CLub Members - Introduction

[mr neon]

Hey everyone! I went to the September meeting at Ocean Rift Aquatics for the first time. Really nice to see a local club as well as a local store giving the space to encourage the hobby! I met all of you and spoke to some but hope to meet more. I figured a thread to introduce yourself here as well as your hobby would be cool. This by the way is my first post since joing the forum.

I have been reefin for about 10 plus years give or take. Started out with a 20 gallon and knew nothing but learned much over the years. I presently have a 60 gallon reef full of LPS, softies and fish. I run a reefbreeders phonton 24 light with a 20 gallon sump with live rock and skimmer. I hope to go bigger but at the present moment the tank is doing good and I hate to mess that up.

I learned a lot through the years in this hobby and even today I still learn more. I have tried a a few differnt approaches to keeping a reef and fish, so failed so did ok but it was all fun in the end.

Hopefully I can pass along some of my knowldege as well as listen to others to further this hobby to be succesful.

 

[Edat]

I also went to the meeting at Ocean Rift Aquatics but I got there late. I have been in the hobby for about 15 years. I started with a 55 gallon that I made every mistake in the book with....tap water, no skimmer...... I quickly moved up to a 75 gallon still making the same mistakes but upgraded to metal halide lighting and a very poor performing skimmer. When I purchased my home I upgraded again to a 125 gallon, started using RODI water & invested in a good skimmer. I finally decided to learn about the hobby and what it takes to keep a successful system. The 125 was very stable and corals and fish did very well. After about 3 years I finally bit the bullet and started building my dream system. My current tank is an In-Wall 300 gallon 96x30x25 built by glass cages with a starphire front. It has dual overflows utilizing the "Herbie Method". Filtration consists of a Super Reef Octopus 5000sss skimmer in a 75 gallon sump/fuge with macro algae. Return pump from the sump is a Water Blaster 10000 that is teed off to also feed a 36x24x8 frag tank also built by glass cages. Circulation in the tank consists of a closed loop fed by a ReeFlo Super Dart/Snapper Gold Hybrid Pump and 2 Jeabo WP40s. For lighting I have 4 Aquaillumination Vega LED fixtures. I was lucky enough to be chosen by Aquaillumination to Beta Test the "Director" control program for the lights. I just recently added the rock and started adding fish. All of the new fish are from Ocean Rift Aquatics and are doing VERY well. Once I an done adding fish I will concentrate on purchasing corals. I hope to attend more meetings as they are planned and exchange ideas and experiences with everyone. I have a build thread on another saltwaterfishdotcom site under the same username as I use here. I hope to see everyone again at the next meeting.

 

[Codemonkey812]

While I have only been in the saltwater world for the last three years, I was working with freshwater for the last 20. My current tank is a 75g reef, that I purchased used (so it came with a whole mess of issues). I am I tinkerer of sorts, and do a lot of DIY stuff, some work (overflow/sump, temp controller) and some fail (media reactor) but I learn from each try. I tend to get obsessed with my tank (saltwater addict), and have to fight to keep my hands out of my display tank. I would love to start over again at this point with what I know and with a slightly bigger tank (90g), but my wife and bank account will not allow for that :nono:.