ShaunMonahan

Just a thought, which leads to this question on your F2 breeding pair: Why breed a brother fish to sister fish? This leads to another question: What do these offspring look like from a father and mother that are brother and sister?

I smell a trade coming...

That's much better than what I was expecting! Thanks for clarifying, and I would use caution when you get that optic and test it on your corals.

Thanks for posting the PAR readings. Just to be clear, these readings where done dry, correct? Meaning these (measurements) were not taken below the water's surface... Thanks and great thread

Why not, share the love.

I saw something too but I did not understand it. I only saw that a few ad's where flagged.

Kim, IF I had a picture of your Clam, I am sure I could find a better, more suitable place to post it.

I smell drama brewing/starting...

Curious: Is/was there a noticeable difference in alga growth when you changed up to the LED's?

Steve, I appreciate your lengthy explanations to my questions, and I am sure your knowledge shared here will help some individuals interested in maintaining cold water tanks. I know that you only use your lighting briefly for cleaning, feeding and viewing your tank.... Have you done anything with LED's yet? I am curious, as they do not produce any UV and sounds like they may be a perfect option over your system.

Sure, The Benefits: * Raise pH * Precipitate PO4 (falls out of solution to be skimmed out) * Adds Ca * Polish water Ca(OH)2 is Calcium Hydroxide. Aka: lime, kalkwasser. This has a pH of 12 when mixed with RO/DI water, and by dripping this kalkwasser into your tank, you'll get the above stated benefits for your reef tank. I was wondering why not use this method for cold water reefs. The only problem I can see is lack of evaporation with the cold water systems. With our warm water/high light reef tanks, we have a lot of evaporation and we have to replenish with freshwater daily to keep salinity down. If all your make-up water is dripped into the tank/sump using the kalkwasser method you get the above benefits. This is the method we all used before Calcium reactors and (2) part dosing to replenish Ca. Raising you tanks pH to 8.3-8.4 with Ca rich water will cause your corals to calcify at a much higher rate - they will grow faster. If you throw in the added benefit of phosphate removal (phosphate blocks calcification), your are going to maximize your stony coral growth.

I figured :( Man, your avatar is really disturbing. What's with that?

Steve, Have you ever dripped Ca(OH)2+H2O to offset your CO2? I would think this would have several benefits: Raise pH Precipitate PO4 Add Ca Polish water Also, what is the Alk/dKH? And does this also have issues being maintained due to lack of natural buffers? Lastly, why not use aragonite under you pebbles and create a DSB with an anoxic layer to dissolve the aragonte to buffer the sea water? Thanks Steve, and nice to hear from you.

If Lowman backs out of RBTA, I'm all over it!

Nicely done!

AE, what does the pH of your tank run without having a natural buffer like CaCO3 or photosynthesis?

We did find them under the sea weed. Man, those rocks are INSANELY HEAVY! I was only able to turn over a few smaller rocks. These must be solid granite.

I was just there for spring break during last months lowest tide. This is a very unique place and collecting their should be really good. I thought I would share a few... I had some help finding some: anemones, a few shrimp, a cucumber, pink coraline algae, various other alga, brittle stars, an orange sun star and many types of copepods and other small shrimp-like crustaceans in the exposed tide pools. This place should be ripe for the pick'ins, and it's where I would go if I was looking to collect my own cold water specimens.

Kim- Your Clam is HOT!

grassi and reefnjunkie Those are SICK! Here's an oddball...

Is the price $50 for the all described here?

This is not the first product to do this. I cannot recall the name of another, maybe "NitroMax" in 02-03'ish... It worked very similar and you would add fish instantly upon having the proper temp and salinity. Either way, I am a fan of the science, the product and the results. A very good share here - Thanks cellowithgills!

Some sweet deals here. If this was a glass tank, I'd be all over it. Duel 150 DE mh's for $50???