words of wisdom from my trials and errors. they can be cheap and easy to do if you already have a reef setup. halides or t5s work great. if you can grow coral, you can grow macros, i got rid of my crabs and snails, but kept ceriths. crabs and snails eat macro, $100 bucks woth of macro makes your tank look like a garden, so cheaper than reefing. add nitro and iron to keep things growing, get too low of values and things die, too much and things bloom out of control. you will have to play with it to get your dosing down to a science.much faster growing than corals. avoid caulerpa, they suck up too many nutrients and crowd out other slower growing species that look awesome. macro tanks can be very cold touchy, one cold night and your tank drops down a little too low and you can lose macros. and macros can also be seasonal. i have some thay grow great in the summer and die in the winter or the other way around.
vendors.
i like
www.live-plants.com russ there answers the phone himself. his customer service is the best. his shipping is the best in an insulated box, with bags that keep the ph where it needs to be to keep you from getting mush in the mail. and his portions are huge. hsi stuff is seasonal though, so you need to watch his site. have had 100% live arrivals of stuff, and the couple bags that didnt, were immediatly replaced no cost to me. so cant say enough good things here.
www.lareefs.com good customer service some obscure macros, smaller portions.
and reefcleaners.org, guy can't ship macros for junk this far away from florida, he shipps macros in very little water, used bags that dont keep the ph where it needs to be, smaller portions for the money. i will say they have the knowhow and they stock, they just havent figured how to ship their stuff 2+days in a priority box without it melting.
also ebay. there is a good vendor called macroman out of ohio.
