Achilles Tang

Sinner, what's on your sandbed is cyanobacteria. What's on your magnet is coralline algae. I suggest a skimmer upgrade or lots of water changes. You should be having a high level of dissolved nutrients that's fueling the cyano. Usage of GAC and Rowaphos will also help greatly.

I am not sure if AVA controls stuff going out. But I am sure your own country will have laws regarding livestock coming in.

Was it from "Allo Allo"?

Wah lau!

Ah Ryan... i see you share my taste in corny one liners!

I love a good debate! Its de bate that catch de fish! Haha.. bad joke. Frankly, this product in question has similar sounding claims to many similar products out there. I can name just a few... who use appealing words like funky, miracle, catalytic nutrient stabilizing solution, all you need in one bottle, blows you away, does everything but gives your fish sparkling white teeth! I left these stuff alone when I research enough on trace elements and only monitored what is more important and critical in a reef tank environment. As Tanzy has rightly pointed out, there are so many trace elements out there and there are only a few specialized test kits for them. You can't test for all of them and there's really no way to know if you're overdosing it. Overdosing of trace elements is supposedly contributing to heavy metal buildup in a reef tank, causing a crash in due time. Even if you have SPS corals which possibly takes up more trace elements than slower growing soft corals or LPS corals, it's still difficult to measure. Those you can, you can dose SPECIFICALLY that to raise it up. But if everything is in a ALL-IN-ONE-BOTTLE, how do you KNOW for a fact what you're NOT overdosing?? Worred about trace elements depletion? The next water change will replenish it! Don't sweat the small stuff people! My 2 cents! AT

Bravo, Mr Octopus Bay! I must commend you on your cool, non-hostile & non-defensive way of handling this situation. You have something to teach some people who can't handle negativity even in the slightest amount.

Those male anthias are stunning! I'm impressed! How much is it selling for? AT

RIO?? Isn't that the brand that so many reefers around the world have very poor opinions of?

hotbod999, You seem to feel so offended by Tanzy's point of view. Why do you use such words as "You will be sued for making this statement. Be prepared that somebody will contact AT for your contact details and IP address." Are YOU going to be one to report to Ocean's Blend how a reefer feels about the product? How many negative views will they sue? If that was seriously the case, ALL of us who feel that many products out the world are snake oil, not entirely truthful, or have dubious magical powers will be sued to thy kingdom come!!! I was looking forward to a interesting point by point rebuttal by Tanzy with all points you counter-claimed. TILL I got to the part where you let go about sueing and stuff. I can't help but be curious if you are the distributor or have some financial interest in this very new product. It is quite rare for someone to rave and rant about a product that claims to do everything everything it says on the label and attribute it to how nice his tank looks. If you want my opinion, there are many many beautiful tanks out there who have never used such additives, including my own and it seems like you have picked a nice sparring partner like Tanzy to debate the finer points about the product's claims. If you don't know what he's studying in UK now... I suggest you pick a simpler subject because he's not fondly called our wise old resident sea turtle for nothing. I suggest you KEEP it to JUST a DEBATE and since you are new here, I suggest you also try to be a bit more courteous. Any more word about suing and curtailing of negative opinions from others with regards to this product and I'm not going to be so understanding next time. Now its your call how you want to swing this conversation. AT

Yummy! More! More!

LOL!! No harm done.

I must request that you have to give your fellow SRC reefers a good deal!

Curious to know who can disappoint you enough to quit the hobby! He/she must be a mightily powerful person to affect you so much! Let me guess, a girlfriend who says you spend too much time & money on your reeftank and not on her?

Tanzy... I love the view from your home!! One minute you're at eye level with the people on the ground and next minute you're high up in the clouds! ps - take pictures of Tuan's tank!

I used to use vinegar and as Tanzy as pointed out... it's smelly as hell! The last time, I ran diluted acid that stronger than vinegar. Don't ask me how I got it. I don't recommend the acid cleaning solution unless you verify that its safe to use and can be totally removed/rendered neutral and of a safe acidic percentage without causing hurt/damage.

I am not going to waste any more time giving advice to someone who persists in having a cavalier attitude towards conscientious reef-keeping. What facts and figures do you need with regards to the probability of short-term survivability of Acropora corals in a 3-week old overstocked tank overunning with 5 anemones & nudibranchs taken care by someone who doesn't give a hoot about proper care of the other 'well-known as difficult to care for inhabitants' of his tank? Sure, keep your anemones. They move around too much? Staple them to the LR! Oh btw, you SHOULD really buy an Aquarium coral book to read up. Last time I checked, an Anemone is NOT an LPS coral. Anyway, you don't have to follow we blind people because you're naturally gifted anyway. You're looking for SPS? Plenty of them in the sea. Take up diving. I'll lend you a chisel and crowbar, I'll even lend you an electric jackhammer if you want to bring up an entire coral head. Go ahead and DO IT ON A BIG SCALE, why just restrict it to your little tank? I'm washing my hands off helping James72. You guys and gals with more patience can take your time to drill it into his head that IT'S NOT SO SIMPLE. I'll just go and stare at my tank where I have spent so much time, effort, heartache and money and ease my frustration away and console myself that I would have probably killed 20x as much livestock and spent 50x what I did if I remained like some fella here.

You confused it with another product called, "Offender's bend"

Hmmm... looks like it! I'll work on the rectangular design!

I will never keep such gobies in my SPS tank. They feed off acros!!! Not SPS-safe, these fishes are.

LOL! Sure, I'll pass them on... IF they do their job!

Wow... that anemone is really bleached!! But beautiful in a sad way. I suggest you feed it regularly with meaty foods like prawns to supplement its energy requirements or it'll die in no time.

To add on the above statement. An experienced SPS reefer may possibly have great success with setting up a new tank with SPS corals. One who lacks knowledge, how-how, skills, the right setup can still try but will face a lot more problems. I suggest you invest first in a good setup because that will help as an 'insurance policy' or 'safety net' to make up for the new SPS reefer's shortcomings.

I just got myself two little lettuce slugs... I don't see them making a dent at all!

In theory, if you have a tank that has excellent water parameters, excellent lighting & you have good husbandry skills, you can keep SPS corals. In practice, a new tank is a highly unstable environment, with a young bio filtration capability that still struggling and needing time to reach maturation and stability which should arrive around the 1 year mark. In that one year, you WILL go through nuisance algae phases like diatoms, cyano, hair algae or other nuisance macro algae outbreaks that will annoy and even kill your SPS corals. These algae will colonise every bare patch on your corals... and cause further irritation and possibly death to your SPS corals. I have one large colony that has bryopsis algae anchored at the base of its coral branches that are impossible to remove to this day. I moved my liverock, water and livestock from my old tank into my current tank. My sandbed had to start maturation from scratch. In that one year period, I had ALL the ABOVE problems and lost a few corals due to nuisance algae. Thank goodness today, we have very good phosphate removers like Rowaphos, and very good skimmers to help alleviate the situation as new tanks' biofiltration like the sandbed and LR will DEFINITELY struggle to cope with the tank's bioload. My 2 cents, AT