Tank Entry

I was very excited to add my first serpent star to my tank last week, which promptly hid under the rocks. Two days later I was shocked to see it hanging on my rock wall just after the lights went out - missing the entire top of its carapace. It looked like a neat dissection with all of the top central disk gone, exposing gonads and stomach - the legs looked fine and tube feet were extended. I was even more shocked to see it moving, and I assumed this was just reflexes until it died. But I found ...

Its been one month since setting my first reeftank, in an extra hurry to house a large hippo tang that came with my used setup. You can see the details in previous posts but here's the run down. Water chemistry is stabilizing and everyone is doing well. I'm a science geek so I had to make some graphs of my progress:



I graphed the main parameters for the first 21 days and you can how ...

So I'm new to reefing and very excited to be starting my first tank this month. I've done freshwater plant tanks for many years and always avoided reefs because of the environmental impact. Well, there is no way around the energy consumption, but I realize that the hobby has progressed to the point that there are many sources of captive bred animals, trading and aquacultured products so I bought a used setup off craigslist. The only problem is that it came with a beautiful hippo tang. As you'll ...