Over the last couple months, it has been spreading like mad. I’ve had a patch of it in my tank for +2 years, but it is just now that it has decided to take off, and it getting a bit out of hand. So that leads me to a related dilemma: my clownfish. My pair of A. percula took this Xenia as home within 24 hours of being put into the tank, and the momma defends it to the death. I’ve been considering fluke tab removal of the Xenia, but I don’t want to deprive the clowns of their home.

My 2 thoughts have been a) once the tank gets back on track and I’ve manually removed as much as possible form the areas I don’t want it, possibly the once again clean water will keep it contained as it used to be. Or, b) remove the rock w/ Xenia that the clownfish host in, QT it, fluke the tank, and then put the rock back in. The issue I have with ‘B’ is that I am afraid any leftover trace of the fluke tabs may kill of the Xenia I wanted to save… but the plus side of ‘B’ is that I also have some anthelia and GSP that I definitely want no trace of, ever again, and the fluke tabs may take care of that…

decisions, decisions…

Off to do some reading on experiences with fluke tabs… here’s a video (cloudy after extreme maintenance). See, how could one possibly take the clowns from that xenia… I think they’d be devastated :). Check out the Ecsenius stigmatura about 1:30 in, cleaning out the kicked up sand from his hole. Also think I may have to hack down the M. capricornis a bit to re-position that rock.

*Post Script - I’ve halted all dosing of Fauna Marin products while I continue renovation. I am still running a reactor / stones, but have stopped all Power Trace, Bak, AA’s, etc. Until I get a grip, just sticking with bi-weekly doses of Prodibio bacs and carbon source.

As a hobbiest, I have access to affordable control for my aquarium that can help prevent catastrophes like this. Of course, all equipment does have the potential to fail, and likely will at some point. But one might think that if I can have a (what, $500?) monitor that not only emails me, but sends a text message to my phone if something in the tank is awry, then why doesn’t a zoo that spends tens of thousands of dollar on an exhibit have something like this in place? Had the head aquarist had something like Neptune System’s Aquacontroller 3 in place, he could have possibly been woken up with a text when the temperature was raising, logged in and checked the status, and raced down to the zoo for a late night fix…

This brings me to “best practices” for a controller. It is simple enough to set your controller, we’ll take the AC3, for example, to turn heaters / chillers on and off at a given temperature. For those of you who have an AC3, you may have something like this:

If Temp < 79.0 Then HT1 On (Heater On when Temp drops to 79*F)
If Temp > 80.0 Then HT1 Off (Heater Off when Temp reaches 80*F)
If Temp > 80.0 Then COL On (Chiller On when Temp hits 80*F)
If Temp < 80.0 Then COL Off (Chiller Off when it drops the temp back down)
If Temp > 82.0 Then ALM On (Alarm on, i.e. send email / text if temp too high…)
If Temp < 78.0 Then ALM On (Alarm on if temp too low)

That code effectively provides the reef tank with a couple degree swing in temperature, turning on and off the appropriate temperature controls per the given range. If it goes out of range, an alarm is turned on (text message send to phone, email sent). That code works, albeit a bit simple since we’re not bringing into account fans / lights, and other gear for the purposes of this post. However, what about malfunctioning equipment, as in the case of Brookfield Zoo? In their case, the chiller never turned on, and the heater was left open ended to keep raising. This 2nd code set takes into account parameters way out of normal range sends and alarm, and just shuts the heater and chiller down. Leaving the chiller on may just keep cooling and cooling. The same goes for the heater.

If Temp < 79.0 Then HTR On (Heater On when Temp drops to 79*F)
If Temp > 80.0 Then HTR Off (Heater Off when Temp reaches 80*F)
If Temp > 80.0 Then COL On (Chiller On when Temp hits 80*F)
If Temp < 80.0 Then COL Off (Chiller Off when it drops the temp back down)
If Temp > 82.0 Then ALM On (Alarm on, i.e. send email / text if temp too high…)
If Temp < 78.0 Then ALM On (Alarm on if temp too low)
If Temp < 75.0 Then COL Off
If Temp < 75.0 Then HTR Off (Temp way too low, cut heat off, something is up)
If Temp < 75.0 Then ALM On (Another alarm)
If Temp > 84.0 Then COL Off (Temp way too high, turn chiller off, something wrong)
If Temp > 84.0 Then HTR Off (Temp way too high, make sure heater off)
If Temp > 84.0 Then ALM On (Alarm notification)

I do really wonder now what kind of gear Brookfield has in place. With all the time and money I’ve spent on my tank, a controller is really not even a question.

Of course, one can’t completely avoid mechanical failure, but I at least feel a bit better taking the extra step with a couple fail safes in the code & text message alarms. I have been woken up in the middle of the night by a text message from the aquarium controller telling me the water was 65*… ran downstairs and turns out I forgot to plug the heaters back in after the water change earlier that night.

On the other hand, I was out of town for 4 days and kept getting messages that my tank was pushing 87*F. I logged into the AC3 from 500 miles away, made sure heaters were off, fans on, though there was nothing I could do - so I turned off the alarm and tried to ignore the nerve to just hop in the car and drive the 6 hours home ;). Turns out our A/C had not turned on and the house was boiling, the aquarium gear couldn’t keep up with it.

Basic idea - Sh*t happens, but there are steps we can take to help avert disaster. The peace of mind a controller can offer is indispensable, in my opinion. I wonder what may have been if the zookeeper got a text at midnight that “Stingray Bay” temperature was out of the ordinary? Could they have run out and fixed it?

Gotta leave the ringer on though. Vibrate may not wake you up…

Link:
Tribune article on the Stingray Bay disaster
“AC3 Best Practices” thread on ReefCentral

Various Reef tank and aquarium controllers on the Market:
Neptune Systems (Aquacontroller Jr., AC III, Aqua controller Pro)
Digital Aquatics (Reefkeeper Jr, RKE, Reef Keeper Elite)
GHL Profilux
Elos (Biotopus II)

I am having one very slow loss in the azoox tank, the Scleronephthya (Umbellulifera?) that never quite opened is now in a constant state of collapse. About a month or so ago, the coral started to show a very thick waxy layer of skin, akin to that of Porites. sp. when they shed. No matter what I did, increasing flow, moving it, very light brushing in attempts to coax the waxy layer off, it simply wouldn’t shed. I am certain this is why it is not doing well / dying. I’m leaving it in and have been changing the position weekly in hopes that it finds a position it likes, though is is likely a futile effort.

So, that’s all for now. I’ll get a new tank shot and some growth photos up next week. I keep the tank ~75 - 76*F in winter, and now that temps and photo period (using AquaController’s Seasonal feature) are increasing, color and growth are are as well. I also attribute a bit of coloration to Fauna Marin’s Power Trace 1 - 4, but more on that + tweaking colors later when I have some visual aids…

In the meantime, be sure to check out Glassbox Design’s page re: new products from the Interzoo show, lots of cool stuff coming out. I’m excited for the new Tunze products in particular, as well as Fauna Marin’s UltraMin D & Ultra Bio Activ. Also check out this blog. Some good reads (don’t miss the one about spearfishing for Synchiropus splendidus …?!…) and some outstanding photographs.

Have a great 3 days off….

I’m a total sucker for little items that make my life easier or make something less annoying. I’ve had fish tanks around most of my life, fresh or salt, and not once have I seen a suction cup last more than 6 months before it’s falling off the glass. Stumbled across these Zoo Med Mag Clips on Premium Aquatics a couple months ago and decided to buy a couple of them.

The MagClips come packaged with 6 different sizes of these clips that just screw into the actual magnet, so you can hold anything from probes, to tubing, heaters, whatever you need. The magnets are also pretty strong, so no worries about your gear falling.

The first ones I bought a couple months back have not shown any signs of rust in the tank, nor have they slipped. They’re solid, encased magnets, and if you need to change its use to hold a heater instead of your pH probe, just pop in another clamp. On that note, I could do without the bag full of extra unused clips - each pack only has 1 magnet, and I really don’t see myself changing out clips.

I recently placed another order and have replaced every single heater suction cup in both of my tanks (FW & reef). I am also using them to hold all probes, RO tubing connected to my dosing pumps (reduced the vibration) & my top off sensor.

I’ve seen some DIY magnets similar to this idea, but in my opinion, $5 for these things is a great buy.

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