Thanks to all for your likes & comments. I won't kid you, it has been a long 29 years. On my tombstone it will say: "He cleaned filters"
@KrisReef, I occasionally vacuum off (waste the water) part of the top layer of Fiji pink sand, that is nasty. Maybe a quarter to a half inch. That top layer covers nylon screen to keep 'em from digging to deep. I immediately replace it with "processed" sand. Process: rinse 10 times in 5 gal bucket until the water runs clean. Allow to dry, preferably in sun for several days. Put the now clean sand in a container until the next time I "vacuum" when it goes into the tank. I don't do it often enough. Maybe a couple of times a year. I try to do it in stages.
I also have a 10 gal reef with Jober DSB which I use as isolation tank & "emergency" if things ever went badly in the 55, which they have not. I set the 10 up in ... 1987? Both tanks always have zero nitrates, nitrites, or ammonia. Phosphates are certainly present, but to low for my tester.
Fish oil: I've been reading what I can find on gut loading. I'm using Spirulina for a couple of hours. I'm getting the impression that the Spirulina is not enough, and the brine on their own are reasonably worthless, kind of like eating potato chips ; )
I've posted a bit on Reef Central. I think I first posted there on Marylin's 20th birthday, which I thought was crazy then.
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1891748&highlight=marylin
Now, almost ten years later. This fish may outlive ME.
