud owner of about a hundred pounds of rock from an empty lot. it'll be a good base to stack better quality dry rock on.


also, 8x65w PCs, an eshopps 1000gph overflow and a rio pump for the return - $520. lol.

I seen a koralia 3 on CL for $20.. maybe they'll ship. Can PM ya the link if interested

you sure the rock doesn't have some chemical that's going to crash your tank and make you impotent?

it's just limestone, lol. I'll scrub and soak it, don't worry.

forgive me if this has already been mentioned - what about building a base out of PVC pipe supports rather than using rock the whole way up from the bottom?

So there are rocks out in Ann Road and Torrey Pines?

Replacement lamps are gonna be a beotch in about a year. PCs aren't cheap. Half of mine need replaced as I type.

@fab: we had to look, but they're there. it's just caliche, I imagine any vacant lot would have it.

@skillz: the ginger has already agreed to replace the bulbs when the time is right. lol.

Nice. Nothing wrong with PCs besides replacement frequency and costs. Most of my tanks have them. So if the replacement is covered, I'd have gone for it too.

yeah, it was a sweet deal - two coralife units, each 4x65w, for $340.

Guess you don't need my lights or the K4's I was going to offer you. Oh glad you found what you needed.

Don't let your ginger get hooked on reefing its not good when your both into the hobby. You end up having very little extra dispossable income.

K4s you say...

sorry i didn't have the time to get the exact street today. i'll be in the area tomorrow fab. there are two huge piles of the rocks (size of a house) unless it was hauled off already. i thiking about going back and getting a few hundred pounds worth, just to have......or landscaping.

sowwy, it was an impulse buy - and the ginger's money. and yeah, he's an engineer; I have a feeling after the plumbing is done he'll take very little interest in the tank save enjoying the view from the kitchen.


yeah, no big piles that I saw, just randomly scattered chunks and boulders. I need more though, so if you do find that mysterious pile, let me know.

so how should I stock my tank?

3x pajama cardinals
1x tang (or lamarck's angel?)
1x halichoeres sp.
1x pseudocheilinus sp.
2x clowns (pink skunks? clarkiis?)
1x dragonet
1x centropyge (eiblii? potteri?)
1x jawfish

how many fish can I put in this tank anyway? lol


also, I've had great luck with the coralife super skimmers in the past, so I ordered the 220 size and a couple buckets of IO from marine depot today. all I need is the 40g tank for the sump, acrylic and silicone for baffles, PVC for plumbing, and paint for the back of the tank and we're in business!