SeanF

Got a Nintendo Wii for my daughter for Christmas. We all know how that really works don't we. It is sweet both because of the interactive game play and the fact that you can download some of the old game system games. I have been playing the first Zelda game and Super Mario Bros. They are still working on getting the old games converted over but they have games from nintendo, super nintendo, nintendo 64, turbo graphix 16, sega genesis and maybe another one that I can't remember. The controllers on the thing are incredible. If you go bowling or play tennis and turn your wrist or anything like that and the controller picks up on it. Now if I could just find a second controller for the thing I would be in business.

In case you were asking me I grew up in Creswell off Camas Swale and graduated in 93. If you make it up by the shop I can do some water tests for you. Bring both your RO and tank water and please let me know before you come so I can make sure that my TDS meter is at the shop with all of the craziness here lately I don't know where anything is.

Your free time looks a lot like mine only with a different hobby: Our E-bay life It definately takes up some time.

Sea Crop has tank raised cuttlefish on a fairly regular basis but you may have to e-mail them to get them. They run a wholesale operation only and may be getting them from someone else but claim to be breeding them.

The power has always been that way down in Creswell when I was a kid power was out at our house in the middle of winter for a week. We ended up staying at the Motel there in town. I believe it is the power company down there. They are slower than all get out about fixing anything. They service most of the rural areas around here. For Hair algae you would need a fleet of Emeralds or Sallys. Sea Hares are ideal but sensitive and sometimes the problem that is causing the hair algae kills them. You said this was an established tank, do you know how long the tank was up and running for before you got it. I am guessing the previous owner probably got frustrated with it and wasn't maintaining it properly. What brand of salt are you using now? Personally here is how I would start to battle a hair algae problem in a well established tank. First get a good salt you trust the Tropic Marin is nice but expensive when you can find it personally for what I am going to recommend I would probably use a cheaper salt. The cheapest salt that I have heard good things about would be Oceanpure. You are going to need to do frequent large water changes. I would recommend running some sort of phosphate remover also. What type of filteration are you running on the aquarium? I would also recommend using some Macroalgae the more aggressive the better. I know it sounds weird but you want to grow as much algae as possible but also be able to remove it from the tank. Whatever is causing the algae will eventually be disappated to a point where the hair algae is no longer able to grow.

Might be alright as long as you live on different ends of town. I figure they stretched the power grid pretty good on your guys side of town when they put in all of that fancy development over there. Let me tell you I still can't believe all of the new stuff down there. I go away for a few years and the town doubles in size.

Hey Miles I have a UV you can borrow if you would like. I have to remember to bring the pump back over to the shop though. You would probably need to get some tubing to run into your tank.

I am more of a purist myself I don't even like hybridizing species but I still think that this is better than the good old time honored tradition of injecting fish with dye.

Don't forget the first rule of Reef Keeping. Keep the wife happy particularly when you are thinking about cutting big holes in the wall to put a tank in.

Don't forget to read the fine print also says ships in 4-6 WEEKS. Kinda slow I would guess. I would say reward the local guy that is fairly competitive and has gone through the trouble to actually stock the book instead of the guy that is going to order the book after he already has your money.

Here is the story of the HBH balance blocks in case anyone is curious. When they were originally brought to market they were made by Sea Lab but then as with many products now HBH sent them to China to have them made for themselves. Personally I have not had good results with the Balance Blocks but have had great success with the Sea Lab #28. I cannot vouch for other peoples aquariums but I know there are a lot of my customers and myself have had great success with the #28 blocks. I am not going to say that they are a better solution than a calcium reactor but for people that aren't willing to make the investment in setting up a calcium reactor they have worked. I even have been able to get a local tank maintainence guy to start using them in some of his tanks of people that were always forgetting to dose their aquariums. He had been skeptical of the product for over two years but continued to test our reef tanks and finally decided to try them in a couple of problematic aquariums and they have worked wonders.

I do not believe they are available as of yet. I know they are not available at any of the wholesalers that distribute to this area yet.

In case anyone is interested that dottyback is more commonly known as a Neon Dottyback

Karma sucks huh. I don't know what it is but the team lacks concentration the play calling sucks. Time to get a new coach I would say but who wants to come coach a team that wears those colors. You just gotta think that by everyones accounts this season you guys had lots of talent. Well if you have talent and can't win it has got to be the coach.

Well I lost power just before 9 and it came back on about 1am at the house. We got some nasty winds that took down a big tree up the road from me and of course it fell right on the power lines. The funny thing is that the shop that is practically falling down around me didn't loose power. Thank goodness one less thing to mess with.

Corals are remarkable in their ability to take low temps. It is the high temperatures that are a problem. I would say if your tank gets down as low as 65 your corals should be quite alright. The first time we went to LA one of the suppliers that we picked up stuff at and they packed it in boxes without styrofoam. The bag temperatures were around 45 degrees when we got back and there were some losses but nothing to bad. Something like 10% loss.

It is possible for just about anything you put in your tank to bring ick into the system. Since snails are wild caught they can be carrying parasites around with them. That is why we don't keep any fish in with our corals or invertebrates but unless the snail or coral has been in our system for about 30 days it can carry parasites with it.

I think most of the stores on this board probably have a flyer in their store telling people about this website. As far as pointing them toward major message boards it is pretty common sense why they don't do that, all of those sites have sponsors that often sell things cheaper than the store. Here is the big problem. People walk into stores knowing nothing and most stores are there to load them down with a bunch of things that they don't really need. I personally think that is foolish because as a store if you give someone a bunch of bad advice and then end up killing lots of things they give up and in the long run you don't make as much money. That being said people have to be responsible for their own actions. Before making a major jump into something they should do some research. I don't go into a store to buy a major electronic item without doing my research on the brands and I am not going to let some salesperson try to steer me toward the item that they have the most mark up on. Businesses are there to make money if you want good advice get it from someone who has no stake in the sale. Too much blame is being placed on people selling stuff when if you are spending the money you should dang well know what you are doing.

The seios are not oil filled and I am sure the new pumps won't be either. In fact don't quote me because I don't stock all of there other pumps yet but I think they did away with the oil in all of their pumps. I believe that is the difference that made them Rio + but like I said I am not positive about that.

That makes sense since pretty much everything Current makes is a piece of cheap junk. I guess that is the way of the world nowadays. Get something made as cheap as possible in China and then spend a bunch of money telling people how great it is.

My favorite part is fragging corals with a dremel. Nothing like saltwater covered hands operating an electric motor. Or better yet waiting 2 weeks to buy a new dremel because the electric shock you get everytime you touch the switch just isn't that bad yet. DOH!

I mean that is why you open a store isn't so that instead of adding that one or two cool new pieces to your aquarium you can add 96.(clap)

That is ok you can find all of the new hardware and I will have all the fun unpacking new corals. There is nothing better than getting in a new load of corals.

You have way to much time on your hands. You always know about all the cool new gadgets before I do.

Just wait for the New Rio Polarios to come out in January. They are basically supposed to be a tunze knock off much smaller than the current Seio pumps and fully controllable but not as expensive as the Tunze pumps. It is funny Tunze goes and makes some pumps that are much more economical to compete with the seios and then Rio creates a more upscale pump to compete against Tunzes higher end pumps. It is good for us stores because we can actually buy Rio stuff and make money on it.