Manhattan Reefs takes great pleasure in announcing our October 2011 Tank Of the Month to Vic8361 and his 180G Mixed Reef!!! Congrats Vic!!!!
What does being chosen as MR ToTM mean to you?
It's awesome, there?s nothing like getting acknowledged for something you have put so much time and effort into. It's my big trophy.
It should be mentioned that you were one of the people who joined Manhattan Reefs back when the site was only months old, can you tell me how MR is the same ? or different ? from how it was back in the beginning?
Yeah, I've been around since the beginning I guess. It's just a lot more people now. Back then everyone knew each other and became friends quickly. How often can you sell stuff to the same person? After a while you just start giving stuff away to your friends. Now there are more people trying to make a ton of money rather than just keeping it as a hobby and trying to keep the livestock affordable for the next guy. I have become friends with some great people recently? so there are still great people on MR today.
Can you tell us what happened recently so that everyone reading this thread is aware?
As most of you know that my tank is no longer up. On Monday Oct 3rd it sprung a leak on the bottom back corner. I found out it was leaking during a phone call from my downstairs neighbor who told me that water was coming down in her foyer.
When I saw where it was coming from I was in shock for a moment and I knew what I had to do. I put some containers to catch to water but it was very hard to contain as the water was dripping all throughout the back of the stand.
I put an emergency sale tread on MR and I was able to sell all of the livestock that very same day. Thank you God for MR and the people who came to buy - cause as they were buying - they were helping me out with my tank.
I think I can speak for everyone here at MR in expressing our thanks for sharing your beautiful tank through pictures here and for those of us who have had the privilege to visit your home and visit the tank in person.
How did you get involved in fish/reef keeping?
I have always loved fish. I had a small 10gal when I was a kid but I could never keep anything alive. So that didn't last long.
Then after many years my upstairs neighbor sold me his 55gal tank and that's where it all started. I ran it as a freshwater tank and before you knew it I had five different tanks in my apartment, talk about addiction, I was hooked for sure!
I got the saltwater bug in 1999 and bought a used 90 gal salt water set up that had a wet and dry and a Red sea Berlin skimmer. The person who sold me the tank gave me his collection of FAMA magazines, there were about twenty or thirty of them and I started reading all the saltwater articles while I was cycling my tank. So I had my tank cycled and I saw this advertisement to a place in New Rochelle called Total Marine I went there to buy some fish and then it happened I saw my first reef tank, that was it, I was hooked with a capital H.
I was broke but who cared, I needed to have something like that tank I was looking at, so I bought about $20 of live rock and I had my first reef tank. Lol.
Eventually I went from my 90 gal that I started in 1999 to my 180 gallon in 2002 until it sprung that leak on October 3rd 2011?.
Your tank was extremely beautiful and successful; can you share with everyone the details about the tank and your husbandry methods?
It was a 180 gal Star-fire reef ready tank with a beautiful oak stand and canopy. For my lighting I ran 6 x T5's ran on two Ice-Cap 660 ballasts with individual reflectors and
this worked well for my set up due to the low canopy I had.
My sump was a Life-Reef wet and dry with a Super Reef Octopus XP3000 cone skimmer, this was -by far- the best skimmer I have ever owned and it handled my full-blown tank like nothing.
My return was a GRI 580 pressure rated pump with two penductors that created a lot of turbulent flow. For the flow in the DT I had one MP40w and one Korallia 4. I was in need for more flow was planning to get another mp40 when the funds were available; these MP40's really do a great job. I wouldn't run a tank without them.
I used a Spectrapure auto top-off straight from my RO/DI - this is a great product that never gave me a problem from the start of the tank. I also used a Sentry 5 dosing pump would dose my Randy?s two part into my system. The homemade 2-part saved me a ton of money and I would try and keep my Alk at 9 DKH and my Ca at 450 PPM.
I used an old Ehime 2213 canister filter to run my GFO. The GFO really made a difference when I started using it and it's a must for me. I also ran carbon 24/7 that I would replace once a month and I dosed Lugol?s twice per week.
Additionally, I made 40gal/month water changes using Instant Ocean salt. Well that was the plan anyway; I used to get lazy sometimes. Lol
Ahhh, we?ve all been there at some point Vic, life will tend to interfere with our reef keeping responsibilities every now and then!
How did you keep your reef cool?
I didn't run a chiller; I would just run the A/C all the time in the summer.
Good man, keeping you & your family and tank happy all at the same time!
Do you have a favorite fish or coral?
The Powder Blue Tang is my favorite fish; it's just a beautiful fish that I have always loved.
I have always loved having a mixed reef with a lot of fish and inverts.
I had well over 100 different corals and 27 fish with two cleaner shrimp at the end.
It's sad that it's gone I'll miss it very much.
Do you name your fish?
I don?t, but my kids and grand-kids always do! Lol
What has Manhattan Reefs contributed to the hobby for you?
I wouldn't have been able to have the reef that I had if it was not for MR.
Raising a family is very costly and I was always short of funds to run my tank. Being able to sell frags to help with the cost really helped so much, also buying frags and used equipment on MR made it possible for me to have the things I wanted.
I could have never had the tank if I had to buy everything from a store?90% of the equipment was bought used or in a group buy and 95% of the live stock was bought as frags. I have never bought a SPS colony, I love watching them grow and MR made that possible for me.
I have met great people here and have made some good friendships as well.
Is there anyone you would like to thank?
I would like to thank Kedd Lytton for helping me so much in the beginning. He had a tank that I loved. I always wanted my tank to get that nice. Anytime I had a problem he would help me out. He's the one who got me into SPS corals I was always afraid of them! It's always nice to have someone to follow and look up to and he was that person for me.
Thanks Kedd!
Final thoughts....
?So it's over for me for a long while. It's been a great ride but it's time for me to take a break.
Thanks again to all on MR that have made this journey an awesome experience.
Vic
...it has been our pleasure Vic. We'll leave the light on for you when you are ready to come back home
~Your MR family :grouphug:
Photo Credits to Vic & Dre
What does being chosen as MR ToTM mean to you?
It's awesome, there?s nothing like getting acknowledged for something you have put so much time and effort into. It's my big trophy.
It should be mentioned that you were one of the people who joined Manhattan Reefs back when the site was only months old, can you tell me how MR is the same ? or different ? from how it was back in the beginning?
Yeah, I've been around since the beginning I guess. It's just a lot more people now. Back then everyone knew each other and became friends quickly. How often can you sell stuff to the same person? After a while you just start giving stuff away to your friends. Now there are more people trying to make a ton of money rather than just keeping it as a hobby and trying to keep the livestock affordable for the next guy. I have become friends with some great people recently? so there are still great people on MR today.
Can you tell us what happened recently so that everyone reading this thread is aware?
As most of you know that my tank is no longer up. On Monday Oct 3rd it sprung a leak on the bottom back corner. I found out it was leaking during a phone call from my downstairs neighbor who told me that water was coming down in her foyer.
When I saw where it was coming from I was in shock for a moment and I knew what I had to do. I put some containers to catch to water but it was very hard to contain as the water was dripping all throughout the back of the stand.
I put an emergency sale tread on MR and I was able to sell all of the livestock that very same day. Thank you God for MR and the people who came to buy - cause as they were buying - they were helping me out with my tank.
I think I can speak for everyone here at MR in expressing our thanks for sharing your beautiful tank through pictures here and for those of us who have had the privilege to visit your home and visit the tank in person.
How did you get involved in fish/reef keeping?
I have always loved fish. I had a small 10gal when I was a kid but I could never keep anything alive. So that didn't last long.
Then after many years my upstairs neighbor sold me his 55gal tank and that's where it all started. I ran it as a freshwater tank and before you knew it I had five different tanks in my apartment, talk about addiction, I was hooked for sure!
I got the saltwater bug in 1999 and bought a used 90 gal salt water set up that had a wet and dry and a Red sea Berlin skimmer. The person who sold me the tank gave me his collection of FAMA magazines, there were about twenty or thirty of them and I started reading all the saltwater articles while I was cycling my tank. So I had my tank cycled and I saw this advertisement to a place in New Rochelle called Total Marine I went there to buy some fish and then it happened I saw my first reef tank, that was it, I was hooked with a capital H.
I was broke but who cared, I needed to have something like that tank I was looking at, so I bought about $20 of live rock and I had my first reef tank. Lol.
Eventually I went from my 90 gal that I started in 1999 to my 180 gallon in 2002 until it sprung that leak on October 3rd 2011?.
Your tank was extremely beautiful and successful; can you share with everyone the details about the tank and your husbandry methods?
It was a 180 gal Star-fire reef ready tank with a beautiful oak stand and canopy. For my lighting I ran 6 x T5's ran on two Ice-Cap 660 ballasts with individual reflectors and
this worked well for my set up due to the low canopy I had.
My sump was a Life-Reef wet and dry with a Super Reef Octopus XP3000 cone skimmer, this was -by far- the best skimmer I have ever owned and it handled my full-blown tank like nothing.
My return was a GRI 580 pressure rated pump with two penductors that created a lot of turbulent flow. For the flow in the DT I had one MP40w and one Korallia 4. I was in need for more flow was planning to get another mp40 when the funds were available; these MP40's really do a great job. I wouldn't run a tank without them.
I used a Spectrapure auto top-off straight from my RO/DI - this is a great product that never gave me a problem from the start of the tank. I also used a Sentry 5 dosing pump would dose my Randy?s two part into my system. The homemade 2-part saved me a ton of money and I would try and keep my Alk at 9 DKH and my Ca at 450 PPM.
I used an old Ehime 2213 canister filter to run my GFO. The GFO really made a difference when I started using it and it's a must for me. I also ran carbon 24/7 that I would replace once a month and I dosed Lugol?s twice per week.
Additionally, I made 40gal/month water changes using Instant Ocean salt. Well that was the plan anyway; I used to get lazy sometimes. Lol
Ahhh, we?ve all been there at some point Vic, life will tend to interfere with our reef keeping responsibilities every now and then!
How did you keep your reef cool?
I didn't run a chiller; I would just run the A/C all the time in the summer.
Good man, keeping you & your family and tank happy all at the same time!
Do you have a favorite fish or coral?
The Powder Blue Tang is my favorite fish; it's just a beautiful fish that I have always loved.
I have always loved having a mixed reef with a lot of fish and inverts.
I had well over 100 different corals and 27 fish with two cleaner shrimp at the end.
It's sad that it's gone I'll miss it very much.
Do you name your fish?
I don?t, but my kids and grand-kids always do! Lol
What has Manhattan Reefs contributed to the hobby for you?
I wouldn't have been able to have the reef that I had if it was not for MR.
Raising a family is very costly and I was always short of funds to run my tank. Being able to sell frags to help with the cost really helped so much, also buying frags and used equipment on MR made it possible for me to have the things I wanted.
I could have never had the tank if I had to buy everything from a store?90% of the equipment was bought used or in a group buy and 95% of the live stock was bought as frags. I have never bought a SPS colony, I love watching them grow and MR made that possible for me.
I have met great people here and have made some good friendships as well.
Is there anyone you would like to thank?
I would like to thank Kedd Lytton for helping me so much in the beginning. He had a tank that I loved. I always wanted my tank to get that nice. Anytime I had a problem he would help me out. He's the one who got me into SPS corals I was always afraid of them! It's always nice to have someone to follow and look up to and he was that person for me.
Thanks Kedd!
Final thoughts....
?So it's over for me for a long while. It's been a great ride but it's time for me to take a break.
Thanks again to all on MR that have made this journey an awesome experience.
Vic
...it has been our pleasure Vic. We'll leave the light on for you when you are ready to come back home
~Your MR family :grouphug:
Photo Credits to Vic & Dre
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