I had to resort to the flash. That Sohal Tang is just stunning, under actinics as well as under full lighting. It had to be 14" long, easily 1" thick, and ruled that tank. Its scalpel was over 1" long. Is it any surprise this is the RC logo fish? I may photoshop about 7 of them into my reef to get past this craving. :D
Here are some closeups under actinics, and also under MH lighting when they finally kicked on after waiting a while.
Octopus Coral (similar to Frogspawn, but with more dots)
Orange plate coral
Candy Cane
This is a really pretty green tabling Acropora milleopora. I don't recall seeing this color before, but apparently many members there have it.
This huge Torch colony was being hosted in by some Ocellaris clownfish.
Sohal - man those streamers are gorgeous!
These huge rose bubble tip anemones hosted a pair of Cinammon Clownfish. The main one used to be 24" wide before the split. It was about 12" wide that morning.
Lobophytum
I asked about the maintenance. They'd changed 40g that day, and the zoo feeds the tank each day. They have specific rules, such as you can't kill anything in the tank. So aiptasia can't be nuked, and flatworms get to thrive. Kind of crazy, but the signed contract requires that they follow the guidelines. In front of the tank are two permanent binders that have heavily-laminated pages about each animal or coral in the tank.
The sump beneath uses Miracle Mud. The skimmer (not pictured) is a My Reef Creations, running externally at the end of the tank. The Aqua Controller II helps track tank parameters.
Closed loop plumbing; eggcrate keeps jumpers in the tank.
The pumps employ timed gate valves that switch the flow from one side of the tank to the other. Calcium Reactor in the forefront
As it was raining, we quickly made our way back to the truck, and I got to eat the "World's Greatest Cheeseburger" before catching a flight back to DFW. Once I got home, my corals were acclimated, my skimmer needed some minor tuning, and all was back to normal again.
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