From The Bedroom Down To The Lounge

[1entra]

Which is your favourite fish 1entra?

Seffie x

Wow Seffie that i a tough question... its like asking a mother what her favorite child is!!! lol I'm actually not too sure if I have a favourite as seem to like several quite alot eg, the dwarf angel is a right little charactor and I like his colouration especially the neon blue stripe along the bottom fins. Also I love the markings on the Exquisite wrasse and the fact it is very active so always up to something... But then I really like the bi-colour blenny due to the fact he is the most interesting fish in the tank IMO.

The shop I bought him from had him in a small tank with a very dominant Midas blenny that kept having a go at him and due to this he had lost the yellow colouration in his lower body ut was still very active, he kept swimming up to the glass when I placed my finger and trying to 'eat' it which made me chuckle so I end up buying him although I had gone in to buy the 'boring' midas blenny which I had reserved! I can sit watching him for ages even now as he is such a clever little fish, he will peep out of his bumker 'shell' and and look around 180degrees before darting out to nip at some rocks or the glass and then quickly dash back into his cave and then sit there with just his head peeping out. Very fascinating to watch as he reminds me of a royal marine commando always on a covert mission and constantly looking around to make sure everything is clear before moving out to complete the task at hand he colouration neer did come back so he is like a all over bluey blacky brown colour....

 

[1entra]

Nice exquisite. I know exactly what you mean about the camera not capturing the colour the same as you see it. There is enough in the pictures to suggest to me what he looks like though. Just cannot see the colour change itself which is part of the beauty of these wrasse. He is beautiful. The solarensis is nice too, but I LIKE the exquisite. When I went to LFS Wednesday, she has a Carpenters, McCoskers and the Red Velvet Fairy that came in with my Filamentous. I was hard pressed not to reserve one I can tell you. I want to very careful about the one I pick though, I reckon I may get 1 or 2 more max, so it has to be special.

I do like that angel too, and he is very photogenic. Very nice stripe along the bottom of the anal fin.

I really like the mckoskers wrasse Tina, I used to have one in my other tank till one day is myteriously vanished. Then several months later I moved my bed and low and behold I had a very flat cripsy mckoskers lay there dead... had decided to go carpet surfing (although I have got netting over my tank, it had somehow managed to find a way out) with deadly results... used to be my favourite fish as well with excellent markings and always flashing. I am thinking about getting myself another one for the other tank. It is a choice between that or a pajama wasse as have always wanted one of them!!! The exquisite is a very attractive fish and I wish i had got him before having got the solar wrasse so it was more dominant, that way it would be a lot more brighter than it is now and also be flashing alot more which would also bring out his full colours....

As far as the angel goes I would always recommend getting one as it is a real interesting character that isn't always out in the open but when he is out he always up to something and i am glad it is not nipping at any of my corals etc. I am considering getting another dwarf angel for my upstaits tank to go with another wrasse.

 

[seffieuk]

Thanks for that 1entra, an interesting read must admit I hadn't even considered a blenny for my new tank but am now going to do a little research on the little chaps

The Mckoskers - have loved that fish ever since Ben had one, must admit would love to have a male with a couple of females

Seffie x

 

[1entra]

Thanks for that 1entra, an interesting read must admit I hadn't even considered a blenny for my new tank but am now going to do a little research on the little chaps

The Mckoskers - have loved that fish ever since Ben had one, must admit would love to have a male with a couple of females

Seffie x

I would defo recommend looking into blennys seffie as they are quite intrigueing little fish with so much charactor and personality and well fascinating to watch them 'swim' as they only cover very small distances at a time. For my tanks I like fish to cover all areas you see so there is always something going on anywhere you look eg, the clowns make good use of the open swimming space, the PJ cardinal hovers midtank, the firefish stays perched between the bottom and the midtank, the wrasses and royal gramma make good use of both rockwork and open swimming space. the tang and especially the angel are always appearing and disapearing in and out of the rocks and caves, and the blenny actually stays on the rocks and kind of half swims half hops from from rock or coral to another when it comes out of its little bunker. All in all there is something for eveywhere if you know what I mean.

I'm not the best fishkeeper on the planet and dont like moaning but I always think it is a bit of a shame when some reefers gt fish that are either all free swimming in the open water or all stay in the rockwork as it doesn't allow the attention of the observer to travel all over the tank and view everything as they only see certain areas (rant over)

When Iget my BIG(ger) tank in the future I will look to having several different fairy/flasher wrasse in it all to be added at the same time so hopefully can keep all their bright colours and would like to have 1 male per 2 females for each type

 

[1entra]

Hey guys just thought I would share with you what my fish eat just in case any of you was interested:

Monday: Brineshrimp with Garlic (1/2 cube)

Tuesday: Mysis Shrimp (1/2 cube)

Wednesday: Brineshrimp and Omega 3 (1/2 cube)

Thursday: Lobster Eggs (1/4 cube)
Krill (1/4 cube)
Red Plankton (1/4 cube)

Friday: Brineshrimp with Spirulina (1/2 cube)

Saturday: Brineshrimp with Oloe Vera (1/2 cube)

Sunday: Marine Mix (1/2 cube)
Marine snow (capfull)
Phytoplankton (approx 5ml)

Also every morning (except sunday) I attach half a sheet of dried nori seaweed onto a veggie clip and place that inside the tank, that is for all the veggies including, tang, angel, wrasses and blenny.

 

[1entra]

Wednesday afternoon I came home to find there was no lights on in the tank and I thought the bulb had blown but upon closer inspection I noticed the bulb seemed fine so took my light unit into a local electrical shop and they believe the ballast seems to have gone, well anyways they ordered me a new ballast in which didnt arrive till today and it was a lot larger than the original one in the unit, well anways they replaced it all for me ut the lights still aint working which has got them scratching their heads at it... current seems to be flowing through the ballast yet the light isnt working...

They said they will get an electrical engineer to have a look a it in the morning, just hope they manage to fix it as the tank has gone 3 full days with out lighting!!!

I have however been using my refugium light over the tank but it is only 11w and in comparisson to a 150w MH bulb and 2 39w tubes it really is not much

Got my fingers crossed that I do not lose any livestock

 

[1entra]

And then there was light! ​

Finally guys I have got my light unit back although only the MH lamp seems to be working, for some reason the T5 actinics still are not working although the ballast was replaced for them along with tubes!! But least the poor fish finally have some lighting after 4 days without light!!

Luckily all fish seem to look well and healthy and all corals seemed to have pulled through also although my leather toadstools are sulking and refusing to open fully!

And on another positive note... all the brown slime alage I had growing over my sandbed seems to have died off without any light to support it's growth which I am well pleased about just hope it does not return now!!!

 

[SkiFletch]

And it was good

 

[1entra]

Hi guys its been a while since I last posted on here and a lot has happened since.

I went away for 4 weeks due to work purposes with my tank all healthy and thriving and gave my 2 younger brothers instructions with regards to feeding, topping up fresh RO and even doing a water change with water that I had already mixed to make life easier for them. Both seemed confident as to what needed doing and said they would sort things between them...

Anyways to cut a long story short neither of them comunicated with each other so fish went several days without food as both borthers assumed the other had fed the fish and when they did decide to feed the fish, again with the lack of communication they overfed them!!!!

So... my fish caught whitespot and all but 3 died!!!! also upon return almost a month ago I found my tank absolutely covered in red slime algae and a lot of my corals looking worst for wear! It loked like my tank had alomost been nuked! what a waste of money and effort that i had put into into!!!

The fish I had remaining were the Yellow Tang, Firefish and PJ Cardinal... bless them, survivors till the very end.... got to admit them fish must be TOUUUGH man!lol

Like I say this was almost a month ago when I came back so after doing water tests I found nitrates to be skyhigh and so started doing daily water changes till they were brought back down to what they should be over a week or so. This kind of helped solve a bit of the algae problem but still have red slime algae on the sandbed... I think the tank could do with with increased waterflow to this area so I am currently in the process of getting another Koralia 1 pump alon with some Rowaphos.

Then came time to re-stock again so I kept my eye open at the lfs and surely enough 2 weeks ago I spotted a couple of fish i really liked and so ended up buying them together on the same day although I was only looking to get one but the oppurtuinty was too good to miss... so drum roll please... I end up buying an absolutely stunning scotts fairy wrasse (Cirrhilabrus scottorum)... I believe it to originate from Cook Islands and it is by far one of the most colourful fish I have ever seen.... along with an absolutely stunning Red Velvet Wrasse (Cirrhilabrus rubrisquamis)... Both wrasse were by far the best examples of either fish that I have personally come across, so bright and vibrant.

Once introduced in the tank both fish had a bit of a 'flashing' session at each other and then decided to call it quits and have got along just fine since then with both having kept most of the bright colourings that they had in the lfs

Half way through last week I visted the lfs and bought myself 2 small clownfish, both false percs... one being black and white and the other being the common type and introduced them into the tank and again both fish seem to getting along just fine!!!

One final bit of bad news however, at the same time as buying the clownfish I bought a stunning little cherub angel but as soon as it enetered the tank the yellow tang set upon it like a psycho and just wouldn't stop nipping at it and 'slapping' it with it's tail! initially i tried to interviene with a net to scare the tang but as soon as i moved away it continued its assult cornering the angel into a corner of the tank where it remained. I decided to leave them to sort out the dispute and hopefully should be over and done with by morning.... how wrong i was... poor cherub angel didnt stand a chance and the following afternoon I found
it dead in the same corner being 'carried' by the boxer shrimp who I'm sure was trying to eat it! Anyways I pulled it out and gave it a proper fish buriel (in the toilet) little guy

Anyways thats enough of me waffling for now.... so rant over!!! lol

 

[ben1987]

#### i bet the brothers arent in your good books now...


get some pics up of the wrasse though please, they sound stunning and are some of my favoriate fish!/
sorry about the lil angel too

 

[tropic_john]

So you have the 120l reef in your lounge and the 180l in your bedroom or other way round?

 

[1entra]

So you have the 120l reef in your lounge and the 180l in your bedroom or other way round?

Its the other way round mate, but saying that the one in the bedroom is also a 45G tank. The one downstairs is the one that this thread is about and is the Rio 180.

#### i bet the brothers arent in your good books now...


get some pics up of the wrasse though please, they sound stunning and are some of my favoriate fish!/
sorry about the lil angel too

and you right the borthers defo aint in the good books, i really did give them an earfull but then again it's a lesson learnt the hard way!!!

Il try take some pics of the set up and the fish later and put them up....

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Sorry to hear that man. Had similar issues with our tank, bought some rock which was supposed to be cured but added up with a massive ammonia spike. Been dealing with the resulting nitrate and phosphate issues for a couple of months now and finally getting back on top but its soul destroying to see something you put so much effort into go so wrong (luckily we didnt lose any fish but did lose my trumpet coral and a couple of my soft corals).

 

[seffieuk]

glad to see you are back on form, brothers, humph

looking forward to seeing the wrasses - we all seem to have a soft spot for them

seffie x

 

[TigerIssey]

I had the choice of a rubrisquamis when I got the filamented flasher. They are stunning fish. I do like the scotts too, especially if you get the cook islands one that is supposed to be much brighter in colour.

Think you did the best thing to add them at the same time, better than one being established.

Sorry to hear about your losses though.

You will beat the red slime eventually, I did.