Reefer Madness

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.