Tank turned 49 this year

DaveK

Well-Known Member
Great looking fish in your tank, @Paul B. Although I was kind of surprised when you got the tang a while ago. One nice thing about tangs is that they get fairly large and tend to swim in the open. This gives the unbelievers (non-reef keepers) something to look at when they visit.
 

Paul B

Well-Known Member
Dave, in all the years this tank has been set up, there has almost always been a tang and usually a Hippo as they are the only tang I don't find boring. I also think they are one of the most colorful fish. :cool:
 

Paul B

Well-Known Member
Today we are going to this very calm, un occupied lagoon with some friends to relax. If it's low tide I will try to collect some mud, amphipods, seaweed and maybe snails.

It's a beautiful day and we want to take advantage of it as long as the nice weather is around.





I had a little argument with my wife this morning, and we never fight. :rolleyes:


She threw out our blender that we have had as one of our engagement gifts in 1973.

Yes, there was electricity then, and fire. :cool:


She bought a new blender which I am sure is made in China, Japan, Sri Lanka, India, Peru, Tunisia or someplace that is not in America. I am sure they make great blenders in those countries and I think the local people should use them and be very proud. But as an American, I care more about American people working. Not that I want to see any body else starve, but my first priority is to my country.


My family all came from Sicily but I am not Sicilian, I am American.


The old blender was running just fine and I use it every week to make my wife's "Jumping Juice" that takes away her pain.


The new blender, I think it's a "Kitchen Aid" is 100% plastic and sounds like an outboard motor. It may have been an outboard motor at one time. It is harder to clean and it will probably last a couple of years and also probably has no parts you can fix after it croaks.


To Me it is sacrilege to throw out a good, working American appliance just to get a new, shiny red one that is not as good and will never last as long. :mad:


Of course I rescued it and will give it to the American Legion or some other American organization so that they can use it at their bar.
 

DaveK

Well-Known Member
I don't think you can find a blender manufactured today that is made in the USA. So I don't think there was much choice if your buying new.

Part of the reason modern blenders make a lot more noise is that they use a lot more powerful motor. They are supposed to be able to chop up all sorts of stuff that would have never been put in a blender in the good old days.

Like most other products, blenders come in all sorts of quality and price ranges. Some of the top rated ones are over $600 (ouch). So I get by with a really old one that belonged to my aunt. It was sort of low end when new but it still works. I don't need a blender very often. If it goes, I'll get something better.

I'd prefer to by American made products, but so few are, even if your willing to spend extra money. Then you find a lot of products that might have been made in the USA, but contain almost 100% foreign sub-assemblies and components. As for getting parts, except for high value items like cars, major appliances and such, you can't get parts even if it's American made.

Case in point. I build my desktop computers from components. Years ago AMI, in addition to making the BIOS software, also made mother boards. They were very good, but you had to pay a premium price to get one. They couldn't really sell them, because of the cost. Like many other companies they were forced to stop making them. So now I use motherboards from Asia. I can't even find something American made.
 

Paul B

Well-Known Member
It's 5:45 am and as soon as I can see a little light I will be taking by bike out and heading for the beach.

I got to keep these old bones working and walking up and down a cliff, 176 steps is all I need.


I can't believe with two bum knees I can still do that. The steps don't bother me as long as I don't turn either knee to one side even a little. That makes it hard to turn so I have to keep walking in a straight line. upload_2019-9-26_5-54-14.gif


Yesterday I couldn't find my bubble coral. I had just used my diatom filter to clean some cyano and I must have blew the thing away.

I found it all the way in the back under rocks and I had to remove a lot of rock to rescue it. My fireclown kept biting me. You would think that after 28 years he would start losing his teeth, or at least start going senile. But I think he will outlast me in that respect. upload_2019-9-26_5-54-14.gif
 

Paul B

Well-Known Member
I'm back from my early morning Bike ride and I didn't get eaten by any deer. I did notice some of them being beamed up to a UFO though :oops:


This was over the golf course across the street from my house. But I don't play golf.


 

Paul B

Well-Known Member
This weekend was pretty good. We went with another couple who have been our good friends for over 40 years to a very small town in Vermont called Poultney. Don't look on a map.

Our Daughter owns a vacation home there. Anyway we live on Long Island so we took the ferry to Bridgeport Connecticut.
This is the Port Jefferson/Bridgeport Conn. Ferry.



The ride is a little over an hour. But it's a nice ride and the weather was perfect. The ship crosses over the Long Island Sound where I did most of my boating.



After the ferry we drove almost 5 hours to the house which is on a mountain up a dirt road, a few miles from anything that resembles civilization.

It's a really nice farm house.
They also have a couple of these, that we used to go up and around the mountain. Our friends also had one and he had to keep stopping every time his wife saw a wildflower she wanted.



That pond there is man made and is loaded with frogs, like millions of them. It was a stream and they dammed it up a little to make that pond. They used to stock it with trout and maybe Manta Rays but now there are only frogs and newts.

We couldn't make it all the way up the mountain like we normally do because one of the 17 bridges was out and looked like if a small horseshoe crab tip toed across it, it would collapse sending you about 5' down a small, rocky ravine.



You wouldn't croak, but that ATV wouldn't fare to well.

They have this swing next to the pond under the apple trees.



Coming down back to the house we noticed this cow. Being born in Brooklyn I don't know too much about cows except that they squeeze them to get milk. upload_2019-9-30_12-49-13.gif



Also, being I went to high school and everything I noticed he was on the "road" and not a few feet away behind the "enclosure", which was a piece of wire about 18" off the ground, so I figured cows were not the smartest creatures.
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I told my Son N Laws Father who lives there about the cow. He called the caretaker, who is a close to 80 year old Lady who can hardly walk to go and rustle the cow back to where ever cows live.
She wasn't real happy about that but I can't write the "colorful" language she used here as my computer would catch fire. upload_2019-9-30_12-49-13.gif

I am not sure how she was able to lift the cow the 18" over the wire to put her back either.

On Saturday they had the biggest event that they have in this town. I am fairly sure it is the only event they have in that town. It's a chili cook off where they all make chili and people vote on which is the best. You buy a cup for $7.00 and you can taste all the chili.

All the townspeople come to this, all 12 of them. I noticed a sign informing you of the rules on what you can put in the chili, and in big letters it read, "NO ROAD KILL OF ANY KIND" at this event. So I assumed at other events you can use that as it is all over the place. We saw (and smelled) Skunks, porcupines, possums, many racoons, deer, beavers, birds, and I swear one of them was an Emu.

The chili I assume was delicious but I didn't try it as I am sure there was something in it that would kill me.

They have a General Store there that is also the post office. It was built in 1730 and still has the horse hitching posts outside. They sell some ready made food but That sign about the road kill turned me off to that.
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WE got to the ferry an hour early and we tried to get on that earlier boat. They were not sure if they could fit us on, but they squeezed and that is my car, that red Jeep. I told them I would get on even if my back wheels were off the back.



On our way home, from the ferry I saw my next boat. upload_2019-9-30_12-49-13.gif



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Paul B

Well-Known Member
I found my "almost" complete Log book from 1971 to the 90s. I see I was having trouble keeping corals but my Alk was 3 and my calcium was about 125 upload_2019-10-6_13-40-25.gif


I think I know the problem now. :D


I also saw that I lost an awful lot of fish, but not from disease. I really didn't know what I was doing and the food available was horrendous. I had fish killing each other, I also used to remove all the dead bleached corals weekly to bleach so they were nice and white and during that fish would jump out or the residual bleach would kill them. :eek:


My tank was "40 gallons" and I had, at the same time a French Angel, Moorish Idol and copperband along with a bunch of other fish. :rolleyes:

I would buy or get for free sick fish and try to cure them with Human burn ointment or human medications as there was nothing for fish.


I really feel bad for all the fish killed. upload_2019-10-6_13-40-25.gif:oops:


I wrote it i free hand in pencil until about 1976, then I lost some pages but it turns up again typed on an Apple computer which was basically a typewriter as there was no internet.
 

Paul B

Well-Known Member
We just got back from Connecticut for a couple of days in a B&B for our 46th (I think) anniversary.


It poured the entire time.


We took the ferry there and it was fairly calm. As I looked over the side at the sea, I saw this large fin slicing through the water. I have been out there in the middle of the Long Island Sound many times but I never saw a large shark there.


I know a few weeks ago they reported a 12' Great White Shark there so I figured it was one of those.

Then as we got closer I saw a Sea Gull land right in front of it. I figured the gull was going to be a small lunch for the shark.


Then I noticed the fin bending from side to side and I know shark fins don't do that as they are made out of aluminum and are very stiff.


All of a sudden this huge fish jumps completely out of the water and slaps down again. It was maybe 4' or 5' long and almost as high.


It was an Ocean Sunfish or Mola Mola.

It jumped three or four times and after every jump it would lay on it's side at the surface and the sea gull would stand on it and eat parasites off it's sides.


Our boat was moving pretty fast so I could only see this for about 30 seconds but it made my day.

I have only seen an ocean sunfish once or twice before but that was far out to sea. This was about 8 miles out.

Sunfish are the largest bony fish and can reach over 2,000 lbs. or as much as some of my old girlfriends. upload_2019-10-10_15-9-2.gif


Very cool.


Coming home it was so windy that they cancelled our ferry due to high winds and rain. I think the Captain noticed there were some Sissy, Girly Men Snowflakes on line and figured they would get the horrors and croak.

This ferry is a big boat holding maybe 100 or more cars.


We drove for an hour to Bridgeport Conn. and got a different ferry to Long Island so we didn't do to bad.


I got good news when I got home and found out my book, "The Avant-Garde Marine Aquarist" is back in print on Amazon so I ordered myself some copies in case I forgot what I wrote. upload_2019-10-10_15-9-2.gif

Just in case anyone believes I am going to get wealthy beyond my wildest dreams with this book, I would like you to know that 100% of any profits from this book will be donated to MS

(Multiple Sclerosis) research in my wife's name.


She has had the disease for 20 years and is not really doing very well with it as MS is so far a disease that can't be cured.


Besides, my wildest dreams involves a flounder, two Supermodels, a bowling ball and a door handle from a 1967 Oldsmobile Cutlass.
 
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Nobbygas

Well-Known Member
Mola Mola are beautiful eh. I saw some when I was diving in Bali.

Now diving in Bali is something I don't think I'd do again. I wouldn't say the currents were strong, but we were overtaking Nuclear Powered Submarines !
 

Paul B

Well-Known Member
I still can't order my own book. Amazon told me they are quarantining them for 48 more hours to eliminate bookworms.
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When we came home from our water logged little trip to a B&B yesterday I noticed that my skimmer was empty as was my reverse UG filter manifold and the algae on my algae scrubber was dry and looked like hay.

So I said "Hay" whats wrong? It's not supposed to do that.


I searched and found my pump, that feeds all those things croaked. It is probably 30 years old and never gave me any problems but that maybe their life span.


Luckily, I had another one slightly damaged so I had to hold it together with some tie wraps but it is running fine.


It is also probably 30 years old so i have to keep a watch on it. Stopping my UG filter, skimmer and algae scrubber won't affect my tank at all but I like those things to work just because I built them all and don't want to look like a Jiboni.


I have some spares.


 

DaveK

Well-Known Member
I have some "spares" that look like that also. When I run out of them, I think I'll just get some other power head pump.

The biggest problem I had with them is that over time the power cord gets brittle and in time breaks open. If you notice that your get a shock when you put your hand in the tank, look for this issue. (grin)
 

Paul B

Well-Known Member
At 6:30 this morning the sun just stated to come out and I figured i would go for a bicycle ride. Loosen up the stiff muscles a little.


There is a little hill next to a pond here and I started cruising down the hill.


All of a sudden I see this young deer right in front of me not moving. As I got closer and closer I could tell she had that

"Geezer in the Headlights" look.


Just before I crashed into her she took off. She was running right next to me for a while and as she looked over at me I could tell she was thinking "Wow this Old Coot can go pretty fast" upload_2019-10-13_7-39-6.gif


But I don't think deer know much about bicycles going down hill.

This isn't her, maybe her sister.


 

Paul B

Well-Known Member
This blue sponge that grows on virtually every spare piece of real estate in my tank is really looking nice. It is "Bluer" that it used to be for some reason. I think it is due to the clams I have been feeding and all the clam juice associated with it.


The stuff grows a little to fast and I do have to trim it about every month or so but it is a great water filter.

I got a small piece of it many years ago but it really took off. It's almost like a very cheap coral and I like it a lot.


I do throw a lot of it out when I trim it because i don't know what to do with it and I don't know anyone locally with a salt tank.

I also think it is photosynthetic which is weird as sponges are not usually sensitive to light except to hide from it.

If it gets shaded because something grows over it, it turns very light, almost white.


 

DaveK

Well-Known Member
Where I live we have a lot of deer to the point of them being a nuisance. I call them "rats with long legs". Since this area is mostly residential there is no easy way to reduce their number.
 
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