Mike and Terry's 300g Reef

[Mike&Terry]

Beautiful, are the Johnsoni in there?

Thank you Brett. The Johnsoni fairy's are in the 30g with the Bell's where we have decided to keep them. They are both smaller than all of our flasher wrasses and I don't believe the male is going to grow any larger. They are very passive and a bit timid, the male even more so than the female. Our Bell's dominates them in the nano and he's not much larger.

We just released the pair of Earl's day before yesterday. They had been in the acclimation box for a few days w/out incident. I had planned to wait a couple more (just to be safe), but the female had her own ideas, LOL, and managed to slip out of the box. Since she wasn't going to get back in the box willingly, I went ahead and released the male. Thankfully, they are doing fine. They are small enough that the Fairy's and most of the Flasher's are ignoring them. The only one who has payed them any attention is the Yellowfin Flasher and thankfully it hasn't been anything serious.

-Terry

 

[MarvinsReef]

Thank you Brett. The Johnsoni fairy's are in the 30g with the Bell's where we have decided to keep them. They are both smaller than all of our flasher wrasses and I don't believe the male is going to grow any larger. They are very passive and a bit timid, the male even more so than the female. Our Bell's dominates them in the nano and he's not much larger.

We just released the pair of Earl's day before yesterday. They had been in the acclimation box for a few days w/out incident. I had planned to wait a couple more (just to be safe), but the female had her own ideas, LOL, and managed to slip out of the box. Since she wasn't going to get back in the box willingly, I went ahead and released the male. Thankfully, they are doing fine. They are small enough that the Fairy's and most of the Flasher's are ignoring them. The only one who has payed them any attention is the Yellowfin Flasher and thankfully it hasn't been anything serious.

-Terry

Bells flasher, Johnsoni's, and Earlei's... what else can yah ask for? actually, an updated vid would be cool. haha.

I like the side shots. really gives yah a perspective on the coral growth. thanks for sharing them.

 

[Aquaph8]

Thank you Brett. The Johnsoni fairy's are in the 30g with the Bell's where we have decided to keep them. They are both smaller than all of our flasher wrasses and I don't believe the male is going to grow any larger. They are very passive and a bit timid, the male even more so than the female. Our Bell's dominates them in the nano and he's not much larger.

We just released the pair of Earl's day before yesterday. They had been in the acclimation box for a few days w/out incident. I had planned to wait a couple more (just to be safe), but the female had her own ideas, LOL, and managed to slip out of the box. Since she wasn't going to get back in the box willingly, I went ahead and released the male. Thankfully, they are doing fine. They are small enough that the Fairy's and most of the Flasher's are ignoring them. The only one who has payed them any attention is the Yellowfin Flasher and thankfully it hasn't been anything serious.



-Terry

Oh wow, they stay pretty small then. I had no idea. Those silly earl's, they have the coolest personality of any fish, just really curious and easy going.

 

[Mike&Terry]

Oh wow, they stay pretty small then. I had no idea. Those silly earl's, they have the coolest personality of any fish, just really curious and easy going.

Brett, we agree, the Earl's do have the coolest personality of them all.



As a small update, we thought we would share a top down shot of our A. desalwii with it's resident acro crab:

 

[MoeManTheSnowMan]

Oh boy! 57 pages?!? Sheesh!! I'm on page 2 lol I'll have to come back to this. You just welcomed me to reef2reef I hit your build link now I'll have to put a few hours aside just to go through your post. Did I say sheesh yet? Lol anyways sorry to hear about that rough start n glad you kept with it. That's dedication n love for the hobby!!!

 

[Mike&Terry]

Oh boy! 57 pages?!? Sheesh!! I'm on page 2 lol I'll have to come back to this. You just welcomed me to reef2reef I hit your build link now I'll have to put a few hours aside just to go through your post. Did I say sheesh yet? Lol anyways sorry to hear about that rough start n glad you kept with it. That's dedication n love for the hobby!!!

Thanks so much for the compliment and for taking the time to post in our thread. :bigsmile:

 

[revhtree Verified Admin]

Brett, we agree, the Earl's do have the coolest personality of them all.



As a small update, we thought we would share a top down shot of our A. desalwii with it's resident acro crab:

WOW that is a acro of beauty!!

 

[jrom1300]

Really nice set up

 

[zibba]

As a small update, we thought we would share a top down shot of our A. desalwii with it's resident acro crab:

Incredible! I apologize if this was covered already, but what top-down box are you using? Also, if you could give details/tips for taking good top-downs that would be awesome!

 

[mike007]

You have got one awesome tank. Looks as though you have invested lots of time and effort. If you don't mine me asking how much to set up a tank like yours?

 

[Mike&Terry]

Really nice set up

Thank you for the compliment and for taking the time to post in our thread.

Incredible! I apologize if this was covered already, but what top-down box are you using? Also, if you could give details/tips for taking good top-downs that would be awesome!

Thank you! We purchased the box here for our Nikon D300s. We also use a Panasonic DMC TS3 waterproof camera for some of our top down shots as there are areas in the tank where the acrylic box is too cumbersome to use.

Both of these stickies in the Photography forum have good information:

https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/photography-forum/9217-juniors-aquatic-photography-how-basics.html
https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/photography-forum/11713-depth-field-dof.html

You have got one awesome tank. Looks as though you have invested lots of time and effort. If you don't mine me asking how much to set up a tank like yours?

Thank you Mike! And yes, we have invested a lot of time and effort into this system, but we truly do enjoy it. As for set up costs, "too much" comes to mind, LOL. Seriously though, the largest expenditure for us was on the custom cabinetry, canopy and counter tops.

 

[MarvinsReef]

WOW that is a acro of beauty!!

that is one awesome SPS! 1smile1

 

[Mike&Terry]

that is one awesome SPS! 1smile1

Thanks Marvin! Wish us luck... This is the single most difficult species we have ever tried to keep and our third attempt. Hopefully it will be successful and our last. It came in looking much better than the two previous colonies and has been coloring up very nicely. It is also the first of the three to have a resident acro crab (hoping that is a good sign). Our first colony never really colored up and rtn'd at 5.5 months over night. Our second colony (small maricultured piece) rtn'd after the 6 month mark when an A. plana touched it.

 

[zibba]

Thank you! We purchased the box here for our Nikon D300s. We also use a Panasonic DMC TS3 waterproof camera for some of our top down shots as there are areas in the tank where the acrylic box is too cumbersome to use.

Nice, I've looked at Melev's top down boxes in the past. Just starting to get back into it and starting to look at topdown boxes so I appreciate the info. The waterproof camera must be fun to use! I've seen other pictures that you've taken with that one, it seems to work great!

Thanks!

 

[LukeG]

I love all the SPS. I've been lurking for a while but I thought I'd say hi.


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[Mike&Terry]

I love all the SPS. I've been lurking for a while but I thought I'd say hi.

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Thank you Luke! We appreciate you taking the time to participate in our thread... :bigsmile:

 

[Mike&Terry]

We had a bit of a scare Sunday when our little female C. earlei went missing. After searching the tank, overflow and filter sock in the sump with no sign of her, we were really upset and just knew she was toast. :sad:

Flash forward 4 hours later and Mike comes in from the garage and says he has some "good news"... Little Miss Houdini is alive and tooling around the 150g sump vat (sump #2). Our drain line is plumbed to allow us to bypass either sump for maintenance purposes. We keep a filter sock on our shallow acrylic sump (sump #1) where the majority of water dumps and allow a trickle of water from the drain to flow into sump #2. How she managed to avoid the first drain outlet to sump #1 is a mystery and thankfully, she stayed away from the return inlet after she landed in the stock vat. We dropped some NLS pellets into the bottom of a Dip and Pour container, waited 3 or 4 minutes for her to swim inside and then moved her back to the display.

Our overflow box is covered with an acrylic top, but she is small and somehow slipped between the teeth before taking the joy ride down to the sump. She is no worse for wear after the adventure and, thankfully, she wasn't gone long enough for her tank mates to pay her any attention when we put her back in the display.

I tried to snag some pics of both of the Earl's, but neither were being very cooperative, LOL. I did manage to get this one of the male:


-Terry

 

[MarvinsReef]

Yikes! Glad she is ok now.


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[Aquaph8]

Oh wow, what an adventure. Glad you found her and she's OK.

 

[Mike&Terry]

Yikes! Glad she is ok now.

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Oh wow, what an adventure. Glad you found her and she's OK.

Thanks Marvin and Brett! I am still amazed that she miraculously made it to the stock vat. This is not the best pic, but you can see the large drain pipe and it's outlets, as well as the shallow sump. The stock vat sits to the far left just out of view:



-Terry