ALL DETAILS ABOUT FRESHWATER FISH AND TANKS: discuss

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Friday, 20 June 2014

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Florida to Ban All Pterois Lionfish Imports Beginning August 1st
Neptune Systems Kicks Off Nationwide Apex Fusion Tour This Weekend
Tip of the Day – 6/20/2014

Florida to Ban All Pterois Lionfish Imports Beginning August 1st

Posted: 20 Jun 2014 08:00 AM PDT

We keep harping on the lionfish invasion of the Caribbean Sea, Atlantic Ocean, and pretty much all waters surrounding Florida because it is a serious, ongoing issue with seemingly no end in sight. Despite the best efforts of scientists to understand the issue, legislators to fix the problem, and recreational fishermen to eradicate the invaders, the problem persists to the point where different and often drastic measures have to be given a good look. The latest attempt to help tackle the invasion is the straight up ban on the import of all lionfish from the Pterois genus into Florida. But is it the right move?

As spelled out in one of Ret Talbot’s latest contributions to the Reef2Rainforest blog, Florida Fish and Wildlife Commissioners unanimously approved the prohibition of the “importation of live lionfish from the genus Pterois“, approved divers to use rebreather equipment to harvest lionfish, and will allow the Executive Director to issue permits to spearfisherman to remove lionfish and other non-native species from areas where the activity was previously prohibited. Ret goes on to point out that lionfish from the genus Dendrochirus are not considered in this ban despite there being significant genetic similarities between them and members of the Pterois genus. This new set of rules goes into effect on August 1st, and as usual, there are good arguments from both sides of the aisle.

One of the key incentives intended by this ban is that marine aquarium importers who still rely on lionfish as part of their product offering will start collecting fish out of Florida waters to fill their demand. This approach, coupled with aggressive erradication efforts from other industries, is hoped to be able to keep the lionfish under better control, though nobody knows what real impact will be had.

But does this ban create a slippery slope for the aquarium trade as Ret points out? While we certainly follow his logic on this one, being that the ban could impact other species besides the target lionfish, we cautiously support the drastic nature of this ruling just so that the lionfish can be controlled. This invasion is serious, and it requires a serious response. Is it overreaching? Probably. But something has to be done, right? Especially since lionfish cullings don’t seem to be doing much in terms of slowing them down. Should the ban be permanent? We won’t touch on this one simply for the fact that there is too many ways to agree or disagree with that approach.

There is a good argument that the other 8 banned species are guilty only by association and that the ban itself is hypocritical because it totally ignores Dendrochirus lionfish. Probably a more even approach would have been to ban all genera and species of lionfish, or just ban the two that have been documented invaders. But, the rules are in place now and we have to play by them, no matter how much or how little they annoy.

All that aside, do you think the ban will help?

Neptune Systems Kicks Off Nationwide Apex Fusion Tour This Weekend

Posted: 20 Jun 2014 07:00 AM PDT

Neptune Systems is kicking off a brand new promotional tour this Saturday, and it’s a bit different than what we’re used to seeing. This grassroots effort doesn’t involve random giveaways on Facebook to generate likes or meaningless sales in which the most amount of product is sold. Instead, this is a multi-state tour that aims to demonstrate all of the capabilities of the Apex Fusion system in a very one-on-one type interface with the end user. At each stop along the tour, a huge RV plastered with Neptune Systems’ branding will host a demo party that will include food, prizes, deals on equipment from the LFS, and lots of Q&A and hands on.

The tour will commence this Saturday, June 21st at Reef Raft NorCal in Fremont, California. The tour will last a total of five weeks and will have scheduled stops in ten different states.

As part of their documentation of the trip, Neptune Systems will post up to the minute pictures and updated schedules on the official Apex Fusion Tour Blog.

Tip of the Day – 6/20/2014

Posted: 20 Jun 2014 06:00 AM PDT

Setting up a new aquarium is always fun, and while you may get impatient to get the tank started, sometimes it’s better to wait. The reasoning behind that is mostly about timing. Life is busy at pretty much any stage, but there are those moments of downtime that are better for setting up an aquarium. If you start a tank while you’re in the middle of other projects, then your tank build may not get off the ground as intended. If you wait until the right moment, however, you will have far more luck in establishing a duly functioning system.

Thursday, 19 June 2014

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MACNA 2014 Adds Trio of Marine Scientists to Speaker Lineup
Lionfish Shown to Tolerate Freshwater in School Science Project
Tip of the Day – 6/19/2014

MACNA 2014 Adds Trio of Marine Scientists to Speaker Lineup

Posted: 19 Jun 2014 09:00 AM PDT

MACNA is always a gathering point for great minds of the marine aquarium world, with the usual all-star cast of guest speakers unleashing all sorts of knowledge on the wide-eyed audience. In that respect, MACNA 2014 looks to be no different. But where we normally see a guest speaker list that consists of well-known figureheads of the hobby mixed in with awesome local talent or folks that aren’t so well know but are doing phenomenal work, this year looks to change things up a little. MACNA 2014 will add three marine scientists to the mix whose disciplines overlap in various ways with the hobby.

A full description of each speech is outlined below in MACNA’s press release, but to summarize, Dr. Todd LaJeunesse will focus his talk on coral-algae symbiosis, which we all know to be the relationship that corals develop with zooxanthellae algae. The second of the trio, Dr. Charles Mazel, will lecture about coral fluorescence and how it relates to the wavelengths of various light sources, but primarily LEDs. And lastly, Jamie Craggs, who is the Curator of Aquatics at the Horniman Museum and Zoo in London, will discuss coral spawning in captivity and how he has been able to get corals to spawn pretty much on command.

Continue below for snippets of the press release.

The MACNA 2014 committee is proud to announce an exceptional selection of pioneering academic and scientist speakers to enrich the lineup of presentations. MACNA is a conference created and produced by avid saltwater aquarium hobbyists, a fact which is well represented in our speaker lineup of many professional aquarists.

However there is a huge pool of reef biology and ecology knowledge in the scientific community that we are excited to be tapping into for this year's conference. In addition to our exciting Keynote speaker Dr. Luiz Rocha, we are proud to announce three more academics from various fields of coral, reef and aquatic sciences.

Dr. Todd LaJeunesse is one of the most pioneering researchers in the field of coral-algae symbiosis and his methods are used everyday around the world to characterize the different "species" of Symbiodinium known as 'Clades' and 'Sub-Clades'. Symbiotic corals are an ecosystem unto themselves and we aquarists can learn a great deal by understanding more about the different types of zooxanthellae, how they interact with our corals and the myriad ways that coral and reef health is closely tied to the community of Symbiodinium present within them.

Dr. Charles Mazel is the founder and lead researcher of NightSea, a company which focuses on fluorescence viewing and imaging technology. Like Symbiodinium, there is a lot we can learn about corals from the fluorescence that our corals display. With the advent of more and specific LED colors in the progressive reef aquarium lighting space, it is now commonplace for reefers to discuss light colors in terms of specific wavelengths and peaks, all of which have corresponding fluorescence excitation characteristics. If you're a fan of multicolors LEDs to bring out the best color in your corals, you definitely wont want to miss this exciting presentation by Dr. Charles Mazel.

If ground-breaking work with coral spawning is more your thing, then you're going to love the presentation by Jamie Craggs. Jamie is the Curator of Aquatics at the Horniman Museum and Zoo in London who made waves this year by spawning Acropora in an aquarium this year. Coral spawning is not that rare in small captive aquarium setups but where Jamie stands out is that he did it on purpose on the first try! By faithfully reproducing nearly all environmental parameters of natural reefs and their cycles in an aquarium environment, Jamie succeeded in spawning Acropora valida and even timing when they would spawn to within days. If you think "Limited Edition" corals are exciting, just you wait until we begin building on Jamie Cragg's work to spawn and rear truly unique new strains of corals that are not even found in the ocean.

Lionfish Shown to Tolerate Freshwater in School Science Project

Posted: 19 Jun 2014 07:00 AM PDT

The effects of the lionfish invasion currently ongoing in Florida and surrounding waters look worse and worse each day, as research continuously reveals just how much damage the fish are causing on native fish populations. But the story has taken a new plot twist, as a child’s science fair project and subsequent scientific articles have revealed that the lionfish, much like bull sharks, can tolerate freshwater environments giving them a whole new environment to invade.

In a recent Sun Sentinel article, a 12-year old student from Jupiter, Florida, showed that lionfish could survive in water with salt concentrations as low as 6 parts per thousand. Normal ocean salinity is around 35ppt, though inshore waters tend to fluctuate with rainfall and other factors. Lauren Arrington’s experiment included five aquariums which had their salinities slowly dropped while monitoring the condition of the resident fish. A sixth aquarium was left at normal salinity as a control tank. Over a two week period, the salinity of each tank was taken down to 6ppt, which is where the experiment was stopped because Lauren didn’t want the fish to die, which would disqualify her from the science fair competition. At 6ppt, the seemed to be completely unaffected.

Lauren went on to win third place in the zoology division of the Palm Beach County regional science and engineering fair, but her project landed her a mention on a scientific paper, something we doubt the first and second place winners ever got.

Craig Layman, an ecology professor at North Carolina State University, built off of Lauren’s project by conducting their own study, which was published this year in the Environmental Biology of Fishes. Layman and his team of students took the salinity all the way down to zero, revealing that lionfish could tolerate a minimum salinity of 5ppt and even withstand influxes of freshwater.

So how does this add to the lionfish’s devastating effect? Well, a lot of marine fish use freshwater systems as nurseries for their young. They travel up into rivers and estuaries to lay eggs, and the juvenile fish live in these protected areas until they are big and mature enough to fend for themselves. With the lionfish present, however, these juvenile fish are likely to get annihilated, further affecting native fish species in a big way.

Tip of the Day – 6/19/2014

Posted: 19 Jun 2014 06:00 AM PDT

When live rock avalanches occur in your aquarium, there’s no need to panic, but there is certainly an immediate need to act. As the rocks shift, either due to natural settling, a fish that burrows, or some other reason, they can come tumbling down on each other in a hurry. Obviously, anything in the rock’s path will get crushed in the process, and this could be fish, corals, or invertebrates. For damaged coral, the remedy is to remove the fallen rock and try to put things back the way they were and hope the coral heals itself. For fish and inverts, it’s a different story as a falling rock could kill them instantly. Sometimes, however, the falling rocks can simply trap the aquarium livestock, which is why it is important to act fast once the landslide has been discovered.

Wednesday, 18 June 2014

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Huge Update Coming to EcoSmart Live Includes Better VorTech Control and Webcam Friendly

Posted: 18 Jun 2014 07:00 AM PDT

Announced just moments ago, EcoTech Marine is giving their EcoSmart Live (ESL) platform a huge update that will allow users more extensive control of the VorTech wireless pumps, give the entire interface a fresh new look, and even incorporate a webcam into the mix that will allow users to check on their tanks from a PC or smartphone. While still only in Beta testing, EcoTech Marine is offering up limited spots for everyday users to test out the updates and help them create a more polished and functional product. The ESL update will release today and all you have to do to be part of it is log into www.ecosmartlive.com and check the "Participate in Beta Releases" checkbox from the Settings & Manage Account page. If you don’t make it into this beta release, more spots will be made available as time progresses.

As for all of the new features coming with the EcoSmart Live update, take a look at these:

All new web design provides quick and convenient access to your Radions, VorTechs, and device settings.
VorTech control! Import pumps, upgrade them, schedule modes, adjust settings, and demo your VorTech pumps to dial in and wow friends, family and house guests from the website.
Creating gyres has never been easier by pairing master and slave pumps visually in ESL.
Create, preview, and save waves for your VorTechs.
Call various saved waves with the click of a button.
Initiate VorTech Feed Mode with one click.
Fine tuning control of VorTech feed mode, night mode, and battery backup mode speeds and durations.
Manage your Radions and VorTechs in your various aquariums using the redesigned, simpler and more elegant Device Manager.
Create aquariums and apply realistic positions for your VorTechs and Radions to define a representation of your actual reef tank.

Now for the new webcam features. The EcoSmart Live platform will now be able to import a Dropcam streaming webcam into your ESL profile, allowing users to view whatever the camera is pointed at (hopefully an aquarium) from anywhere in the world at any time. And because the software is very mobile friendly, you can watch your tank from your iPhone or Android device.

When signing up to be a beta tester, keep in mind that this is not the final product. As with any beta, there may be some glitches, errors, or issues that you could encounter. On top of that, some feedback will be required in order to be part of the program. So, if you encounter an issue, be sure to document it and pass it on to the brains at EcoTech so they can fix it for all users across the board.

Tip of the Day – 6/18/2014

Posted: 18 Jun 2014 06:00 AM PDT

In yesterday’s tip, we scratched the surface on fragging corals to stop tissue loss, so today we are rolling with the punches to expand on that a little. While our focus yesterday was stopping the spread of a lethal gelatinous material on LPS corals, the idea of coral amputation, so to speak, can be applied across all types of corals undergoing all sorts of tissue death events. Whether your corals are undergoing inexplicable Slow Tissue Necrosis (STN) or Rapid Tissue Necrosis (RTN), cutting off the dying portion of tissue can save the rest of a colony from complete and utter destruction. This activity (both the necrosis and the fragging response) is common in SPS corals, and it’s not rare for a full grown colony to take a turn for the worst only to have an aquarist frag it up just to save some of the coral from certain death. Sometimes the fragging works extremely well, and other times it just speeds up the necrosis. And with mixed results combined with lots of uncertainty as to why the process is happening in the first place, many hobbyists just sit back and helplessly watch their prized corals melt away into oblivion.

Tuesday, 17 June 2014

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MBI Workshop to Raffle off F1 PNG Lightning Maroon Clownfish
Cherry Corals Giving Away MACNA Trip During Summer Spectacular 2.0 Live Sale
Tip of the Day – 6/17/2014

MBI Workshop to Raffle off F1 PNG Lightning Maroon Clownfish

Posted: 17 Jun 2014 08:00 AM PDT

As the 2014 MBI Workshop draws closer to its July 19th show date, some shockingly awesome news has been revealed regarding the raffle. According to a recent posting on the Marine Breeding Initiative Facebook page, one of the first generation offspring of the world famous Lightning Maroon Clownfish will be going home with one super lucky attendee. But that’s not all, the raffle will also include a F1 PNG Morse Code Maroon Clownfish, which is paired with the lightning clown, and both fish will be shipped to your door. How awesome is that?

The F1 lightning maroon clownfish is being donated to the MBI Workshop, now in its fifth year, by Matt Pedersen and Blue Zoo Aquatics, while the F1 More Code clownfish is donated by Sea and Reef Aquaculture. Again, this is an amazing prize offering for the MBI Workshop and will easily boost attendance of an already great show. Raffle tickets are only available at the show and you must be present to win.

As for the show itself, it takes place July 19th, 2014 at the Cranbrook Institute of Science in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan.

Cherry Corals Giving Away MACNA Trip During Summer Spectacular 2.0 Live Sale

Posted: 17 Jun 2014 07:00 AM PDT

Cherry Corals is kicking off another huge live sale event in a few days, and it will feature more than just the typical offering of discounted corals. Now in its second year, the Cherry Corals Summer Spectacular will run 12 hours long (from 3pm to 3am) on June 21st and it will host hourly $50 give card prizes, a variety of games, a large raffle, and “darn near 1000 WYSIWYG corals”. But that’s not the best part. The cherry on top, so to speak, is the raffle’s grand prize, a paid trip to MACNA 2014 in Denver, Colorado. The prize will include $400 worth of airfare, two nights paid at the hotel, and one full conference pass. All you have to do is pack a bag and show up.

To enter the MACNA raffle, all you have to do is make a qualifying purchase during the live sale and “check in” every hour of the 12 hour event. So that means you’ll be staying up late this Saturday evening. In addition to the qualifying purchases getting you a ticket in the drawing, you’ll get an additional ticket for each $100 spent.

To view more details of the Cherry Corals Summer Spectacular 2.0, be sure to visit their announcement thread over on Reef2Reef.

Tip of the Day – 6/17/2014

Posted: 17 Jun 2014 06:00 AM PDT

If you have any LPS corals, then chances are you have heard about the infamous brown jelly. This dark substance, as its name implies, is a brown gelatinous goo that forms on some corals, eventually causing total death of the colony or frag. While this in itself is disturbing enough, the jelly doesn’t stop at just one victim. Usually any corals downstream of the infected coral will also become jelly infested, causing an intense cycle of death that affect nearly everything in the tank. The only way to solve the brown jelly problem is aggressive fragging and removal of the infected tissue, and totally remind the coral from the system helps too. It’s not an un-winnable battle, but it is certainly a tough one.

Monday, 16 June 2014

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Ultra Rare Neptune Grouper Shows Up in Thailand
The AquaNerd Weekly Recap
Picture of the Week, Walking Dendro Garden
Tip of the Day – 6/16/2014

Ultra Rare Neptune Grouper Shows Up in Thailand

Posted: 16 Jun 2014 08:00 AM PDT

The mother of all rare predators recently landed in Thailand, and we’re so excited to be covering the news. While we typically focus on fish of the reef safe variety, we couldn’t pass on the opportunity to mention the fact that Ocean and Sea Aquarium in Bangkok got their hands on a stunning neptune grouper, which was announced on their Facebook page a few days ago.

This amazing fish is one of the rarest to enter the aquarium trade, with this individual probably only being one of a few that have been collected in the last few years. This has led to exorbitant price tags exceeding $5000, and you might recall that it made the top 10 list of the most expensive tropical fish. Now you know why we’re so excited about it.

As far as facts about the species, they are one of the smaller groupers available (a term used very loosely) to the trade. It grows to about a foot and a half in length, and interestingly looks better as an adult than it does in the juvenile stages.

Our emails to Ocean and Sea Aquarium have gone unanswered at the time of publication, so we don’t know any of the circumstances surrounding this individual (size, price, location collected, etc.) but if any further details surface, we’ll be sure to include them.

The AquaNerd Weekly Recap

Posted: 16 Jun 2014 07:00 AM PDT

It is Monday, and although we’re still shaking off Father’s Day and regretting the fact that we didn’t throw a little vacation time at today, we are back with another exciting week full of aquarium articles. From the week of June 8th through the 14th, our top five articles include a top list list of the most expensive aquarium fish, a brand new pricey coral from Reef Raft, a new top off automation devices form AVAST Marine Works, an updated on a convicted coral smuggler, and yet another look at the new Riptide Gyre Generator. We hope you enjoyed the articles, and as always, we'll have another week full of aquarium hobby coverage ahead of us, so stay tuned.

Picture of the Week, Walking Dendro Garden

Posted: 16 Jun 2014 06:00 AM PDT

We found this cool image while digging through our archives, and it’s a garden of walking dendro corals (Heteropsammia cochlea) from the Aquarium of the Pacific. As their name implies, these members of the family Dendrophylliidae have an unusual form of locomotion that make it seem as though they are walking around the aquarium. While the corals themselves are incapable of such locomotion, a tiny worm lives in the coral’s base that cause the coral to shuffle about the sand. The worm crawls out of a tiny hole in the bottom of the coral and pushes it around the substrate, usually moving around in a small area.

Tip of the Day – 6/16/2014

Posted: 16 Jun 2014 05:00 AM PDT

If you’ve got random dead spots behind the rocks and your powerbeads just can’t seem to get rid of them no matter how many ways they are adjusted, you can try aiming the flow from your return pump with the help of Loc-Line fittings. These fittings piece together at a flexible joint, with pieces locking into place and forming chains as long as could be imagined. These links can be fitted with various nozzles for narrow stream flow or flow that is a little more spread out, making Loc-Line even more adaptable for your particular setup. There is one key thing to remember when creating your Loc-Line plumbing setup. Any time the water flow stops, a siphon will be created that could drain a significant amount of water back into your sump, possibly causing a flood. To remedy this, drill an anti-siphon vent on the underside of the Loc-Line or some other point in the plumbing.

Sunday, 15 June 2014

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ORA’s Latest Captive Breeding Success, the Girdled Goby

Posted: 15 Jun 2014 08:00 AM PDT

What better way to celebrate Father’s Day than to show off a newly aquacultured fish species from the always busy fish breeders at Oceans Reefs & Aquariums? Like the proud papas they are, ORA is gushing all about their new Girdled Goby (Priolepis cincta) in their latest blog post, sharing all the joys and unfortunate pitfalls that fish parenthood has brought with this new goby. This goby was first raised much earlier in 2014, marking the first time that P. cincta has been bred in the hobby. Unfortunately, long larval stages, challenging feeding requirements, and conspecific aggression have sort of marred the normally joyous process of breeding a new fish.

Despite these challenges, ORA breeders pressed on and eventually raised enough fish to make a viable commercial offering. The first batch was shipped to Drs. Foster and Smith for their help in securing fish for ORA’s broodstock, and retailers will start to see them show up on their availability lists, though the gobies are not expected to be a regular offering.

Which brings us to our next point, and we apologize in advance for it being a long one.

ORA has bred numerous different fish species, with the popular ones being clownfish, cardinalfish, and dottybacks. Every once in a while, however, they focus their efforts on a fish species that isn’t so popular. This focus on the not-so-popular fish is intentional some of the time and somewhat accidental on a few others. On the “accidental” front, it’s common for a popular aquarium fish to not be such popular once they are aquacultured. Take a look at the ORA Mandarins for example. They are intensely popular fish in the hobby, and ORA started breeding them in captivity, making them commercially available in relatively large numbers. But they flopped. Not because ORA failed to deliver a solid product, but because hobbyists wanted cheap, wild-caught fish. The captive-bred individuals were more expensive than their wild counterparts and, well you know the rest of that story. And this story has played out for other species as well.

As for intentionally breeding fish that aren’t in the limelight, there are numerous moves from ORA that have left us all a bit curious. Take the ORA Eastern Hulafish. I’ve never seen one at a fish store, they aren’t necessarily ideal fish for a warm reef setting, and ORA never had a ton of them available. So why breed them in the first place? The question to that is two-fold. For one, unknown or relatively unpopular fish might be a huge commercial success, so might as well give them a try, invest a little time and money, and see how it goes. On the other hand, and the most important aspect in my opinion, is that breeding random species like the hulafish or the girdled goby that lets ORA breeders learn so many valuable lessons. You can never truly gain anything by staying with what you are familiar with, and anything learned by branching out could be applied to other species that are either already being bred en masse, or ORA is having difficulties with, or just a another fish down the road.

That about sums up my standpoint nicely, and we applaud ORA for not staying within a conventional box.

Tuesday, 10 June 2014

Got Algae? These Fish Can Help

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June 10, 2014

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In This Issue

Video: Bloomberg TV interviews LiveAquaria's Kevin Kohen
Kohen discusses the marine aquarium trade, captive breeding, and the $5,000 angelfish. More »
Fishless Aquarium Cycling Method
This type of aquarium cycling is more humane and is easy. Just follow these directions. More »

Are Your Fish Compatible?
angelfish

Keeping
Zebra Danios

Algae Control in Backyard Pond
dirty pond water

plecostomus

Five Algae Eaters for Freshwater Aquariums

Although these fish eat algae, they need to be fed regularly as well. More »

Coral & Reef USA 2014 Annual

The Coral & Reef USA 2014 Annual (CORU) serves as an important source for experienced marine aquarists who are looking for cutting-edge information about the aquarium hobby. It is designed to provide this type of reader with the latest developments in the aquarium industry. The editorial focuses on those who successfully own an aquarium or aquariums, but who are still looking to improve their husbandry skills, as well as provides those new to reefkeeping with the information they need to be successful. More »

10 Saltwater Fish Beginning Fishkeepers Should Avoid
There are plenty of saltwater fish to that are hardy and take to tank conditions more readily, and plenty of captive bred species to keep things interesting. More »

Aquarium Snails-What to Keep and What to Avoid
At one point or another, every aquarist has experienced an unexpected outbreak of snails in the home aquarium. It can be incredibly frightening, too. More »

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