I'm discouraged

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Oscarr19

Aquarium Advice Addict
Joined
Jul 12, 2011
Messages
2,038
Location
Canada
There just has to be a problem all the time :(

I'm doing my regular water change and I happen to burn out my heater that's in my mixing bucket, find my purple firefish on the floor all dried up, and had a massive algae outbreak probably due to the death of my lawnmower blenny because I haven't seen him in a week and he was starved since he wouldn't eat any natural algae and nori didn't seem to do anything.

This just sucks after all the time and money you invest trying to do things right...
 
You are not the only one experiencing disaster in reef keeping. I'm pretty sure many have even worse than yours. However, once you have settled down and learned how to avoid mistakes it will be just a simple routine and the feeling of success is more rewarding.
 
Just remember perseverance is the key keep at it bro things will get better iv been where you are I mean look at my tank in this pic and see where it's at now ImageUploadedByAquarium Advice1393226890.088721.jpgImageUploadedByAquarium Advice1393226918.204218.jpg
 
My saltwater setup I picked up off CL he ran a canister I wanted a sump, first sump I built I used the wrong silicone and didn't let the PVC cure long enough, baffle collapsed and I'm pretty sure chemical residue wiped out any or all beneficial bacteria, even the aiptasia shriveled and died, second attemp went a little better until the side of the sump split due to the bottom of the stand being warped, third sump is doing good,
foot long engineer goby, carpet surfing
Yellow coris wrasse, carpet surfing
Other foot long engineer goby, choked on a shell
I've had two anemones disintegrate,
One wouldn't attach to anything and got blown under a rock
The other decided he wanted to snuggle up to the heater
I can't count the number of times I forgot to turn off the ro unit and ended up with water on the floor and the list of mistakes and mishaps goes on and on

IT HAPPENS, and has happened to most of us, the best you can do is learn from it, prepare for it, and use the experiences to better your practices so you can build a better reef, I've made plenty of mistakes, I'm sure I'll make plenty more, but the scale and Oh S##% factor of them continues to get smaller and smaller, just take your time and be thoughtful of what of you do and remember that nothing good in this hobby happens quickly and the good things are worth waiting for
 
I know a guy who bought a 600 gallon acrylic tank off CL and it broke. The top brace came apart and the front panel bowed and water poured out...on to his computer couch floor! He came home to find the return pump smoking and a third of the water out of his huge tank and a half dozen fish dyeing on the floor.

He runs to the tank and pushes the bowed center( 8 foot tank) back straight

Then a seem on the side opens up spilling the rest of the tank onto his entertainment center tv cable box surround sound all toast. Giant flood washes fish out the open slide door into his pool purple tang dident last aslong as the parrot fish in the pool

He was lucky to be alive the tank could have killed him or his kids.

Every time I have a problem I think about how good I have it!
 
Yeah you guys are right, lessons learned and now I know better. I guess if I give another firefish a shot I'll make sure to use screen netting instead of egg crate. Algae is getting better and I might do a blackout to make sure it doesn't come back. I'm giving my LMB one more shot. I'm hoping he'll come out as I placed nori on a piece of live rock he usually comes out to. Perhaps he didn't like or noticed the algae clip.

Worst comes to worst, I get to purchase new fish that I've never had before and give em a shot. :D
 
I know a guy who bought a 600 gallon acrylic tank off CL and it broke. The top brace came apart and the front panel bowed and water poured out...on to his computer couch floor! He came home to find the return pump smoking and a third of the water out of his huge tank and a half dozen fish dyeing on the floor.

He runs to the tank and pushes the bowed center( 8 foot tank) back straight

Then a seem on the side opens up spilling the rest of the tank onto his entertainment center tv cable box surround sound all toast. Giant flood washes fish out the open slide door into his pool purple tang dident last aslong as the parrot fish in the pool

He was lucky to be alive the tank could have killed him or his kids.

Every time I have a problem I think about how good I have it!

If he's married he's still lucky to be alive, if my money pit did this, my wife would kill me...:lol:
 
The wife is in Brazil for 2 weeks

I dot know this guy well and he was on the path to a tank crash but never imagined this. 8 foot by 3 foot by 3 foot tank. He bought a huge tank on CL that had nice lights skimmer and ( no joke ) 125 gallon sump entirely full of bio balls for some reason. He go rid of the skimmer because it was 4 foot tall and ran on a pool filter pump. Also got rid if the return for the sump ( also a pool pump) and replaced it with like a 300gph mag drive. 150 watt heater.

He was having 10 degree temp swings every day/night
He bought the fish and rock from someone breaking down. 1200 gallon tank in a restaurant. Tangs angels parrotfish and about 1000lbs of rock. He could fit about half the rock in his tank and was selling the rest. ( that's how I met him)

He also bought the coral from someone with a 55 gallon tank and had a few rocks covered in alage, aptisia and a few polyps.

To this he added two huge and beautiful nems and more damsels than one could count.

It's almost better that the whole thing literally fell apart before it fell apart
 
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