STT to VT

[Melanie]

Ok, Drew, I have to tell you that I LOVE your chronicle. I laughed so hard when you posted the pic of of the pepermints in the trap. Your photos go so well with your narration. Keep it up!

[hma]

Originally Posted by Dentoid

I agree with TheSauce. It's hard to accept any loss, but it does go along with the territory. It never gets any easier as you go along, but you learn to accept it nontheless.

When I recently lost my BS jawfish, I wanted to scrap everything and then my elegance frag disappeared. I just pull up my boot straps and get back on the horse.

agree 110%

[Melanie]

Oh, I thought of something last night when I was mulling over your problem with those parasites.

During my trial and error phase (which is still going on) I put LS I collected myself in my tank. I also had my rock in there. The LS had those very same parasites in it. I took all the sand out (for lots of reasons) and put all the rock in coolers with salt water and started over. I have never seen the buggers again.

So my point to all this is that they did not infest the rocks and keep breeding all over my tank. I didn't do anything except manually remove the ones I found and I have never seen them again. (Knock on wood.)

I'm not suggesting you remove your sand and rock. I'm just saying, I bet if you just keep trying to pull out the ones you find you probably will keep the problem under control.

[lcstorc]

Great thread.
Hope you can get the buggies under control.
Wish I had real info but guess I juswt have to play cheerleader on this one.
Don't give up. Your dedication will show itself in great results over time.

[ScubaDrew]

I want to reply to everyone but I've been tied up in meetings all day! I want to get this post up and hopefully back to you all tonight.

Lots happening, first things first...

I CAUGHT ONE.

Next, I found this:







Crawling on the glass, then on the sand:



Then up a rock:









And I'm SURE you can see it LOOKING BACK AT ME RIGHT HERE WITH YELLOW EYES:





Then it crawled away:

[ScubaDrew]

Then my mantis came out to eat. pictures suck, he was too deep in the tank but since its all i've got, I'll post em:

[Dentoid]

Woo hoo! Get those suckers Drew! Looks like a Halloween mask!

The second photo is of a stomatella snail, very good HH.

Love the green Mantis, makes me want to get one!

[Melanie]

Ewww! Congrats on catching one!

That other thing is weird. Dentoid knows everything. He's the google of the fish world. GREAT photos.

[GeeWizzItsMe]

Cool pics! Great job catching that little nasty, and cool stomatella hitchie!

[hma]

Congratulation Drew, catches the beasts! Nice stomatella, I had at the beginning also many in my tanks. Unfortunately triggers and puffers like them so much which now exactly 0 are in mine tanks.

[ScubaDrew]

Some random photos for today:

My VERY green mushrooms




There are a couple of Bright White "blobs" in this pic next to the mushrooms - any one know what they are?


Here is a snail doing gymnastics with a small hermit? Some type of crab anyway.


Better shot of the little crab


Snail reaching between branches, little crab wondering what the idiot snail is doing on this thing with him


My pride and joy, Mag-18 powered return system:


Shot of my pride and joy from below (I did fix it so the PVC is entirely above water. In this photo its sagging a bit on the right side):


Mushrooms don't look so green w/ the MH on...


My fighting conch, very cool eyes!:


Foxface has plucked every ball of this red algae in three days:

[goldenmean]

Great Pics Drew!!
I have several of those pico-sized white hermits.
Love your shrooms.

[Dentoid]

The mushrooms are great. They look like they are waterfalling off the rockwork.

What is the green mass in the middle of the tank (or middle of photo)?

The Foxface is great too. Mine hides most of the time. Yours seems very bold and out there. I also like the Foxfaces with the black spot. Mine is spotless!

[ScubaDrew]

Scott - the foxface has worked like a charm. He has clear cut the tank in just a couple weeks. I've owned a lot of fresh and brackish water fish but this guy is by far the best!

thanks,

Drew

Originally Posted by Dentoid

Is there any media in that Phosban reactor? If you want to get rid of that caulerpa, get yourself a Foxface rabbit fish. I had a ton of caulerpa and within a few weeks of putting in my Foxface, he ate every piece of it! He also ate the bryopsis and any other macro that popped up.

[ScubaDrew]

The green mass is a very porous dead rock I picked up at the LFS because I was short on rock. It appears to have some type of algae growing in the pores. It previous photos this rock was paper white.

Originally Posted by Dentoid

What is the green mass in the middle of the tank (or middle of photo)?