430gal., L-shaped display
- Thread starter JohnL
- Start date
MrineLfRlz
Active member
how about some updated pics of your sump/frag/breeding room?
driftin
New member
Andy don't feel bad on the clowns, you're not alone! My pair hasn't done a darn thing other than clean and defend their area, while the pajama cardinals have been breeding for years and the much much much more recently introduced centropyge's have already paired up and started to breed. I was hoping to develop my techniques with clownfish eggs and... still waiting!
Kensmith201
New member
Thanks for the information all, now my head really hurts!
That Randy Holmes-Farley is something else.
His detail reminds me of a lecture by Ron Shimek at MACNA in DC a few years back.
That Randy Holmes-Farley is something else.
His detail reminds me of a lecture by Ron Shimek at MACNA in DC a few years back.
"Umm fish?"
Premium Member
Who knows? I never seen a clown nest, though.
I just got it semi-cleaned up for a meeting today. I'll try to take some photos after the meeting. (If the club doesn't trash the place.
) But, truth is, it hasn't really changed all that much.I honestly think it's easier to get pelagic spawners to spawn. They don't put as much energy into each egg so they need less conditioning, IMO.
"Umm fish?"
Premium Member
Here are some update photos.
FTS:
Fish room:
A pair of Plebius butterflies:
The files were trying not to be photographed. They are now at 10 months and 9 days.
Oh, and haven't seen a coral since March 1.
FTS:
Fish room:
A pair of Plebius butterflies:
The files were trying not to be photographed. They are now at 10 months and 9 days.
Oh, and haven't seen a coral since March 1.
"Umm fish?"
Premium Member
Honestly, not bad at all. I do have an exhaust fan in there and I blow in air conditioning with intake vents from other parts of the house. It's a little more humid than the rest of the house, but the rest of the house (and the whole state, really) is just too dry.
Western_reefer
Reef keeper
Wow! Very nice! I wish I was able to build my own fish room! lol
murfman
New member
I get a lot of condensation on the inside of the window and walk out door, in the winter time. I try and crack the window to release the humidity but it just gets too cold in the winter time. I think I am going to put an exhaust fan, in a sheet of plywood, in the window and seal it up and exhaust that way.
"Umm fish?"
Premium Member
Thanks, y'all. The exhaust fan seems to do a really good job. The rock wall on the right side stays a little moist in the summer but I think that's seepage from the outside sprinkler system rather than from the tanks. Otherwise, it seems good. If I turn the exhaust fan off the humidity gets very noticeable very quickly.
MrineLfRlz
Active member
thanks alot for the updated pics
you really do have one heck of a great setup GREAT WORK!
have you been having any water quality problems since you set everything up or has all been running pretty smoothly?
you really do have one heck of a great setup GREAT WORK!
have you been having any water quality problems since you set everything up or has all been running pretty smoothly?
"Umm fish?"
Premium Member
Thanks! My one regret so far is that things haven't been stable enough to keep a lot of corals going. Every time they seem to be going pretty well, something happened: salinity issues, heat issues, pH issues. But things seem to really been stabilizing the last month or so. The coralline cover has really taken off and the cleanup crew seems well-established (thousands upon thousands of worms, amphipods, copepods, growing populations of several varieties of snails, and I've finally seen the beginnings of a mysis population). So, I'm hoping things will get going this time. I won a mille frag at the club meeting. So, now I have a slowly recovering elkhorn, a tabling acro frag, and an acro mille to let me know if the harder corals can make it. Brain corals seem to love the tank, though. Maybe I could just go all-brains. Might be cool....
"Umm fish?"
Premium Member
Well, that's the theory. It is true that they eat acros in the wild. Stomach content analysis on wild OL has found acro polyps in the gut. Is there something magical about coral flesh that means that the filefish can't survive without it? Or, is it just that they are such poor hunters that coral flesh is about all they can get? Mine haven't seen coral flesh in over eight months (and have been in my care since New Year's Eve), and I don't believe that coral flesh is anything special. It's just flesh. So, the key is to get them eating alternate foods. Once you manage that (and don't get me wrong, it was _very_ difficult with these fish), they are easy to keep. They spawn for me on a regular basis.
By some accounts, those plebius butterflies are also obligate corallivores. Same deal with them, since they also have no corals in their tank for over six months now. They grow really slowly, though, and were _tiny_ when I got them.
By some accounts, those plebius butterflies are also obligate corallivores. Same deal with them, since they also have no corals in their tank for over six months now. They grow really slowly, though, and were _tiny_ when I got them.
"Umm fish?"
Premium Member
I don't know. I'd bet at this point, they wouldn't touch anything. Heck, there are amphipods covering their entire tank (I have to feed them 4x/day) and the fish don't hunt the amphipods at all. But I'm not lying when I say it was really hard to get them onto alternate foods. There was a lot of banging my head against the walls. If you are serious about looking into them, I can go into detail for you (it's a long story).
"Umm fish?"
Premium Member
Honestly, feeding frozen 4x/day is a lot less work than running an entire frag farm just to feed a pair of these fish. Plus, I've seen pictures of these files in tanks with corals and they were still starving to death. So, having them with corals is still no guarantee that they'll get enough to eat. I really do think it's better to get them onto some high-calorie foods so it's not so hard for them to keep the weight on. I'm tempted to say that the nutritional profile of coral flesh is probably pretty low.
