SkiFletch
New member
Hey all, wanted to say hi to all the folks I knew in the community before I dropped off the face of the earth this time last year. Nice to see so many old friends and new faces still pokin around the boards and in the hobby. Long story short, in Nov 2009 I was diagnosed with Stage IV Colon Cancer and obviously took a break from active participating in the hobby. I've had multiple surgeries and chemo over the past year and continued to live my life as best I could through all that. For now, thanks to all that modern medicine and some help from the big guy upstairs, I'm done with treatment and cancer-free. Before getting on with the reef stuff, I just wanted to remind everyone, even those of you who think you're young, to not ignore any prolonged troubles with your guts, and get screened if you're 50, or 10 years prior to the age of a parent who'se had colon cancer, whichever is sooner. It's not only an old person's disease, and please trust me, none of you want to go through advanced colon cancer treatment, the scope is much easier 
.
Anyway, stories over I'm looking to "revamp" my reef tank over the next few months. I kept about half of my stock going over the last year, so I have some mature stuff, and my favorite fish thankfully are still with me. They survived in a basement horse trough over the summer when I bought a house and moved here, and now they're finally back in the tank and on display. My wife (got married too this year
) loves the tank and is really encouraging me to develop it so I've got a semi-clean slate and want to make it back to the beauty it once was.
Before I go diving back into livestock I want to make sure I have hardware to accomplish my goals. I've still got my 65g custom tank with a 20g sump and a mag 7 return pump on a small ocean motions for "some" alternating water flow, but it really isn't all that much. Also, a Koralia 3 for some extra flow in there. A modified re-circulating EuroReef handles my skimming, and twin 175watt reeflux 12K halides and a couple supplimental LEDs handle my lighting. All that stuff is ran by my ACjr (God bless that device for getting me through the last year). Before Cancer I was just about to dive into a home-made LED lighting setup, but those plans all got put on hold. I'd love to re-visit that dream. I would be surprised if a lot of things haven't changed in a year on that front as LEDs are such an emerging technology. Are there any off-shelf LED setups worth buying right now, or is it still the case that I could build something both more powerful and "worth it" myself? Money isn't too big a worry, but I will be looking for a DIY project over the winter and this would fit the bill, and something my electronics-oriented brain can easily wrap itself around. I don't want to spend gobs of money on something off-shelf that outputs less light/penetration than my halides. Also, what if anything has changed out there in terms of wavemaking or surge type flows? The MP40's, 15's, and 10's were just coming out last I knew. Are these still good options for flow/surge, or has something better hit the market? Livestock wise, most of my surviving corals are LPS (used to have quite the mix), and I think I'd like to continue going with LPS moving forward as I've always had the best luck with them.
Anyway, that was a gigantic post and I thank anyone who takes the time to read it and give an old friend some direction. I've missed the hobby a lot and am really excited to get back to it. Who knows what the future will hold, but I can't wait to get back into active fishkeeping. For now, it's just good to see everyone again.
.Anyway, stories over I'm looking to "revamp" my reef tank over the next few months. I kept about half of my stock going over the last year, so I have some mature stuff, and my favorite fish thankfully are still with me. They survived in a basement horse trough over the summer when I bought a house and moved here, and now they're finally back in the tank and on display. My wife (got married too this year
) loves the tank and is really encouraging me to develop it so I've got a semi-clean slate and want to make it back to the beauty it once was. Before I go diving back into livestock I want to make sure I have hardware to accomplish my goals. I've still got my 65g custom tank with a 20g sump and a mag 7 return pump on a small ocean motions for "some" alternating water flow, but it really isn't all that much. Also, a Koralia 3 for some extra flow in there. A modified re-circulating EuroReef handles my skimming, and twin 175watt reeflux 12K halides and a couple supplimental LEDs handle my lighting. All that stuff is ran by my ACjr (God bless that device for getting me through the last year). Before Cancer I was just about to dive into a home-made LED lighting setup, but those plans all got put on hold. I'd love to re-visit that dream. I would be surprised if a lot of things haven't changed in a year on that front as LEDs are such an emerging technology. Are there any off-shelf LED setups worth buying right now, or is it still the case that I could build something both more powerful and "worth it" myself? Money isn't too big a worry, but I will be looking for a DIY project over the winter and this would fit the bill, and something my electronics-oriented brain can easily wrap itself around. I don't want to spend gobs of money on something off-shelf that outputs less light/penetration than my halides. Also, what if anything has changed out there in terms of wavemaking or surge type flows? The MP40's, 15's, and 10's were just coming out last I knew. Are these still good options for flow/surge, or has something better hit the market? Livestock wise, most of my surviving corals are LPS (used to have quite the mix), and I think I'd like to continue going with LPS moving forward as I've always had the best luck with them.
Anyway, that was a gigantic post and I thank anyone who takes the time to read it and give an old friend some direction. I've missed the hobby a lot and am really excited to get back to it. Who knows what the future will hold, but I can't wait to get back into active fishkeeping. For now, it's just good to see everyone again.
, JK congrats on that too). Great news on your remission. This is a great time of year to pop back in and remind us all to take stock in our lives, loved ones, jobs, health, reef tanks :thumbsup: and the like.
