Monthly Archives: August 2010

chingchai’s tank.

Yerp I’ve been going a little aquarium crazy lately and I’m spending a couple of hours a day reading through tank journals. If I had a tank as amazing as this I doubt I’d ever watch TV again. High res version here.

In preparation for the LED units I’ve ordered I set out to build a simple light stand to hang them on. I spent 2 hours in Bunnings last weekend (I heart Bunnings). I could have simply gone for 3 brackets to bolt into the wall or a connect-it style rack which would stand on top of the tank but instead I’ve tried to create something a little more minimalist.

The materials.

The stand (the current light on top of the tank will piss off and I’m hoping the hanging lights will look a lot cleaner).

Detail of how the light stand connects to the tank stand.

I used a simple “L” bracket to join the square tubing.

I also replaced the door knobs.

It’s pretty sturdy thanks to the thickness of the tubing. It’ll have to hold about 15kg and should do so no worries. I’ve always hated the tank stand and I’ll have to look into stripping it one day and making new minimalist doors for it.

Alan – cat perch.

Carmen & Mia.

Alan and Carmen came around on Sunday to talk aquariums (they’re setting up a 6ft marine!) but we ended up playing with Mia and eating ice cream instead (haha).

Poor Peppa had a cyst removed from her shoulder. Jess had the entire process on film too (nasty!).

Expensive taste at such an early age.

We’ve got so many cat toys for Mia but she refuses to play with any of them! Instead she goes absolutely ape over this pink Jimmy Choo bag (which her toys came in funnily enough!). She’ll chase it, slide on it, tackle it, jump in it and attack it (kangaroo kicks!). Her other fave toys include a fat rubber band and a zip tie!

Jarod and Sanja have requested more Mia photos! We’re more than happy to provide!

OMG look at your face. You’re such a pretty girl!

When Mia’s out (quite often) she’s completely out. She’s so floppy you can pretty much do anything you like with her and she won’t wake up!

Little Mia paw.

She’s such a good lap cat and still doesn’t like being on her own.

Out again, feet up this time!

Prodibio Bio Clean kit.

As mentioned in yesterday’s fishy post, technology in the aquarium hobby is constantly progressing and one of the products everyone has been raving on about for the past few years is Prodibio.

Prodibio is a French company which combines science with aquaculture and biotechnology. Their kits contain these funky glass ampoules containing various live bacteria packed in nitrogen (air tight = no shelf life). You literally have to break the glass tips to get the stuff into your tank.

I’ve gone for the kit that’ll bring my nitrates down. Fingers crossed, hope it works.

Since buying some new fish a few weeks ago (and realising the quality of my tank water was way off whack) I’ve been busy working on getting the tank back into shape and in doing so I’ve very much gotten back into the hobby. My obsessive compulsive nature has taken off and I’m finding myself haunting reef related web sites and forums on the iPhone, the iPad, the PowerBook and my PC. I’ve even got a book on Marine Invertebrates sitting beside my bed now for bed time reading!

The marine aquarium hobby evolves pretty quickly and a lot of things have changed since 2007. There’s a lot of technology advancements. LED light units are taking off, they’re just as strong (for coral growth) as metal halide lighting but they use much less power, generate much less heat and last 5 times as long (where you had to change bulbs every 60-12 months you now only have to change bulbs every 5 years!). Biotechnology has stepped up and a lot of people are dosing their tanks with all sorts of advanced products (using very advanced dosing gear too) and perhaps most importantly quite a few myths and must do’s and must not do’s have been debunked.

I’m going to dedicate this post to some of the amazing tanks I’ve stumbled upon in the past 2 weeks of browsing:

C.P.Farm Japan. If you know me you’ll know I love everything Japanese. Cars, bikes, food, culture… you name it. What I didn’t know though was that they’ve been way ahead in the reef game for years too. This tank pictured above is 10 years old (!!!!!!). Back then keeping marine fish was a challenge let alone corals. As usual the Japanese have done things in their own style and a lot of their tanks are braceless/rimless (meaning there are no glass lids/braces on top) and they like to use various spot lights to highlight different corals in different colours. More amazing Japanese tanks (all very old) can be viewed here and here (leep a look out for the lighting set-ups and the gear under these tanks, amazing stuff).

invincible569’s tank. This guy was perhaps one of the first guys on the Reef Central forums to do a rimless tank right. His minimalist aquascaping and clean style has inspired many reefers (myself included).

Kyle Verry’s tank has a rock structure going way out of the tank allowing crabs to breach the water and climb up the rock. Mangroves reduce the nitrates, it’s all very much literally out of the box style and thinking.

ChingChai is a guy in Thailand who’s gone all out with this HUGE tank. His tank diary can be found here.

Marcello’s “nano” tank is an amazing 25 litres small. I’ve been thinking about setting up a tiny nano tank, but supported under it’s stand by a huge tank (more volume = more stable) for a few years now but seeing something as amazing as Marcello’s tank just makes me want to give up before I even try. More of his tank here.

Nice bommie! As pretty as some of the above tanks are, nothing beats the real thing.

Even if you’re not a fish keeper I hope you’ve enjoyed the post. FYI I’m currently looking at an LED lighting system and a new VorTech wavemaker system which has an electronic controller to emulate different currents found in reefs. I’m also going to start dosing my tank with prodibio too. More updates to come.