- Location
- Toms River, NJ
Ugh.. had to make 5 posts before I could post this.. I tried to make the 5 post spams as helpful as possible though!! :shhh:
Hi Everyone,
Kinda new here.. I'm on a couple of other forums under various names (OK 2 names.. either Jersey, or Coolaid) Figured I would start a tank thread here to get to know you guys.
I'm a member of NJRC, and based in Toms River, NJ. I'm a 36 year old married biker and cat dad. I've been involved with Salt water since I was 13 years old when I got my first 1 gallon tank with a pair of guppies. I then have been through more tanks then I care to go into. I've bred discus, angels, apistogramma and done a lot of aqua scaping with fresh water. My friend Gil, and I where pretty much our own club at for many years.
In 2010 we had an apartment fire started by a careless neighbor and while everyone got out and was safe (including our cats) we lost my fresh water tanks and everything else we owned.. We had to spend a year loving with my father, and then after much fighting with insurance where able to get our lives back together enough, and we moved down to Toms River to be near my ailing grandparents and my mother / step dad.
When we got into this place, I had built a 210g tank for our turtles that we rescued from a friend of my wifes who was just going to release them into the wild after having them for 5 years..
I decided I wanted a natural look so with some egg crate, rock, driftwood and spray foam, I built this..
View attachment 129098
Current(ish) shot.
View attachment 129099
I love this tank, but I really wanted fish.. Yes, there are fish in the turtle tank (they don't eat them for whatever reason) but I wanted a FISH tank.. My wife doesn't seem to understand the difference... lol
So, I found a good deal on ebay.. A bit of a drive, but I got a 12g nano cube with LED conversion for $125. Picked it up, and here it was!! Just wait.. lol
It was up and running, cycled and had it's first corals.. which fairly quickly turned into a bunch of corals.. Then the cat struck.
Yea.... That was not a good day.. We quickly set up a 20 long I had in the garage, and miraculously managed very few losses.. One fish, and a couple corals after all was said and done.. I went to my local reef club and picked up a nano cube LED pro cheap, and set it up.. got some dry rock, dry sand and prayed the cycle wouldn't be too bad for the fish and corals to handle.
Everything made it though, and it's been up for about 6 months now.
I also have since set up the 20 long as a macro algae dominated tank.
Here is a shot of it.. I'll be updating with more pictures as time goes on, just wanted to get this up and give an introduction
These are both from December.. only a couple of changes since then. I'll get more recent shots up in coming weeks.
Equipment
28g nano cube LED Professional
4 LED pods for accented blues added
mp10es
upgraded ballasts for dusk dawn
CPR bakpak 2
TLF Phosban reactor
2 MJ1200 pumps on wavemaker for return
Titanium heater
20l
2x Aquaclear 50HOB filters (Chemipure and perguine)
2 JBJ wavemaker powerheads
1 korelia nano powerhead
cheapie heater
Nova Extreme t-5ho
4 CFL 6500k diy light
Hi Everyone,
Kinda new here.. I'm on a couple of other forums under various names (OK 2 names.. either Jersey, or Coolaid) Figured I would start a tank thread here to get to know you guys.
I'm a member of NJRC, and based in Toms River, NJ. I'm a 36 year old married biker and cat dad. I've been involved with Salt water since I was 13 years old when I got my first 1 gallon tank with a pair of guppies. I then have been through more tanks then I care to go into. I've bred discus, angels, apistogramma and done a lot of aqua scaping with fresh water. My friend Gil, and I where pretty much our own club at for many years.
In 2010 we had an apartment fire started by a careless neighbor and while everyone got out and was safe (including our cats) we lost my fresh water tanks and everything else we owned.. We had to spend a year loving with my father, and then after much fighting with insurance where able to get our lives back together enough, and we moved down to Toms River to be near my ailing grandparents and my mother / step dad.
When we got into this place, I had built a 210g tank for our turtles that we rescued from a friend of my wifes who was just going to release them into the wild after having them for 5 years..
I decided I wanted a natural look so with some egg crate, rock, driftwood and spray foam, I built this..
View attachment 129098
Current(ish) shot.
View attachment 129099
I love this tank, but I really wanted fish.. Yes, there are fish in the turtle tank (they don't eat them for whatever reason) but I wanted a FISH tank.. My wife doesn't seem to understand the difference... lol
So, I found a good deal on ebay.. A bit of a drive, but I got a 12g nano cube with LED conversion for $125. Picked it up, and here it was!! Just wait.. lol
It was up and running, cycled and had it's first corals.. which fairly quickly turned into a bunch of corals.. Then the cat struck.
Yea.... That was not a good day.. We quickly set up a 20 long I had in the garage, and miraculously managed very few losses.. One fish, and a couple corals after all was said and done.. I went to my local reef club and picked up a nano cube LED pro cheap, and set it up.. got some dry rock, dry sand and prayed the cycle wouldn't be too bad for the fish and corals to handle.
Everything made it though, and it's been up for about 6 months now.
I also have since set up the 20 long as a macro algae dominated tank.
Here is a shot of it.. I'll be updating with more pictures as time goes on, just wanted to get this up and give an introduction
These are both from December.. only a couple of changes since then. I'll get more recent shots up in coming weeks.
Equipment
28g nano cube LED Professional
4 LED pods for accented blues added
mp10es
upgraded ballasts for dusk dawn
CPR bakpak 2
TLF Phosban reactor
2 MJ1200 pumps on wavemaker for return
Titanium heater
20l
2x Aquaclear 50HOB filters (Chemipure and perguine)
2 JBJ wavemaker powerheads
1 korelia nano powerhead
cheapie heater
Nova Extreme t-5ho
4 CFL 6500k diy light
