Photo Gallery :: Saltwater Reef pics

[DavidY]

Okay, a couple of you asked to see pics of my saltwater reef tank. I dug up a few old pics and uploaded them and here they are. I'll try to get some more recent ones as well as some pics of the predator tanks and the filtration system.

Here's the most recent shot of the entire display tank from a few months ago. It was after I removed all of the old rock which had become completely overgrown with red mushroom corals, pulsing xenia and leather corals. I moved those down into the basement grow-out tank. I added some new live rock and a few new corals.


Here's a closeup of the clown fish in his host anemone...

That's a Tridacna crocea clam in the foreground...


This is a pic of the pulsing Xenia (left) and the blue-speckled red mushroom corals (right) after i moved them to the basement.

and one of the giant Green Tree Nepthea coral...

and here's a pic of some of the corals being propagated in the grow-out tank in the basement (I trade these in to the pet store for credit). Those are some leather corals on the left half of the screen...

[N4784N R4613]

THATS AWESOME!!!!! I can't wait to see more pics!! What kind of filter are you running on the display tank? Nice job, it really looks awesome!!

[Parnasa]

Wow, I admire all of that, I'm dying to have a saltwater reef tank when I grow up and have my own home.

[turboturtle8]

ohhhhh wow cool tank how many many fish do you have in there??

[powerofvoodoo]

That's amazing. I've wanted a saltwater tank for awhile now but I think that if I do ever get one, I'll spent all my time and money making a replica of the fish tank in Finding Nemo. (For the record, I'm almost 21 years old)

[turboturtle8]

lol your not the only one everytime I see a clownfish I think of Nemo too

[kmichael55]

Very cool, I'm jealous. I always see saltwater fish at the store and want them, they're definitely more exotic looking. I really want a starfish, the Petco near me has some really brightly colored ones, I thought they just came in brown.

[SpotsMama]

How beautiful! The colors are magical.

[Safdar]

Wow that is beautiful
Is it alot of maintainence

[Tenodera]

Wow! How do you "grow" coral? lol

Beautiful tank! What's the predator tank?

[Terryo]

Unbelievably beautiful! I never knew coral grew. More pictures please!

[DavidY]

Thanks! I have about 7 fish in the main display tank along with several red peppermint shrimp (that breed regularly), a bunch of small hermit crabs and snails (algae eaters), a serpent starfish, at least one sea cucumber and some other little critters. The predators are a snowflake eel and an angler frogfish. They each have their own tank with all the tanks sharing the same common filtration/sump system in the basement. The entire system is setup and established as a minimal maintenance habitat with high intensity lighting (2x250 watt metal halide bulbs) to mimic natural sunlight. This starts the cycle by allowing the algae and corals to feed off the nutrients in the water from all the biological waste. The food chain continues with other micro organisms, crustaceans and other invertebrates feeding on the algae, fish feed on the them and then their waste products feed the algae and corals and the cycle continues...

I only have to feed the predators frozen/thawed shrimp and fish once or twice a week and that's it. The only other maintenance involved is scraping the algae that grows on the glass, cleaning out the protein skimmer (a bubble/foam generating filter that removes excess nutrients from the water), and a 30gallon water change once or twice a year.

[grey goose]

Thats really beautiful David. One of these days I'm going to try my hand at salt water tanks...........

[turboturtle8]

Must be hard to take care of.Must be really cool to have one of those bad boys in your basement

[N4784N R4613]

Are all the tanks on the main filter in your basement? Or do you have a pump to go upstairs? It sounds really interesting, and I would love to hear more about the filtration system you have!