1350 Gallon Reef

[KevinK]

Mr Wilson,

what substrate is there in the main tank, and how thick,

it seems very course and as far as my understanding goes' thy always say course material will trap a lot of debris.-- what's the background on this ?

I also se there is a DSB in the refugium what's the grade there

thanks

[fishoholic]

Originally Posted by mr.wilson

Good to be home. The aquarium is in Oakville Ontario for those that don't already know.

Cool, I was born Oakville

I have to say that is an amazing set up, if I ever had the money I'd definately want something just like that Thank-you for sharing

[lastlight]

I remember thinking when he first started this build that it seemed crazy to have no budget restraints and still limit yourself to 3 feet across. You guys have done an amazing job though it looks fantastic!

I recall reading that Peter was sourcing premium stuff and not really starting with frags so it's hard to tell how growth has been. Have you seen a lot of growth under the Orpheks?

[mr.wilson]

Originally Posted by lastlight

I remember thinking when he first started this build that it seemed crazy to have no budget restraints and still limit yourself to 3 feet across. You guys have done an amazing job though it looks fantastic!

I recall reading that Peter was sourcing premium stuff and not really starting with frags so it's hard to tell how growth has been. Have you seen a lot of growth under the Orpheks?

Actually, frags are premium, we have been buying maricultured pieces from tangerine to grapefruit size. They come in washed out and we do what we can to colour them up.

Don't even bring up the 3' across thing It drives us all crazy that it isn't 4-5'. That ship had sailed before I came on the scene, and Chingchai had warner him too... well, next tank

Growth has been really good, especially in the past month. A colour improvement was the main difference we saw. I will dig through my pics and try to find some before and after with dates, but give me some time. The staghorns are the fastest growing, with montipora & millipora not far behind.

[mr.wilson]

Originally Posted by fishoholic

Cool, I was born Oakville

I have to say that is an amazing set up, if I ever had the money I'd definately want something just like that Thank-you for sharing

You never know, the tank may still be there when it's your turn to retire and move back to Oakville

[mr.wilson]

Originally Posted by KevinK

Mr Wilson,

what substrate is there in the main tank, and how thick,

it seems very course and as far as my understanding goes' thy always say course material will trap a lot of debris.-- what's the background on this ?

I also se there is a DSB in the refugium what's the grade there

thanks

We started off with a mixed grade and scraped the small stuff we had initially. The fine stuff gets swept up into the cleaning magnets too easily. The surge in flow moves some sand around, so we add course (grape size) aragonite where the sand tends to shift.

I like course substrate because it turns pink with coraline algae and provides good tunneling for gobies and jawfish. It also provides better homes for zooplankton. Fine sand simply cannot support large colonies of copepods and amphipods.

We used regular fine sand in the refugium because it was more for bacteria and we needed to use it somewhere. I like the look of mixed sand with shells. The regular stuff is too homogenous and looks like cat litter