Updates and OSRAS conference

It’s been over a month since my last real post. Ugh, that’s disappointing. Well, the NEERS conference has finally come and gone and I have made some additions and upgrades to the tank system.

Let’s start with the big Premium Aquatics order. The RO/DI unit is working brilliantly. With a garden hose Y-splitter from Lowe’s and a little bit of drilling into a 5-gallon bucket, I’ve got a fantastic handy product water reservoir that fills in just an hour. The RO/DI unit is rated at 100 GPD, not that I’ll ever be able to hold that much product with the system and storage I have right now. But no more awful tap water! I’m very convinced that the new clean water has contributed largely to the control of the hair algae.

Float valve fitted into my drilled bucket, connected to the RO/DI unit.

The RO/DI sits on top of the dryer.

View of the garden hose Y-splitter connected to the cold-water laundry hook up (the green knob).

Full view of the RO/DI unit installed.

RO/DI unit and my product water reservoir.

I’ve situated the Rock Mags in the tank and they do fill up the awful ugly back space nicely. I love how they purple up rather quickly. Even the new ones are starting to change. I haven’t drilled these yet, as I haven’t quite decided where I want to put the frags I have yet.

Two of the three new large Rock Mags.

I don’t have a good photo of the Natural Wave timer, but it’s also working wonderfully. It has made a great cross current system, as my two circulation pumps alternate with left side on for 30 seconds, then right side on for 30 seconds. This rate seems to keep all the corals happiest, as they aren’t blasted continuously.

I did get to attend the Ocean State Reef Aquarium Society conference in Rhode Island last weekend and had a great time. I ended up meeting a fellow reefing hobbyist (a friend from college) down there. I picked up some nice little zoanthid frags (you can never have too many zoas in my opinion) in addition to some great free loot! I had the opportunity to talk to many hobbyists from New England which was nice. I was able to sit in on Greg Hiller’s talk, which proved very useful as a reminder not to skimp on water changes and water quality tests. This has made me more determined to actually log my parameters every week. I’ll be doing this on aquarist.me.

All of my free loot from the OSRAS conference.

I tested everything when I got home from the conference and what would you know, the calcium was really high and the KH was REALLY horribly low. No wonder my corals aren’t growing. Fortunately I have BRS calcium and alkalinity solution mixed that I can dose to counteract this.

I went out today hoping to pick up a couple of skunk cleaner shrimp for the tank today (I really miss my Jacques) but both PETCO locations near me did not have any. Hopefully next weekend. One good thing I will say for the PETCOs in my area is that their aquatics departments are filled with knowledgeable staff. Seriously. These people actually know saltwater tanks and several of them keep reef tanks themselves. I do truly favor supporting local businesses, but hey – when you want a shrimp, you want a shrimp.

Well, that’s about all I’ve got right now. I’ll aim to be better about posting every week or so.