200-g diet

[Dins]

Hello everyone.

This thread is dedicated to my build project, 200-gallon reef.

Actually, this project started last autumn, 2007, when I was desperately going on and off from diet, trying to lose some 20 kilos that I got from my delivering my adorable son (two years old now, btw). My hubby promised me, that if I succeed in it, I may start building my reef aquarium. And now, I am "only" 5 kilos from my goal. :rollface:

Now the pace has been extremely slow, but I am getting there, I sure am!

At this point I finally bought the aquarium!

It is 200-gallon beauty, with custom built stand and cabinet. Front and side panels are low-iron glass. I went to see it three weeks ago, and I fell in love instantly. Cabinets were of very good quality and the aquarium was just as good as new, although it has been in use for two years. We will get it "home" in maybe a month.

Click here to see the tank!!

Of course, my dieting is now going better than ever before, because I have now decided, that I may purchase all equipment and other stuff ready, but I MAY NOT fill the tank before I hit my target weight!

So, what have I bought this far?

-Tunze stream 6000 2pcs
-Tunze wavebox
-Tunze multicontroller (+controller for the wavebox)
-Tunze Moonlight
-Aquarium, stand, cabinets
-Sump, some PVC pipes and ready-made durso
-IKS aquastar computer, with Ph- , temperature-, and conductivity meters and a 4-channel dosing pump
-Deltec pump
-RO-equipment
-warmer

Above all these I have bought 5 thick books, full of information I have read them every evening, and the picture is becoming clearer all the time. I am so happy that I did not rush into this, but stopped to think! There have been so many changes in my plans along the way, that I would have been so hard to change things later on! I am still planning to buy atleast two more, because I have had people recommending me to buy those two..

After all, I am FULL on excitement and anticipation to start this thing! THere have been times, when I felt, that I was too stupid to do this, because sometimes the information can be so overwhelming and cross-referenced that it is hard to make anything out of it. But we'll see -maybe I get there!! (please help me on the way!)

 

[Mikeeal]

Boy that is a nice lookin tank. Good luck with your build!

 

[adammreef]

<a href="http://s137.photobucket.com/albums/q210/xmotocross447x/?action=view&current=welcome.gif" target="_blank"><img src="http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q210/xmotocross447x/welcome.gif" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>
TO REEFCENTRAL

DINS


good luck with your build

 

[Dins]

Mikeeal, isnt is really! I am already SO proud of it

It is going to be so beautiful, a true center piece in our livingroom! I already changed the arrangement of the furnitures completely, in a way that I got a much better place for the aquarium. I did this for two reasons: one was to get it away from TV, because I did not want the TV to be disturbing the aquarium. I mean, who wants to watch TV after I get the reef up and running? Other reason wast to make the surroundings of the aquarium little bit quiter, so that there wont be people walking around the aquarium too much etc.

But at the moment I am truly truly having problems in staying on this diet I find it so hard to say no to candies and chips and other stuff during the weekends, when the rest of the family is showeling them down their throats... *grrrrrrr* But I have found a way to manage that: I promised to my self, that everytime when I have not eaten any sweets during the weekend, I may take one piece of equipment, and "make it ready". In the other words, I can reward my self by cleaning stream or setting up few PVC-pipes...

I'll be informing you on my progress frequently (thou I dont know, if you really really want to know anything about my diet )

 

[Dins]

Trying to decide the fishes

Trying to decide the fishes

Hi again everyone!! :jester:

I am trying to decide which fishes would I like to have, and here is a small listing. please tell me what do you think: do they go well together and so on. What else would you recommend? Also, I would aprreciate is so much, if someone could suggest me in what order should I put the fishes into the tank....

Pterapogon kauderni = Banggai cardinal fishes. Pair of these.

Amphiprion Percula = Pair of these. What anemone would they assosiate best? Do I put the anemone in first, and then intoroduce the fishes later..?

Chromis cyanea of chromis viridis. Shoal of these, maybe 13 or so.

Paracheilinus carpenteri = Carpenters Flasher Wrasse. Or some other flasher wrasse. I dont know how well I can get these from Finland, but I has some flasher in my mind, anyways

Pholidichthys leucotaenia = convict blenny = engineer blenny. I would like to have several of these, how well they do together?

I was also planning to have some shrimp goby with a shrimp, just to add something interesting I like the appearance of the gobies a lot, but it is hard to decide which one would be most suitable...

For the main center piece of the aquarium I thought of Naso Lituratus = naso tang. This fish grows to be big, but if I have understood right, it is not that agressive towards non-tangs

Then, what kind of sand digger / cave builder fish would you recommend for me - I have been planning to build the aquascape in such way, that there will be deeper sand in the other end. This is because I would like to get some fish, that lives very closely to the sand. I had garden eels in my mind at first, because they are so interesting creatures, but I am not sure if this aquarium is going to be too active for them. I could of course try to make their perimetres more suitable for them by aquascaping vicely.,..... Does anyone have experience on garden eels?

 

[bullitr]

Re: Trying to decide the fishes

Re: Trying to decide the fishes

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12261172#post12261172 target=_blank>Originally .

Amphiprion Percula = Pair of these. What anemone would they assosiate best? Do I put the anemone in first, and then intoroduce the fishes later..?

Chromis cyanea of chromis viridis. Shoal of these, maybe 13 or so.

]

a red bubble tip is the best anemones out there they don't move much and will not kill a fish only if you can make a clown host it . i got lucky with mine
and don't get chromis get a school of anthias you won't regret it i promise

 

[Dins]

Thanks bullitr! I will take your advice into account for sure! I better start looking for some anthias Do they shoal when in larger groups? I would not like the fishes to spread out across the aquarium all the time, but rather stay in the group... (of course I realize I cant make fishes do what they dont want to.... )

 

[rlxwcapt]

The problem with Chromis is that they pic on the weakest one until there's only 1 or 2 left.

 

[Dins]

Oh? But I have understood, that if there are many of them, the aggression is spread out more evenly and no body gets picked too much? :O

 

[rlxwcapt]

keep working out and never give up. keep in mind that you should have a benge day once a week. You need to enjoy eating. Other wise you will go back to old habits. try to get your family involve in eating healty as well. Like an aquarium start off with the best equipment 1st. You can do it.

 

[Dins]

I went to the scale tday, because my hubby said that some of his property seems to be missing haha, I went and yes, I had lost one kilo! Wooohooo!

I am truly concentrating into changing my bad habits -I do not want to give up all goods and sweets, but I am minimizing them. I have "candyday" now once every two weeks. And at those times I allow my self "only" 150 grams of sweets. THis has been great this far, and I have actually noticed, that I am still satisfied with this amount, thou I used to eat like 350 grams easily!

I am also eating more youghurt and full grain. In Finland we also eat a lot of rye bread -there is nothing to compare to it anywhere else in the world. I have heard, that some people even order it from Finland, because they love it so much

I was happy to hear people also commenting on my weight loss! It feels good to be noticed also that way, since that is such a big accomplishment in my life!!

Ps.What unit do you use instead of kilograms? It would be easier, if I convert the kilograms in the future...

 

[Dins]

I was calculating a bit with my sump + refugium.

At the moment, the "old" sump+refugium has three compartments: rist one is for top-off water sensor, heater etc, second one is for refugium and third one is just to host the pump, that pumps the water to the display tank.

First compartment is 12 gallons, second one is 20 gallons and thirg one is 5.5 gallons.

I am planning to to do some changes with it, and after these changes I could use both, chamber one and two as the refugium. Does 32 gallons of refugium sound better than 20 gallons? (display tank is 200 gallons)

I am very convinced in having refegiums, and I will grow macroalgae there, and I will have live stone there. MY plan is to introduce these stones with agae on them to the display every now and then, so that the agae eaters get stuff to eat and something to do. Refugium will also have pretty thick layer of sand, so that it also feeds some critters to the display as well....

Opinions -would the larger refugium be good or should I just stay with '20 gallons?

 

[kingsland]

That is a really nice tank. Of the anemones that I have had, I like the rose bubble tips the best. They are very colorful and once they find a spot they like, they stay put. My largest has been in the same spot for the last five years. Please post lots of pictures as you go along.