430gal., L-shaped display

[Sisterlimonpot]

Andy,
Hows the natural heating working out?

 

["Umm fish?"]

It's doing fine now. I have one Vornado blowing straight into the heating duct while the lights are on, sucking hot air out. I have another Vornado on the other end of the tank sucking cool air from the house and blowing 24/7 down onto the water's surface. I'm running at about 80 at night to about 82 by the end of the lighting period. Not too bad.

 

["Umm fish?"]

Well, a fun night tonight! Two new species for me caught spawning!

Six line wrasses:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Za26IHcMs60

And here's a teaser for the second:

I'm still uploading the video on that one. I'll post the link in the morning.

 

["Umm fish?"]

Sigh. Double post.

 

[dtech]

That should be a great video, I read somewhere awhile back that you couldn't get them to spawn in aquarium that was suposed reason they were wild, or would it be that they are hard to raise?

 

["Umm fish?"]

Actually, quite a few people have gotten them to spawn and at least a couple of people have raised them. I think Julian Sprung raised one quite a while back and Matt Wittenrich has raised a number of them.

He has several blog entries here: http://microcosmaqx.typepad.com/matt_wittenrich/

And here's the mandarin video :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXB2-o4rl3E

 

[rEd86]

Wow, that mandarin photo is incredible! (both the clarity and the colors. I can't get any of my fish to sit still long enough to get a decent photo. (or maybe it's just me taking too long to take the picture)

Once I'm done getting the new tank built out, I am going to take some time and really learn all the settings on my camera.

--Ed

 

[dtech]

Thanks for the link the more I can learn the better I can be with the critters I have.

 

["Umm fish?"]

Thanks, Ed. I have to admit that there was some post-processing on that one. Neither the water column nor the glass were anywhere near that clean.

No problem, dtech. You want to try to raise some babies, too?

I went ahead and made a still from one of the movie frames. Here you go:

 

[mpoletti]

Very cool Andy

 

[jnarowe]

Wow, what a shot. So I realize this is your "thing", but when I see spawning, I start thinking somethings is either very right, or very wrong. I guess I have built up a red flag system that includes spawning, because some spawning events seem to be survival tactics. Any thoughts on that Andy?

 

[GSMguy]

i think the stress induced coral spawning are similar to a miscarriage the corals release the eggs not to procreate instead for self preservation or as a sign of poor health, Fish spawning is almost always a good sign.

JMO

 

[jnarowe]

Yeah, I just notice a correlation between stress and snail spawning.

 

[melev]

I actually saw the mandarin spawn in the water. Good catch!

 

["Umm fish?"]

I've seen a coral stress spawning correlated with a whole bunch of tissue disintegration and I know that one of the techniques in inducing snail spawning is to stress them, but I've never heard of it with fish. I've heard that's one of the ways to get anemones to split, too. I guess it's possible, but I would think I would be losing fish right after the spawning events if that was what's going on and I wouldn't see them keep spawning, day after day.

It's not like I'm seeing any huge swings. Salinity only changes by a point or so even if I let it evaporate down to the point I'm worried about running the pumps dry. pH has a daily swing, but everyone's pH has a daily swing. The temp swings a couple of degrees, but from about 80-82, maybe close to 83 if it's a really hot day outside. Not pushing any limits there.

The only thing I can think of is that I'm starting to get a lot of that nasty green-brown algae dying off. That could be releasing something nasty into the water. But none of the fish are acting like there's a poisoning event going on. None of them are spending any special amount of time near the surface like it would be low O2. The corals have been gaining color and looking better after their initial brownings, so I doubt it's high nitrates. Nitrates that would bug the fish would have already killed the corals.

Yeah, I don't know.

 

["Umm fish?"]

Oh, and "Thanks, y'all!"

 

[jnarowe]

I was not inferring that you were having issues, just curious on your opinion. I have had nems in my tank since day one and only seen two splits more than two years ago. One of the splits was into three though!

I think with nems light is a factor too. With my system, there is so much light, they just get bigger and bigger. Obviously there are time-related spawning genes in fish, and that's why clownfish IME do it every couple of weeks. Sure that is, in a long-term view, survival related, but not because of water quality.

 

[melev]

I saw that algae in the video, and my first thought was how I would have been ripping that out until it was all gone, and my second thought was "I bet the fish are finding all kinds of tiny critters to eat in that algae..."

So even though it may not be pretty to my eyes, your fishes' response is pretty darn clear that they are happy - happy enough to "do it". :lol:

 

["Umm fish?"]

No, I know Jonathan. I was taking your comment seriously and trying to think out loud (can you say that about typing?) about what issue it might be. Honestly, the fish don't look unhappy to me so I'm not too stressed.

I wouldn't know on the clownfish, though. I've yet to have a clownfish spawn. Sigh. I have a couple of sets (B&W Os and regular Os) but they were really young when I got them. The B&Ws are just starting to make one area a home base.

Marc--Yeah, the algae doesn't stress me out too much. I would, of course, prefer that the really short turf that the tangs like would displace the longer stuff, but it's getting there. And, yeah, whenever I pull any of the algae out and drop it under the scope, I'm always impressed with how much is going on. What I don't really want is for all of the algae to die out at once, crash all of the small creature populations, and then release a bunch of nutrients into the water. I assume coralline will eventually displace the macroalgae, but the concrete rocks offered all kinds of surface area for the macro to get established. But yeah, small critters go where the food is and lots of them eat algae. Am I rambling yet? Man, I'm tired....

 

[dtech]

Maybe one day but not anytime soon, I don't have the space for any kind of grow out tanks or anything but I do wanna learn about it and what to do etc. and be able to do that if it happens.