Does your spouse or partner share your love of aquariums?

Yes. But when I pay $80 for a coral she starts to have a cow man. But she actually likes my hobby and has bought coral before. Of course under my supervision.

Right up until I want to spend more money.

she called it an "unhealthy obsession." and I have to tell her my acan cost me $20.

yea...i do the same. I just alter the actual price of things.

LOL!!! At least I'm not the only one who changes the price.

yeah. i told her my recent prop tank set-up was thru a trade (so basically free) w/ cesar's "brother." I don't even know if he has a brother. haha.

I change the prices on my wife all the time. I just bought a return pump from Tigahboy for only $50, hahahaha.

Hahaha

it's funny how many reefers bend the truth w/ regards to prices. I keep hearing buyers tell me that they have to fib to their spouses about an acan purchase.

most recently a guy sold stock to buy some acans from me and some others. When I called to finalize details, he was acting kind of strange and never mentioned that he would pay me. He calls me 15 minutes later and says, "sorry, my wife was right next to me so I couldn't mention money or corals over the phone."

Mine will not touch or learn about the tank but i occasionally catch her sitting in front of it staring at a pod or something. Als she has started to tag along with me to the LFS to pick out corals. I always get the "This one is pretty can we get it". I fugure its basicly her tank and i just take care of it.

Alicia hated my fish tanks. I wonder if us splitting up was related to that?

i wouldn't be surprised if my gf broke up w/ me b/c of my reef tanks.

I thought you were gay ???.

i thought you were at least out of high school. I guess we both misjudged. =)

My wife bought me a Nano Cube for our anniversary and then got mad at me because it ran for several months before I even added rock and sand. Then she saw how much the rock cost. She just rolls her eyes and shakes her head and asks me not to talk about aquariums so much. She lieks the new 37 gallon I put together for our twins. 15 months old and already asking for shrooms. LOL. She like sthem but doesn't understand the cost or the obsession. Funny, she works ina Fisheries and Aquatics dept at a college.

I used to have to hide and or lie about the money amounts all the time. Not just with my tanks but with my car.

You have too because they want you to buy stuff for the kid(s) (even AFTER you already done so) or somthing else or themselves. I think most men go through it.

They don't think that without OUR reef's and other hobbiies we wouldint be able to deal with their ass. We NEED our outlets.

-Angel

I spend to much money on reefing to have a spouse lmao. When I had a girl friend, she got ####ed off that I bought a $80 Satalite Fixture from Current USA and I was unable to take her out to eat...ah well, I don't need her, I have my Nano-Reef

my girl utterly hates it... a trip to the LFS is like a trip to HELL or worse...

every so often she threatens to smash my tanks. i fear the day will come when she will really do it :*(

I voted "I don't have a spouse or partner" Before I saw the "No, and they left me" vote. One of you mods want to subtract and add for me?

Funny, the tanks get the chicks, but then they end up hating you for it. ???

My wife says she kinda likes it but when people come over to visit she brags about it, hehehe.

i'm pretty lucky...i've gotten my girl so addicted to reefing that she's actually in our local reefing club with me. she goes to the stores, points things out...even goes halves with me on certain corals(if not buying them for me flat out!). best girlfriend i've ever had! so far we have 4 tanks in my apt. and one in hers. i'm gonna be setting up a 55 soon though! sooooo excited!

Let me say that this is the best thread I've read in a while. Especially Tigah's excuse involving Cesar's potentially fictional brother.

My girlfriend initially wanted to buy me a fishtank for my birthday. She ended up balking on the idea and I did it myself, with her support. Then I started researching on Nano-Reef.com. Based on the threads here, I questioned everything I put into the tank. Naturally, I wanted to bounce my ideas off of her. I think this is probably what made her hate my fish tank.

To get her to go to the LFS, I had to bribe her in some form or another. On top of that, she picked out a starfish from the LFS and I named it after her. Of course, it died. The only thing in my tank to have died. But as time has gone on, and I have discussed the tank less with her, I think she has come to enjoy it as it has matured. Last week she picked out a Feather duster she liked and some small zooanthids.

It's just funny to hear that everyone is/has had roughly the same experience.

..I think my wife regrets the day she said, 'hey, why don't we get the kids an aquarium for the holidays?' Similarly to a post above, I think she does brag about it when company comes over tho'. Explaining the RO/DI unit purchase was (gulp) ..a tough one. But....I think she still loves me. As for the post above about 'Alicia leaving me for the tanks'...don't sweat the tanks man. It wasn't that. Just keep plugging. SH

If she only knew the cost. I would be getting the best deals in the universe!

my g/f hates the fact that i spend more time on nano-reef and more oney on my fish tank than her. her father makes fun of her for it, it's quite amusing. my excuse is,"but my fishtank doesn't give me an attitude."

My wife loves it. She spends hours at a time sitting in the dark with a flashlight...

My tank was the hook in college. It was in my room, and I would be like, "hey wanna see my reef tank?" My g/f doesn't fall for that one any more.

my girl friend dosnt like it ever since the clown bit her

I love it when my wifey does that! Once she told her sister the price of the live rock per pound (She added a few $$ to the original price)then they looked at me like if I was nuts! Her sister said she can get filet minion for cheaper than that per pound.
But what kills me is when she starts describing what I have in there to her friends and family like a pro. She really does listen to me!!

HAAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA

Dennis: It was a joke . How come you don't hang out in chat more often?

My girlfriend loves her saltwater tank. Too bad I cant lie to her cause she knows how much about every coral cost.haha She was the one who got me into saltwater(I hate her for that). She even gets mad when I rearrange things in her tank cause I dont like the way it looks.=P She's waiting for me to upgrade so she can jack my mh lights so she can keep sps corals.

I have to eBay all this stuff on the side to pay for my purchases so that I don't get hit with "what the hell did you buy for $120 from the LFS/Premium Aquatics/MarineDepot/MarineAndReef..." blah blah blah.. from the wife! X)

I voted I dont have a partner, but I sorta gave my mom my 33(because im too poor to fund it, and it gives me a place to put my corals till I get my prop/display tank set-up. Then I get to influence her decisions on what to get, lol. My mom loves to look at it. I do all the maitnance though, and get to put everything how I want it. I think 'Nemo'(Boso, the fish in my avatar) will be a major hook once I find a g/f. Lol. Dont worry I know hes a cinnamon clown not a perc/occelaris.

Chris

My wife pretty much lets me have free reign on anything.

As Grouch Marx said:

"A happy marrige will come from the man keeping his mouth shut and his pocketbook open."

I haven't figured out how to do either, but she is still happy. Let the good times roll!

It needs a "No, and they left me because of the aquariums" category. Actually, my husband doesn't care one way or another...he doesn't like them a lot, although he comments from time to time that the fw show tank looks good (after I've cleaned the glass and trimmed the plants:D ). He also doesn't ask how much $$ I've spent...don't think he wants to know!

My wife thinks I am absolutley crazy.

When I got 3 acro colonies valued at $200, but of course, I told her I spent $15 @ $5 each, she got really upset at me from spending too much.

My wife regularly informs me of my current LFS spending trends. Thank goodness I have her around. Imagine the disposable income if she weren't here!

I also have to ebay stuff to pay for my reef. I also build custom canopies and really anything i can to support my reef. As long as i deposit as much as i withdraw, My wife is cool with any purchases. She really likes the tank and is getting into how the biotope really works. It helps to have her on my side for a change!

my boyfriend David likes my hobby! i think.
he's the one that got me my tank, retrofitted my hood with 2x32 and put in a cold cathode ray tube moonlight for me.
i always bend the prices with him, I'm an obscene shopaholic and buying coral is like buying a really nice pair of shoes. He has his own 38 gallon cichlid tank and we mostly have parrots in there that are all named "baby".
He never thought a nano tank would be too much $$$...boy, did i prove him wrong!

I wouldn't say that my nano tank actually precipitated the end of my marriage. I would say, however, that my soon-to-be-former husband was mightily ####ed off when my 5.5g saltwater reef turned out to be way more interesting (not only to me and our kids, but to him, too!) than his 75g Lake Malawi cichlid tank

My husband just rolls his eyes when I get something new for the tank. But, when I ask him to look at it he groans and calls in the "Tank of Vile Horrors." The Pulsing Xenia really creeps him out. I think he's reads too much Lovecraft.

I dont think my wife is to thrilled about it too much anymore I actually told her that I will use about $1000 to get my 60 gallon tank running but I miss calculated and told her that it will be a bit more. Her expression? :| ??? :*( :x Not very excited. She blew a piston when I told her I bought acan from another reefer here so I guess I should'nt mention that lights itself are going to be about $650 :*(

My GF used to moan, but then I pointed out the fact that her 'make-up' bag and accessories cost about the same as my coral and fish purchases.

She won't help in any maintenance but she will occasionally go buy my live foods for them.

She definatley enjoys looking at the aquariums, but hates it when I shout her in to look at some microscopic critter or polyp thats spouted from knowhere!

But she Loves me!

my b/f likes my tank. when i left work to come back to uni i gave my desktop pico to him to have on his desk - haha he named the coral banded shrimp 'shrimp diggity' and all his housemates gather around to watch 'the feeding' lol

he even came with me to a local reefers house to pick up some frags and oohed and ahhed about her tanks too.. i think hes gonna get hooked one day soon..

i think he missus likes my tanks, i know she thinks i spend to much dough on them.

ive lerned to duck when she takes a swipe at me for lookin at my nano over her sholder when shes tryin to talk to me, he he but thats wedded bliss for you.

Dave

Jeez all this BS we as men have to go through to have a simply hobby. But really what hobby can men haves without the significant other *****ing about something or other. Maybe thats the reason divorce is so high in the US. If I had to do it all over again, I would never get married. Dating was so much more fun. I could do anything I wanted and still be happy. Now just like everyone else I am married and miserable and fight to have things that I took for granted for. I make 6 figures a year and the ball and chain *****es about a nano cube. Before marriage I had a 200 gal tank. I should have just married the tank.

Not just men have to hear the moaning...I hear it too. It took me almost 8 months to get my boyfriend to even look at the tank. Funny...the only thing he liked in it is A FREAKIN "BROWN" COLT CORAL! I have all sorts of rares and he likes THAT ugly thing! I cant get rid of it or he'll throw a fit. It took me a week to get him to accept the RO unit.