SuncrestReef

On the rare occasions when I need to use my Neptune autofeeder, much of the food ends up floating into the overflow and just gets caught in the filter socks. I'd like to modify my feeder to add a feeding ring like this, but the vendor that makes it says they're out of stock and no ETA for building more. Does anyone know where to get something similar to this?

Wow, huge improvement of waste water! Nice work. 👍

My shrimp molts about every 16 days, and the whole exoskeleton including antennae come off in one piece. I guess I could try an experiment next time he molts by clipping the discarded antennae to the tang's seaweed clip to see if he eats them. But then again, that may increase his appetite and go after the real thing even more. 😬

Trivia fact: Did you know that Spuds MacKenzie, while marketed as a male, was actually a female dog? See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spuds_MacKenzie

You just need a series of frag tanks...Your introductory 8.0 dKH tank for new frags, then a few weeks later move them to your 8.5 tank, then 9.0 tank, etc. Eventually they end up in your 11 dKH tank. Can you imagine all the dosing pumps or calcium reactors you'd need to monitor and maintain for this??? Alternatively, you just have 1 frag tank that starts at 8.0 dKH. Then you buy a pallet of new frags all at once (perhaps from @viper55's new shop) and put them in the frag tank. Over the next couple months you slowly increase alkalinity to 11.0, then BOOM....new frags ready for your display tank! 🤣

Honestly, I think that would work. 🤣

My pavona was sitting on a rock for a month or so, until a turbo snail knocked it over onto the sand. The pavona left behind remnants on the rock that are now growing into a new colony, so I can attest to how easily it reproduces.

It looks pretty similar to mine, though it depends on the lighting. Mine sort of looks teal blue/green, but it's one of the most difficult to photograph accurately. This was also my very first coral, and I bought it at Cuttlefish & Corals. Here's a crappy iPhone photo:

Nice photos!

Nice! Looks great. Are you doing anything fancy in the sump and cabinet, or just going old school?

The hydroids in my tank went away on their own after a couple of months. I'm not sure why. It was during a time my tank was going through different phases with green hair algae, wire algae, and bubble algae. I could see my cleanup crew working on the various algaes, but they never touched the hydroids. I now have several long digitate hydroids that only come out at night.

And this is Bryopsis:

Here are some macro photos of hydroids. Is this what you're seeing in your tank?

Hard to tell from the photo, but it might be hydroids.

Great write-up as always, Bert! It was definitely a fun and informative meeting. Here are some of the photos I shot. I actually didn't shoot too many corals, but instead singled out a few and took many shots with different settings to compare them and hone my technique. I posted these previously in the meeting announcement thread, but here they are again for those who missed them:

I own a Reefer XL 425. While I really like it, there are some features on the Waterbox Reef product line that I would like to have: Leveling feet on the cabinet Gate valve on the overflow Dual nozzles on the return line The 70.3 is in their Marine product line, so not sure if it has these same features as the Reef line.

@Mandinga Thanks for the frags. The miyagi torts are looking good under my lights! I can't wait for them to grow out like your larger colony. You all should take a look; Isaac's got a nice collection to pick from. The Oregon mummy eye looks amazing.

The tang gets plenty of food. In fact, while I recorded the video there was a piece of nori on the other side of the tank. He goes back and forth between eating the nori and then pecking at the shrimp. It's like some sort of game for him.

My kole tang spends half his day nipping at my cleaner shrimp's antennae. The shrimp seems to be a good sport about it, but I can't imaging he likes it. It'm not sure why he keeps doing this. 🤷‍♂️ Anyone else having this issue?

This got weird really fast. 😳🤣 Happy birthday.

pm sent.

I just learned my tank has been featured on R2R's Reef Tank 365! https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/reef-tank-365-featuring-suncrestreefs-rsr-425xl.578550/#post-5894725 Not sure I can handle the new found fame. 🤣

@MrBret Here are some of the macro photos I shot in your tanks after the photography session:

Congrats! Looks great. (both the kitchen and new tank)

Any reason you're adding a separate Apex rather than just extending modules to the new frag tank? Just curious.