Leaving my wife in charge of the tank.

sweatervest13

sweatervest13

Active Member
Hi all,

I am going to be going out of town this week for a wedding in Denver this Friday I am putting my wife in charge of the tank(s) while I am away. She is pretty good at following directions, but does not really understand how the tank works. The last time she was in charge of the tank (January of 2013 for 4 days) I lost one clown fish. I never found a body and she was just as surprised as I was that it was gone.

I left two pages of directions to cover everything from feeding to cleaning the glass. She has already reviewed them and asked a few questions. My only big concern is that I have a nice Powder Brown Tang in QT right now. It is in the middle of a hypo treatment, and so far has been doing great.

I have three tanks going right now: 125g reef tank with 67g sump, 10g QT, and IM Nuvo 8 mini reef tank. The big tank is fully automated (minus controller), but the other two require topoff's.

Anyone else freak out when leaving someone in charge of their tanks???

Last night I did my weekly water change on the big tank, cleaned the skimmer, changed the filter floss, top offed the top off reservoir, and cleaned the glass. Besides cleaning the glass every other day she should be fine other than feeding the big tank.

What are some other things that I might be missing??
 
snakeblitz33

snakeblitz33

Well-Known Member
If she comes on here while your away, I'll be sure to let her know that chlorine bleach is a great additive... increases coral growth and you'll be really happy when you come back. :D



All joking aside, I think that you can cover just about all of your maintenance routine in two pages of notes. Add in observation if you can. If your wife notices something off, you can have the LFS on standby.

I might would have 10g of water mixing / premixed just in case of emergency.
 
btldreef

btldreef

Moderator
Even though your tang is mid-hypo treatment, I wouldn't be expecting her to have to change the salinity of the QT tank, just leave it as it is. Just make sure she stays on top of top offs.
You could also make her an account here just in case she has any questions and we can help her out. Update your tank thread so if we have any questions about your setup, we'll know where to look quick to know what's running.

Most importantly: Have fun while you're away!
 
goldrush

goldrush

Member
For what it's worth: I go away for a month every year and leave my son-in-law in charge. When I leave I make sure everything is perfect. I leave him 50 gallons of top-off water and 8-10 little plastic containers of food. He comes over every 3-4 days, tops off, feeds and leaves. I've been doing this for many years and so far I've never had a problem. Of course there is a plan B in case of an emergency. He can reach me and I can put him in touch with someone locally that can handle anything way out of the ordinary. Sure, when I get home there is extra cleaning and adjustments that need to be made, but I don't obsess. It's one of those cases where less is more. Good luck. I hope everything turns out fine
 
snakeblitz33

snakeblitz33

Well-Known Member
If you have any local reefers in town that you know of and who you trust,... see if they will do some vacation maintenance on your tank. Nothing better then a fellow reefer friend to do it for you... and more then likely they will love to do it.
 
sweatervest13

sweatervest13

Active Member
If she comes on here while your away, I'll be sure to let her know that chlorine bleach is a great additive... increases coral growth and you'll be really happy when you come back. :D 
All joking aside, I think that you can cover just about all of your maintenance routine in two pages of notes. Add in observation if you can. If your wife notices something off, you can have the LFS on standby.
I might would have 10g of water mixing / premixed just in case of emergency.
Observation was a big bullet point in the notes. Specifically when she cleans the glass. She had done a lot of bits and pieces of maintenance but now the tank is in her hands. I feel comfortable.
Also good call on getting in here if something goes wrong. I'll have her post something like sweatervests tank in trouble help!!
I did not get water mixing before I left, but I will have her start mixing a bit later tonight.
You guys are great!!! Thanks for the ideas!!
So far the trip is just a lot of driving. 4 guys in a sedan. We left at 630 pm last night. I stayed up with the driver until 5am before we changed shifts with the back seat guys.
The weather in Denver is iffy at best for an outdoor Friday wedding. But I get to see some great friends so I don't care one bit. Plus I get to try to secure a place to stay if I can pull off MACNA next year.
 
islandkoa

islandkoa

Member
Comms. Aside from the wedding ceremony, will she be able to contact you while in Denver? Using Skype or an ip cam in addition to voice would help. As someone recommended, having a fellow reefer POC is good advice in case of emergency.. .especially if comms were limited.
 
sweatervest13

sweatervest13

Active Member
I am back in town. My wife did a great job!!

No losses. The tank actually looks very good. She followed the notes and called once for a quick (easy) question. We did Facetime a couple of different times and one of them she showed me the tank. It was pretty cool. A couple of corals did get knocked over by my darn urchin, but no big deal.

Tonight I have to get some water ready for my regular weekly water change. Clean the skimmer, and change the filter floss. There is always work to be done on a reef tank!!.

The Powder Brown did great. She said it was eating like a pig!!

I am going to continue to observe the Tang and hopefully start to bring up the salinity next week.

Thanks for all of the suggestions... You guys ROCK!!!
 
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