Quote:
Originally Posted by
Kiefers http:///t/388290/ask-me-anything-ama-thread#post_3423543
My turn.....
1) Why saltwater? Surprisingly, I'm not just passionate about saltwater. This is a saltwater forum, so I expect to talk about saltwater tanks etc. I have a passion for all things aquatic and aquaculture. If this was a freshwater fish forum, I'de be going into the gritty details of DIY CO2, breeding cichlids, rams, and guppies and breeding fish for genotypes/genetics, Plantscaping and all kinds of things. lol. I'm fascinated with Aquaponics, Aeroponics, Hydroponics, Aquaculture, and permaculture. If it has to do with water and growing or breeding something, then I'm interested. 
I love saltwater especially because of the challenges that it provides, and the ability to apply our knowledge of the hobby to try to help the ocean and reefs. My main interest is studying the worlds reefs, which hopefully I will be able to do first hand one of these days.
2) If there was only "ONE" piece of advice you could give to a new comer, what would it be? (Aside from reading a book, no books, articles or journals allowed).
Research every purchase before you buy. Anything from equipment to livestock, you must know what you are buying, the benefits and problems that it may cause and the compatibility of it to your system.
3) If your space and check book allowed, what would your dream tank consist of? Size, and live stock included. DEAR GOD! My dream system... I'de live in Hawaii, very, very close to the beach. I would have them scoop out a good portion of the sand and lay boulders down to create a natural reef. I would have a livingroom underground and the entire wall would be really thick acrylic with a true ocean view. Over time, corals would inhabit the area and I wouldn't have to pay for any corals or fish or equipment to maintain it, except a diving suit and an acrylic polisher. HAHAHAHAHA And by the time I could afford all of that, I would pay for someone to do that for me. Now that would be a room with a view!
In reality!!!! When I finish school and my wife and I finally settle down into a house, I'm going to make sure that the living room is adjacent to the garage. I'm going to build or buy a 500+ gallon reef tank built in wall of my living room. The tank would actually be no taller than 2 foot but it would be really long. I would use two closed loop systems on two ocean motions 4 way units. I am going to design a custom acrylic sump of about 100g, that has a place for an algae scrubber, a live rock refugium, and plenty of space for extra water. I would need enough space for the two external return pumps and two closed loop pumps and a pump to a completely separate system for a shallow frag tank, about 100g. I would also like two 45g brute trash cans filled with sand for two remote deep sand beds. If I had my choice I would get a volcano skimmer, but the $5000 price tag might put me off a bit. Besides, I don't think he makes them anymore.
I would add a skimmer to the system because I would want to heavily feed. 500 pounds of live rock in the DT, 200 pounds base rock in the sump, and another 50 pounds in the frag tank. Surprisingly, I would actually go barebottom in the Display tank, just because I need a high flow for all the SPS I would also use that foam technique to get the caves just right. Over time everything would be corallined over. I also plan on dripping kalkwasser and having a calcium reactor. I would go with metal halides supplemented with T5HOs for my lighting system. If LED's come a long way till then, I'm going to go the old school route.
For livestock... Snowflake clowns, picasso clowns, bi-color blennies, lawn mower blennie, scooter goby, mated pair of ORA mandarin dragonets, watchman goby, green banded goby, helfrichi firefish goby pair, regal tang, sailfin tang, yellow tang, clown tang, kole tang, scopas tang. For corals, I would have to go with SPS dominated, Acropora, Pociliopora, Stylophora, montipora in different varieties. I would like to get a couple of tabletop acros and let them grow out. I plan on fragging a lot and re-selling them. lol, not on here of course. I would also like an open brain if barebottom permits. I'll settle on a fungia plate. Sun corals are also a personal favorite. My wife wants something that moves a lot, so I'll have to probably get a blue carpet anemone - I would LOVE one. Maybe the clowns would host it. I'll end up with some frags and stuff from other peoples tanks somehow that will find a way into my tank. lol.
and congrats on your new child to be!
Thank you, thank you.
