Roger's House

[tparsons]

As hobbyist ourselves, we at Reef Wholesale understand how important it is to help encourage and promote education surrounding marine aquariums.
Nothing delights me more than a young child’s face lighting up as they ask questions about the fish and the corals in a marine aquarium.
I am always amazed by the amount of knowledge that children can absorb – often quicker than adults.
Let’s also remember, that awareness and education doesn’t stop with children and often their enthusiasm is encouragement for family members to take an interest in our beloved hobby Smile

That is why this year we have dedicated time and funds to help ensure that proper marine care and education is encouraged in our community.

One of our main community focuses for 2011 will be the maintenance of a 180g Reef Tank at Roger’s House.



Roger’s House is an eight-bed Pediatric Paliative Care Hospice in Ottawa, Ontario located on the grounds of the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario.
Roger's House enriches the lives of children, youth and their families facing progressive life-limiting illnesses. Roger's House was built in memory of Roger Neilson--Hockey Hall of Fame Coach and Member of the Order of Canada.

Their team provides respite, end-of-life, transition to home support and bereavement care by ensuring individualized physical, emotional and spiritual support in a caring, compassionate and continuous learning environment. Their reward is the peace and comfort of every child, the creation of memories for their families and honouring the legacy of Roger Neilson.



Roger’s House staff informed us that one very special comforts for the children and families who stay with them is their salt water aquarium. This 180g fish tank is situated in a quiet corner of the residence, a nice tranquil area flanked by a comfy couch for all to sit while mesmerized by the fish and corals in the aquarium.

Families often tell the staff of Roger’s House how special the fish tank is to them. It offers a place for solace and quiet reflective time as well as an opportunity to observe unique and entertaining specimens.

For many years, Roger’s House has been blessed with the help of a local tank maintenance company, however, they could no longer continue to offer the level of attention the tank required. Patrick and I answered an add for volunteers to help maintain the tank and made our first visit to Roger’s House. After meeting the staff, volunteers and youth of Roger’s House, we at Reef Wholesale have decided to make a commitment to help Roger’s House maintain their tank.

[abcha0s]

This is great. Please keep me updated and if there's anyway that I can help - I will.

[eli@fijireefrock.com]

A very noble thing to do.
give help when needed with open arms.
If there is anything we could do please let us know.

[tparsons]

Thanks to everyone for their support on this project, including our supportive manufacturers and suppliers!

It is time to update everyone with a few changes happening on this system.

After initial assessments, we noticed that the tank was severely lacking in the Clean-Up Crew Department. We added;
Astrea, Cerith, Nassarius, Mexican Red Legs and Mexican Scarlets to the tank. The astrea are still working away at cleaning up the rocks and the back glass, but these cleaners have done an excellent job so far! As for the cerith and nassarius they must be in heaven in that dirty sand bed as they disappeared right away and are only occasionally seen at night and at feeding time.

The staff at Roger's house noticed a difference in the overall cleanliness of the tank and the children enjoyed seeing the "crew" do their work, cleaning rocks and glass etc and especially the Nassarius burrowing in and out of the substrate!



Next we needed to address the feeding regime.
To date the fish had been fed pellets but only a couple times per week.
Fauna Marin graciously donated fish food for the year so we brought in a mix of Spirulina, Health and Energy foods from Fauna Marin.

Thank You Fauna Marin!!

Through the help of some of the volunteers at Rogers house I am happy to report that the fish are being fed 1-2 times per day now and loving their new food

Although I did anticpate a change in eating patterns from the fish, it was amazing to hear from Lise herself that the fish seemed to be eating more voraciously and becoming more active with their new diet. After supplying the fish with a better quality food and a better feeding regime, the fish were noticably more active and less prone to hiding.


This week we added the Two Little Fishies Purple and Green Algea to their daily feeding regime and I haven't seen tangs go after Algea so happily in my seven years in this hobby Normally it can take tangs that have been in captivity for this long and that have never been fed nori several days to start eating nori but both the tangs were mowing TLF nori within second of it being added to the tank.
I am sure this will provide lots of entertainment for the children and the staff.
To help the staff know how much to feed we also took the time to tear up several pieces of the TLF green and purple nori into the appropriately sized pieces. This way any member of the staff can come along and create a feeding frenzy with the tangs for the children to relax and enjoy watching. Right now we are just using the normal TLF algae clip with a suction cup but shortly we will upgrade to one of the TLF algae clips with the magnet and the foam floating for when it comes un attached.


The flow in the 180g tank was more than just a bit lacking as the only flow in the entire tank was from the little giant return pump.
We approached Ecotech and we need to send out a HUGE thanks to them as they were crazy generous and donated not one, but TWO MP40 W ES pumps for this amazing cause!

Thank You Ecotech!!!

Previously the tank had chronic cyano issues due to lack of flow, but the MP40's are doing an excellent job and creating more than enough flow in the tank. Now the nutrient are staying in suspension and going down the overflow to the sump where that can be properly exported. About 2 weeks after adding the pumps we received an email from the Rogers House with comments about how much better the tank looked and how much cleaner the front sand bed was looking. The extra inverts did of course help with this, but the additional nutrient export is vital in our efforts to make this tank look its best!

Sorry that we do not have any more pics at this time but we will be in helping out at the Rogers House again later this week so I am sure we can snap some then.