Mantis Shrimp

Here are some pictures of the “striking” Mantis Shrimp. I toke these pictures during diving in Lembeh Strait, Indonesia. Lembeh strait is perhaps the world’s best muck diving. Make sure you bring your macro lens and you will be astonished by the weird and quirky animals that live there.

I will be posting pictures from different species that i have encountered.

Day 6 of Cycling – Levels and Hitchhikers

It’s a day 6 of the cycling period. The tests show that the ammonia has gone Zero, so I guess the cycling is working.

Testing results from yesterday:

• PH 8.2
• Ammonia….4.0
• Nitrite………2.0
• Nitrate……..20

Testing results from today, day 5:

• PH 8.4
• Ammonia….0
• Nitrite………5.0
• Nitrate……..0

Also the rock is turning a little brown, there are bubbles forming on its surface.

Also there is some green plants/algae growing in places.

There are some stuff that has start appearing, but I have no idea what they are:

Some spiderweb like patch coverig the rock and the grass.

1/8" white tube with 1/16" red feathers sticking out

It looks like aipstasia, but not 100% sure yet.

Uknown hitchiker, flinches from time to time.

New addition – 5lbs live rock

After impulse shopping spree, returned home with 5 lbs more live rock. As you can see there a little re-arrangementent of the rocks. It was frustrating at the beggining because I didn’t like how the formation was turning out. Bu,t at the end I was satisfied and created plenty of caves/swin thoughs for the critters.

Also, I did some testing of the water on day 2 and here are the results:

• Salinity……..1.022
• PH …………..8.0
• Ammonia….2.0
• Nitrite………0.5
• Nitrate……..20

Aquascaping, DONE!

The Live Rock that we got, has just arrived from Tonga. It’s uncured rock, and has all sorts of growth on it, several tiny crab hitchhikers, and some wormie thingies.

After several tries of playing Tetris with the rock in the tank for the best Aquascape, I reached satisfaction. Than came the sand and the rock disapeared in a cloud of sand Finally the water cleared up and I must say I am very satisfied with it. Here are some pictures of the tank and closeups of the rock. Notice the growth on it.

The aquarium is home

Finally I made the purchase. I came home with:

• 14 gallon BioCube tank
• Stand
• 12 lbs of Live Rock from Tonga
• 20 lbs of Live Sand – Fiji Pink
• MaxiJet 900 pump
• Heater
• Purigen
• Chemi Pure
• API test
• Thermometer

I made some modifications to the back chambers:
• 3rd chamber — I replaced the stock pump with the Maxi Jet and removed the sponge
• 2nd chamber — I removed all of the stock filters, bioballs and sponges and replaced it with bag of Chemi Pure and stack of Filter Floss
• I cut 3/4″ between the 1st and 2nd chamber for better overflow
• 1st chamber — Took out the false bottom, placed bag of Purigen and the heater

My mind is set

Ok, so this is the deal. My landlord doesn’t allow any pets with claws. So no cast or dogs.
I came a cross this web-site Nano-Reef.com, a website for salt water aquarium enthusiasts. Since I am an avid diver and want a pet/pets very badly, i got hooked right away.
After spending hours and hours reading the forum posts and doing my research as a newbie I decided to start with a 14 gallon Oceanic BioCube tank. Tomorrow I will be driving to Dublin, CA for an hour to this cool aquarium shop called Aquarium Concepts and pick up the aquarium, together with a live rock and other stuff required to start our own aquarium.
I will be blogging my process with photos and I hope the aquarium will turn out awesome. Wish me luck!