I have been diving for over 20 years my father had me certified when i was 13 years old by NAUI and have been lucky enough to dive in the Red sea with Dr Eugenie Clark which was absolutely amazing and educational, the Great barrier reef, Hawaii, Bahamas devils backbone, Galapagos, Cozumel, fiji, Bonaire, Greece, rip diving of st marten, shark diving in eluthra. I didnt count my certification dive of shinicock cannal..lol:splitspin.. I probably logged well over 700 dives.
Well I suppose if you were enticed directly into reefkeeping from an experience then that would count. but if there was a large gap and the two were largely un-connected then id say to put it down as a 'no' vote.
To be a little bit more forthcomming...what im after is a ratio of reefkeepers who can effectively say that the way they run and set up thier reefs has been directly or indirectly affected by physical experience of the real thing rather than just images or film footage.
Regards and thanks to everyone for your feedback so far.
Dove prior to Reefkeeping. Now do both whever I can. Just came back from Central America-stayed a week at a local dive resort. Had a blast-eat, sleep, dive, repeat.
Diver(and snorkel/snuba when couldnt dive)... was the reason I got a fish tank, I missed it.
I believe my tank is not a attempt to "replicate" a reef, or any other real dive site..but rather just a collaboration of corals I like and where they fit/work in my tank...but I did want the rock structure to be as "realalistic" as possible.
Dive locations:
St Barths
Nieves island(I think this is the spelling)
South Florida(several locations)
Mexico(several locations)
Belize
and maybe more I cant think of