KenH

That's an interesting looking specimen. I attached a pic of what a typical ORA Bird of Paradise looks like. In my experience, the best colors seem to come out under fairly low light with emerald green body and purple polyps with the colors weakening under strong lighting. I have never seen them morph to a solid green, but you never know with corals. Branches also look a little too blunt to me. Looks a bit like a Stylo, but since the polyps appear to be arranged more or less in rows, it is probably a Birdsnest of some type. On the topic of favorite Birdsnest, this bi-color colony was pretty cool looking.

The mucus net that they cast out to feed can irritate or harm corals. It is generally best to remove them if they are around corals.

Glad you like them!

I also had the same experience with using Kent while dosing causing some excessive precipitation issues on pumps and the glass. Any of the salts like Kent or Red Sea Pro that mix to elevated levels can aggravate chemistry imbalance issues when dosing. Holly is spot on when she said that it is generally best to use a salt that mixes closer to NSW levels like Fritz or the standard Red Sea (not the Pro) when dosing. I personally would not worry about trying to elevate your alk much above 8. It used to be popular to run up in the 10-12 dKH range, but if you look at most of the TOTM winners, the majority run their alk close to NSW levels. In my own systems, I experimented with running alk at different ranges. Color and vitality of the coral always seemed best if I kept things at around 8 with 9 being the upper limit. With higher alk, corals become more photosensitive and if nutrients run low and you have strong lighting you can sunburn your corals. Here is a pretty interesting link where someone compiled the data from over 100 TOTM winners. TOTM Data

Certainly as a coral garden grows, the demands it places on alkalinity and pretty much everything else grows in a more or less exponential fashion, but the question at hand I believe is looking at the more immediate consumption rate based on the alkalinity level that the tank is run at. Scenario A - A tank is run at 8 dKH and you have to add X amount of alkalinity supplement to maintain that level for 24 hours Scenario B - The same tank is instead run at 10 dKH and you have to add Y amount of the same alkalinity supplement to maintain that level for 24 hours. Does X = Y or is X < Y because the demand is higher with the higher alkalinity level because of increased calcification or other biological processes? IMO there is probably a slight difference, but it is within the source of error created by the dosing and measurement methods.

In theory, higher alkalinity levels increase the rate of calcification in corals but I think the effect would be fairly modest from the standpoint of calculating dosing rates. So as you stated, within the alkalinity range that is considered healthy for corals it is probably a slight curve but flat enough to assume it is linear.

Thanks to everyone that was able to come out today! I know the unfortunate timing of the website being down made it difficult for some of you to find us, but hopefully those that did feel like they got some great deals and we got closer to our goal of getting the tanks emptied I do want to give a special thanks to Holly who I was told was instrumental in getting our address out to a number of people at the last minute and that really helped to save our bacon. Not to mention the fact that you gotta love a woman that can roll-up her sleeves and bag her own coral when you're swamped. Also thanks to my friend Tom, who took the brunt of the tagging and bagging workload. For those who are picking up fish, the plan is to drain the tanks down next Sunday morning (7/16) and have the fish ready for pickup starting around 2PM. --- Ken

I had a fairly large WYSIWYG website that was taken out by a viral attack last week, so no list.

The address for the garage sale is 13080 SW 107th Ct. Tigard OR 97223. Sale starts at NOON. There isn't a set ending time, but it will go until at least 5 PM. A quick update on the sale. The basic coral holding system which includes the tanks, stands, sumps, lights currently over the tanks and skimmers have been sold as a complete system. Also, most of the fish have been spoken for, but there is still going to be lots of good stuff available on Saturday. Frags as low as $5 and low prices on about 50 Bali maricultured Acro colonies. There is also a great selection of live rock that is fully cured and ready to drop directly into tanks if you want to add rock to an existing setup or are setting up a new system. Bring something to haul rock in if you can, though we have some buckets available. The goal is to empty the tanks of coral and rock as much as possible on Saturday so expect great prices. Over 35 new or slightly used full spectrum LED lights from 19W PAR lights to 180W setups. I also have a couple of small 35W grow light cans that work great for algae scrubbers and some people use them over refugiums. Lots of PAR light components like clamps, goose necks and sockets. I have 3W Epistar LEDs available for any DIY'ers out there. 2 killer calcium reactor setups for larger tanks. Can sell as complete setups or part out. Par meter, wave makers, Hydor Magnum power heads, books, dosing chemicals, coral glue, etc. etc. Junk boxes of free stuff including lots of PVC parts, tubing, etc if you can make sure of them. There are also some acrylic light mounting components and SS rods that are too nice to throw out and may inspire a project idea or two. A few more pics attached to wet you appetite.

Those tanks Jeff got had flamed polished rounded corners and were brand new. I had bought those to expand my setup and never got around to doing the expansion. These larger tanks are straight cut and have some use on them. Nice tanks, but have the typical acrylic scratches. If using as a display tank, some buffing would be needed. New cost was around $900 each.

The tanks were custom built by Advanced Acrylics out of CA and have about 3 years use on them.

I am located in Tigard

As some of you know, I have operated an internet business out of my garage for the last couple of years selling LED reef lights and live coral. That business has been closed and now it is time to reclaim the garage which means the stuff in the garage needs to find a new home. I am having a final liquidation garage sale July 8th starting at NOON. Everything will be priced to move so that I can shutdown the systems. I am located at 13080 SW 107th Ct, Tigard OR 97223. Coral - I have a fair amount of coral left. Mostly SPS frags and Bali maricultured colonies, LPS frags and some soft corals as well. There are also some misc items like Gorgonians, Urchins, Sea Cucumbers, etc as well. Priced to find new homes so that I can shutdown the systems. Some stuff will be free to good homes like my pet rock (boulder) montipora with his Sea Urchin BFF. The urchin was originally just a hitchhiking spec on the montipora. They have been together for years and the urchin is now more than just a spec and the rock is more of a boulder but it has always stayed with the montipora, so would like to see them find a home together. The montipora is also loaded with brittlestars and misc worms. Live Rock - Approximately 400lbs of good quality live rock. There are lots of larger pieces with some smaller pieces as well. Some has coralline algae, some has mushrooms, polyps, xenia or other corals growing on them. $2/lb. Fish - I have around 50 fish including Yellow, Scopas, Kole and Purple Tangs, Chromis, Bangaii Cardinals, Foxface, Christmas wrasse, etc. All very healthy. They can't be caught until the tanks are drained, so if you are interested in some of the fish, we'll need to schedule a time to catch and pick them up. Selling cheap at around wholesale prices to get them into new homes, so yellow tangs for $10 as an example. Equipment - Lots of equipment and misc items. Some of the equipment is in operation until the tanks can be completely shutdown and will be available for pickup by the following weekend. LED lights, both new and used. Mostly 120W LED but also some PAR38 19W LED, 90W LED and 180W LED. New full spectrum 120W LED will go for $125 which is cheap. Also have a 400W 20K MH with setup with electronic ballast and a jumbo hood designed to illuminate a large area. There are also some misc odd-ball large T5 fixtures which I am happy to give to anyone that might be able to use them. 2 complete large calcium reactor setups which are Geo's Reef CR818 setups customized to fit under a 21" stand. Rated for up to 400-600g, I was using them on heavily loaded 300g setups. Includes main reactor, 2nd stage CO2 scrubber, 10lb aluminum CO2 tank, Carbon Doser electronic regulator, PinPoin pH Controller, feed pump, etc. Only about a year old. Pic shows one of the setups when first installed. Cost $1600, asking $800 OBO. Lots of misc stuff like Eheim pumps, SRO-5000SSS INT skimmer, Maxspec Gyre, heaters, wavemakers, chemicals, black eggcrate material, GFO/Carbon reactors, 150gpd RO/DI, Reef T-Shirts, Sea Monkey Incubator...you name it, I probably have it. Tanks - There are four holding tanks that are 48" x 48" x 12" x 3/4" acrylic. They have overflows with two 1.5" bulkheads but are otherwise undrilled. Two sumps that are 48" x 18" x 16" and two 40g breeder tank refugiums that have been drilled on both sides for pumping water through them. I had 2 tanks connected to each of the sumps and refugiums. Great for larger scale frag tanks or something like a look-down tidepool tank or perhaps a stingray tank. There is a possible offer outstanding on some of the these, but accepting backup offers and these REALLY need to find a new home. Some pics below to give a feel for some of the stuff available.

Completely harmless filter feeder fan worms. Since you are not running a skimmer, there is more stuff floating in the water for them to eat than in a heavily skimmed tank. I saw a similar proliferation of these in an unskimmed prop tank I had running for awhile. Indicates that the water is 'dirty' enough to support them with floating foods, but not that the water quality is necessarily bad. They probably grow mostly in low light areas because they are non-photosynthetic so don't need the light and there is less competition in those areas. They also seem to prefer lower water flow and lower light areas tend to have less water flow.

Too low of nutrients can absolutely cause color loss. It generally takes a week or two before it becomes noticeable. Taking the GFO off-line is probably a good idea as is feeding your fish a little heavier for awhile. There is also a correlation between nutrient levels and maximum lighting levels for the corals. With higher nutrients, you can run higher intensity on the lighting. If your nutrients have dropped, it may be beneficial to also lower the light intensity for awhile if your lighting is adjustable.