Jack-the-reefer

Sure.

Equipment is just the tank, lighting, heater, filter. Anything that goes in the tank (livestock, rock, sand, etc.) isn't counted in the budget.

Here we go! The thing that got me back into this hobby 6 years ago was a contest very similar to this one. I didn't participate, but I loved following the builds and seeing what was possible in small tanks. The goal of this is to see how creative people can get with their builds. It's really fun to take something that was definitely not designed to be used as a reef tank, and figuring out how to make it work. I'm only going to put 2 strict rules on this: 1- Total volume must stay under 5 gallons. This is the total system volume. No, plumbing a .5 gallon cube into your established 10,000 gallon system doesn't count. 2- The budget is 100$ or less for the equipment. This is going to force you to get creative. You can use anything you already have on hand, or borrow from a friend who hoards supplies. - Other than that, everything is fair game. The budget applies to equipment only. If you want to keep a 1000$ trachy in your Cuisinart mixer reef, you win. If you want to play, all you need to do is make your first post by next Saturday (3/17). Your first post simply needs to be an equipment list, along with pictures and a cost breakdown. After that, you'll just have to post a tank update, with a full tank shot, every two weeks. So, posts are due by 5pm on 3/17, 3/31, 4/14, 4/28, 5/12, and 5/26. If you miss any of these, you'll be publicly shamed, and removed from the contest. The final posts will be due on June 2 at 5pm. I'll post the final pictures and throw it out there for the community to vote on. I want to start by giving a huge thank you to Saltwater Harmony (Holly), and Cuttle Fish and Corals (Jeff), who have paired up to donate a pico appropriate prize for the winner. The winner will get a pre-quarantined yasha goby and pistol shrimp pair. Finally, I'm going to be playing along, but I want everyone to know that I'm not going to be in the running for the actual contest. Weird pico tanks are kind of my jam and I really just want to help everybody else see how much fun these can be. If you have any questions or need advice, don't hesitate to pm me. Also, this is my first attempt at running a contest, so go easy on me.

Players: 1- Bubbles (out) 2- Oregonic (out) 3- Flash21 4- Jack-the-reefer (quitter) 5- Kingfisher (out) 6- Rdavis (out) 7- Gil&fin

Everything spoken for.

Still have the mg kit up for grabs. Who needs it?

. Done. Pm me and let me know when you want to come get it.

Sea swirl pending.

Give me a few minutes.

I just found this stuff from my old tank that I'm probably never going to use. There's a 1/2" sea swirl, a coralife turbo twist uv sterilizer (could probably use a new bulb), and a salifert mg test kit that I only used a few times. Everything works, and it's all free. If you want any of it, let me know. I live in downtown Vancouver.

Cool. I'm going to see Jase this weekend anyway. I'll let you know after that.

Thanks! That's almost too convenient.

Thanks!

Ha! I was waiting for that. This is for a different project. I'm already planning my next 2 tanks.

Does anyone have a partial bag of black sand left over? I need just enough for an 8" cube and I don't want to buy a bag and only use a handful.

I'll start an official thread at the end of the week. Then we'll get it rolling. Is everybody happy just doing this for fun and bragging rights? Does anyone want to do a buy in to sign up, then prizes for the winners?

Just for a little inspiration. This is a 1.5 gallon vase with only a heater and airstone for water movement. Google maritza reef vase if you want to read more on it.

I think I'm going to keep it under 5. I want to see how creative people can get. I'm going to make an official thread at the end of the week. It looks like we have enough people that are interested.

I'm going to say definitely no on the store bought. And probably under 5 gallons total volume. It's too easy to just plumb it into a bigger tank.

Your clownfish might have a very short future. Just mentally prepare for him to disappear on you one day.

It's not eating frozen, but it it awesome. I would have brought it home with me today if I want afraid it would eat my wrasse.

You just have to use tiny pieces and glue them together. Like building a ship in a bottle.

Looks like we have 5-6 people interested. I'll leave this up through the week to make sure everyone has a chance to see it. I'll look through old threads and find out the rules and ideas that seemed to work the best too.

This was my little sea monster.

I had a wart skinned frog fish and it was the coolest thing I've ever kept in a tank. I would love to get another one at some point. Mine was doing great, but unfortunately got stressed out during a move and never recovered. I did a ton of research before buying one. Here's what I did. - If you order from a local store, arrange to pick it up right when it comes in. They stress easily, so making them acclimate to conditions in the store, then transferring again and acclimating to your tank at home is hard on them. - NEVER let them be exposed to air. If they swallow air, they're pretty much doomed. - They will probably only accept live food in the beginning. Some will learn to take frozen food if you have a little patience. Some are stubborn and will never take anything but live food. Either way, be prepared ahead of time. When you first get one, it might not be interested in eating for several days. - Training mine to eat frozen was easy enough, although it took 6 weeks or so to get him onto only frozen food. I bought ghost shrimp from petsmart a month ahead of buying the fish. They have basically no nutritional value, so I loaded them up with good quality food. The shrimp die pretty quickly in salt water, but if I held them by the tail with long tongs, the fish would be attracted to their movement and snatch them up. - Everything I read told me the best all around frozen food was pieces of tilapia filets. I started by holding a sliver of tilapia asking with the shrimp, and he would gulp down everything at once. Eventually, he learned to associate the tongs with food. I think he would have eaten a rock if I held it in those tongs and waved it in front of him. - Once you have them eating frozen, the hard part is over. They will actually eat themselves to death if you let them. They only need to eat something a little bigger than their eye once every 3-4 days. - Anything that can fit in their mouth, will become dinner. - They're color will change in your tank. They change color to match their environment.