reefing

[redemer123]

I wanted to start a thread asking all you fellow reefers what is it that brought you into this hobby?

[schminksbro]

For me it was a guy I worked with circa 1989 who had a beautiful 90 gallon reef. I expressed interest and the next thing you know I have a 55 gallon reef tank complete with Lights, return pump, skimmer, and a few rocks that he supplied at no charge. He helped me along and I have been hooked ever since.

[DYoung]

Best friend had a ~300 gal custom in the living room that was just incredible! Asked me if I wanted to go with him to pick up a few corals and from the moment that I set foot in that store I was 100% hooked!! Had to give the hobby up for a while- bought our first house (an intense fixer) on raised foundation and the 960 wasn't making the trip. Hated to let it go, guys at a local acrylic shop built it for me for a pretty penny. Got back in about 2 months ago with- wait for it this will blow you away.....a nano

[creefer]

Ever since I was a kid I was always fascinated by reefs.....just had to get one of my own.

[MizTanks]

Aside from loving everything ocean related? I've been keeping FW for more then 30yrs. There's not much I don't know about FW. Had 7 tanks running at the time I went to the LFS cause they has some new Shell Dwellers in, yahoo!
Stopped to check out the SW room and I was hooked. There before me was the perfect SW tank, beautifully set up and thriving! A little 8g bio cube! A year an a half later here I am, looking to upgrade


There is nothing like being a REEFER!

[creefer]

Aside from loving everything ocean related? I've been keeping FW for more then 30yrs. There's not much I don't know about FW. Had 7 tanks running at the time I went to the LFS cause they has some new Shell Dwellers in, yahoo!
Stopped to check out the SW room and I was hooked. There before me was the perfect SW tank, beautifully set up and thriving! A little 8g bio cube! A year an a half later here I am, looking to upgrade


There is nothing like being a REEFER!

Shell dwellers are super cool. I always wanted a shell dwell shallow tank, but this bug got me instead.

[jolson10450]

Well my family has had freshwater tanks almost my whole life and i also had freshwater tanks for numerous years and i am only 23 years old right now. I didn't know much about water quality at that time, i just plopped fish in and topped off the water. It went great for a number of years for me, i had really nice freshwater tanks with gar's and stuff. I then converted to saltwater around 2003-2004 setting up my first 29g stand alone tank. It had no skimmer just a HOB filter and heater and powerhead. i did not know what a water change was because i never did them in freshwater so i would always just top off my water for about a whole year. I got an explosive amount of algae (cyano and diatoms) in the tank and each day it would come back until i finally just gave up and tore the tank down. Around 2005-2006 i started back in freshwater breeding a few different types of fish and selling them to a local store at the time that has since went out of business. What really inspired me to get back into reefing was an old neighbors uncle had a tank. I believe it was roughly a 120g half circle tank. He had it right in his doorway and i went over there once and literally watched everything for 2-3 hours. He had 3 100g sumps in his basement that ran this tank and it was truly amazing. at that point i decided to get back into it buying a 3g tom dico tank. i had that tank going for about 2 years with coral and inverts only. I then purchased a 12g nano from a friend and added a 70w metal halide to it and finally was down the read with my 12g reef tank with fish. It had all customizations done to it. I had a prizm skimmer on back, the 70w halide, koralia nano in it, upgraded mj1200 on it, hydor flo on it, the surface skimmer on it, it really was the works for a 12g nano. it grew sps great. After that i got a buddy of mine into the hobby and he started off with a 22g tank, well i decided to upgrade to keep a bigger tank than him so i went with my new current 29g tank with t5 setup and it has been running since march of 2010. I have done more research on tanks that anyone can imagine, i wanted everything to go perfect and live great and flourish this time around. i had a few stand issues with a particle board stand so i built my own stand and canopy DIY from research i have done. everything went smoothly and i did not lose a single in the switch of stands. I have changed substrates in a single day without a single loss either. I have since started bacteria dosing my tank and i have no complaints at all. everything has been going strong now that i have done extensive amounts of research. I do plan on getting into breeding fish but i currently do not have the funds and would like to move into a better place first before doing so.

that is pretty much my story about reefing so now you all know.

[gablett]

My parents had a saltwater tank when I was a baby almost 30 years ago. Then they got a 180 reef complete with undergravel filter, trickle filter and the dead coral that was all the craze. Cycled it with zero live rock and 6 blue damsels. I remember watching those buggers swim around for weeks. Most didnt last too long. Had puffers, sting rays and so on. It was my job to do the weekly water quality tests. Sold it and skip forward 15 years and they out of the blue decided to get back in with a 150 bow front, so I bought a used 50 breeder for my house and now the 220. So I guess it was my mom and dad that are responsible for my addiction!

[cg5071]

We had ciclid tanks a couple of years ago and still had the tank laying around. I was looking for pumps ect since those were in bad shape. I found a 40g reef ready in the paper for $60. It only had 2 x 96w pc and a marineland 400 but that was enough to get started. Last october I believe I started collecting stuff but I started at the bottom finding all my info on the internet about anything that interested me and of course those searches lead to something else.

[redemer123]

great stories keep em coming