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jades

jades

Joined
28 Nov 2011
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Location
Ladysmith, KZN
Hi, I am getting back into the marine hobby after about 10 years, lots of moving around caused that. Now i have finally setup another marine system, it consists of 7 tanks, all plumbed into the sump. One is setup as a quarantine tank. Then others are for livestock. Total quantity is about 500 lt. The protein skimmer is a counter current diy version. I have a 5000 lt/h return pump. Currently all i have are four mollies in the system. Now all i need is to put in some livestock. Can anyone advise me on a good supplier who can ship some nice fish to me. I live in Ladysmith, KZN and there isn't a marine supplier anywhere near here. Thanks for this great forum.

Heres a pic of the system right now. Still setting up the algae scrubber. Everything else is up and running.

[img=http://s9.postimage.org/70jl1cirv/Image2.jpg]

Image2.jpg
 
Welcome to MASA and it must be awesome to get back into the hobby :thumbup: Check out the sponsor forum as a lot of them should be able to ship livestock to you.
 
Hey and welcome to MASA!:thumbup:

What are you planning to keep? A lot of small reefs or fish only tanks?
 
Thanks, and yep, its a DIY skimmer, works quite well, using a limewood airstone and a whisper 1000 right now. Well this is what i was thinking of stocking. In the 100lt up top, a pair of common clowns, 6 line wrasse, the mollies, and a coral beauty or jumping bean angel. A yellow tail damsel on its own. A toby puffer on its own. Wanna put a few soft corals in the middle small tank. A fuzzy lion on its own, maybe, not sure on that one yet, not sure if the tanks to small for it. And sea horses in the last one. Any ideas would be helpfull.
 
:welcometomasa2:to MASA...I would love to see you'r Algae Scrubber, when that is up and running....I want one and just started reading up on them...got a Link to an Algae Scrubber that looks "user friendly" and would love to see if you'rs is the same or different....I'm still green...:biggrin:
 
Hello and welcome


please, stop torturing them.
jades said:
Currently all i have are four mollies in the system.
Click to expand...

Interesting setup. Is the top left tank the only big tank? I doubt if you can house any Tangs, or other fish that grows big. But you can have multiple pairs of clowns. And no Anemones, please. Do not look like you have light units capable of sustaining anemones.

Anyway, welcome to this hobby, again.
 
This is the PDF i got the plans for my algae scrubber. I just need to put the lights on it. Will post pics when I have done that.

Lol, the mollies are doing great, they do really well in full seawater, better than in pure fresh water. My salinity is at 1.024 and one of the females are already gravid. I don't have light units on most of the tanks yet. I am gonna use leds for all of them. For the one I want to keep soft corals in I am gonna use 6 3w high output leds, that should be enough light. All the fish i want to keep are small, all nano tank fish.
 
jades said:
And sea horses in the last one. Any ideas would be helpfull.
Click to expand...

Seahorses are one of the harder species to keep, what are you thinking of? The dwarf species, erectus? I would PM Brenda (Anemone) as she has a lot of experience with keeping and breeding these delicate creatures. Also remember try to get captive bred specimens as wild caught specimens tend to not eat and carry disease.
 
Completed the algae scrubber, this is what it looks like now.

I used velcro to mount it, so i can take it out to clean it easy.

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The back plate is in

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These are the leds i am using for now, if its not bright enough, i can always add more.

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Front plate installed and lit up.

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Looks quite bright, hope the algae likes it.

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Update time, its been a while since I put some new pics up. Was trying the system without a skimmer for a month, with only the algae scrubber, GHA loved that, lots of patches everywhere, put it back on when I saw signs of cyano, that was 3 days ago. But I did see a huge increase in pods all over the place without the skimmer, and the leather loved that, its grown alot. I don't have any mechanical filtration, I have a wet dry handling the main filtration, algae scrubber and protein skimmer for nutrient export. DSB refuge for all the small life that needs it.

Heres a full shot of the system, with all the lights on. The top tank has:

7 blue-green chromis
2 mollies
1 coral beauty
1 midas blenny
2 ocellaris clowns
2 cleaner shrimp
1 hermit
1 snail
1 toadstool leather coral
1 colony of zoas
1 feather duster tube worm

Theres nothing in the 3 tanks on the right, except for a few baby mollies
The tank on the middle left has a six line wrasse.
The tank in the middle has:
1 purple pseudochromis
1 colony of green mushrooms
1 brain coral
1 hermit

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My midas, a ball full of personality!
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The tank with the brain coral and the mushroom colony. Still a work in progress, needs more corals to fill it up a little.
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A little lost zoa, not sure how it got from the other tank to here, under the mushroom colony.
57084f4a1a5e89ced.jpg
 
You should get yourself some proper live rock. will make a big difference in your system filtration capabilities.
 
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