Doggies in Fishtanks...

     How about an update on the tank? Sure, there is always club stuff  (politics/nonsense) galore going on but, I haven't given a good update in a while!! Before I do, one more club bit of humor. A post went up for photo of the month and they were looking for photo's with red and green in them (Christmas theme). This was Chris's entry...

     Buggy was not amused...

     It's December 2012 and basically, the tank has been growing in quite well. From what happened less than a year ago, we are quite happy with the results we are getting with our coral growth.

     The water bill has certainly gone up and even though Chris refuses to admit it, so has the electric bill. However, that's only because he keeps adding more shit downstairs. Everytime I turn around it's a new tank of some sort, a new light over that new tank, a new light over the old tank because the old lighting wasn't good enough, forty thousand new pumps and the list goes on...there's no use fighting it though. He'll remove one thing and just add another, it's a losing battle! 

     Remember this coral? If you don't or you need a refresher for your memory,  Check This Out. 

     That's right, it's the SPS in the fragging video we did. This coral was sitting on just a small piece of itself in the tank (did you notice the wobble in the video?) and attached to the live rock with some epoxy. One day while sitting down Chris watched while the weight finally took over and this birdsnest toppled over. So, Chris moved it.

The bottom of the bird

From a tiny little frag to this...amazing! Isn't this hobby the greatest!!

     The zoanthids are doing well and we have added a few creatures to our little underwater family too. 

     So, here it is folks, after nine months....

  

Presentation for OSRAS

     We weren't the only people frustrated with CTARS and the current board of directors. A man named Rich and his wife, Brenda decided they were going to go off on their own in their own state and start their own club. They named it Ocean State Reef Aquarium Society.

     The intentions started out fabulous. They felt that the bod of CTARS was hiding funds and being shady and that the meetings were not teaching anyone anything. At the time, CTARS had had two or three meetings in a row on how to make fish food. People were getting antsy. We were stoked that someone had taken the reins and decided to do this. Also, Charleen, the current secretary from CTARS was acting treasurer and secretary for OSRAS until further notice.

     It wasn't long and Rich called us up and asked if we could do a fragging presentation for their club. We gladly accepted the idea of this and began working with Rich on how he wanted everything to work. 

Flyer that was posted online, at libraries and stores and given to us as a present

     It was going to be a simple 'Fragging 101' workshop and Rich wanted Chris and his father to also bring in corals of their own to sell somewhere in room. Simple enough. Even better was the fact that Rhode Island is really only a hop, skip and a jump from where we live so, joining this club as well was really a plus for us. More info about the reef-keeping hobby the better!

Chris and I starting our presentation

       
     Chris and I put together a few video's this time to aid in our presentation. We actually had our oldest daughter help so that I didn't have to figure out yet another thing on my computer. It made things a little easier this time with the presentation. Rather than trying to put up little plugs and pieces of epoxy and trying to explain "okay everyone, your now going to glue this tiny piece of white stuff to this blah, blah...", there was a video to accompany a variety of simple fragging processes up on the projector. We did one for soft leathers, sps, lps (we used our wall hammer) and zoanthids.

Our video on fragging a soft leather coral

(don't mind the sound on these...we had the computer muted during the presentation)

Another video but, this time fragging a SPS coral

     Rich brought some corals from a LFS (local fish store) of his choice and just as the fragging demo we had done at Charlene's, there was a twenty-five dollar buy-in to acquire one of these pieces before leaving. People were also allowed to bring corals of their own that they wanted to learn how to frag.

     At the end of the meeting, Rich and Brenda had all kinds of idea's for the club and asked to have Chris and I on the Board of Directors as well. We declined their invitation however, agreed to help out with the club as much as possible. Rich seemed to have some wonderful idea's and we looked forward to seeing something new in the reefing hobby as it had been such a while with CTARS.

     Chris and I left happy with our demonstration and up in the air with Rich and Brenda. Their agenda for the club seemed wonderful but they themselves were, I don't really know how to explain it...off I guess. We decided to go with the flow, what would it hurt right?

Rich and Chris setting up

Selling frags in the back corner

Peeking in to see what will get fragged today

It's always nice when someone comes along to help!

Fragging Workshop

      CTARS had been demonstrating how to make fish food for months and Ego had just simply irritated so many people that Chris and another board member got together and decided to hold a separate meeting that held no affiliation to any club whatsoever to teach people how to frag coral. 

     Chris worked out a deal with Happy Coral, Inc. to get in two very large rare SPS and anyone who chipped in $25 was able to leave with a piece of each.

     The Post read as follows:

Charlene and I have been speaking about having different types of workshops for some time now. For this first adventure we have finally come up with a date!

Saturday, August 11, 2012 I will demonstrate how I frag SPS, palys, and zoanthids and any other corals you may want to bring to the workshop that you have been hesitant about fragging or just don’t know how. This workshop will be hosted at Charlene’s home. (I’ll let her ultimately decide how we are posting or PMing her address)

I would like to purchase two large sized colonies to frag for this meeting as well. This would guarantee everyone leaving with at least two decent sized frags of a unique SPS for a decent price depending on how many people we can get to sign up for the workshop. The prices I am looking at right now (in order to get free shipping) would be a minimum of 10 people signing up at $25 apiece. Charlene and I are already in so we only need eight more people. This price could be more if there are less people!! Of course we could always decide if there are a large amount of people signed up, to purchase additional coral to keep the cost at $25 a person or lower the cost per person. It would be a GROUP decision at that point.

In addition, I have also already received a few coral donations from a gentleman that had to break down his entire tank because he had to leave in order to go serve our country. Not only do we thank him for those donations, but, we thank him for his sacrifice for our freedoms.

This is open to ANYONE. You do not need to be part of any club in order to come to this workshop, only a reef keeping enthusiast! Anyone interested is invited! You do not need to be part of the buying in portion in order to attend however; you will not leave with one of the frags from those corals.

I absolutely DO need a sign up list ahead of time however for the buying in portion of the workshop! I need everyone to sign up by July 14, 2012. On July 15, 2012 I will get the majority decision here on this thread on what we would like to do if there is a large amount of people signed up for the buying in portion (ie: additional corals or lower costs per person). All payments MUST be made by July 21, 2012 by PayPal. I can provide my address to you through a PM if you must send a check.

Donations are always welcome. Frag plugs will DEFINITELY be needed!!

Remember, bring anything that you want fragged but may be hesitant to do yourself!

This is something for everyone…a learning experience for those who aren’t sure about fragging and for those that do, a chance to get some frags they don’t have for an inexpensive price!

     This immediately became a HUGE hit! Everyone was going to be able to leave with a coral no matter what because the donated corals were going to be given away and if you bought in, you were going away with two cool frags as well. On top of everything, if you didn't have any experience with fragging, you also would have the opportunity to learn something! Win, win!!

     In the weeks to follow we collected the money through PayPal and then when the final date came up, we ordered the coral. Of course I'm always the one that has to accept the packages when the arrive and acclimate the corals and these ones I was especially worried about. They weren't MY coral to kill...they were everyone elses! On top of everything else, the owner of Happy Coral had already spoken with Chris and told him one of the ones he wanted wasn't looking good. He sent us three SPS instead of two and good thing because one arrived dead. The other was on thin ice but, Happy Coral had promised that if it didn't make it to the Fragging Workshop date that he would give each person a $25 gift certificate. 

     The day of the workshop arrived and everything went wonderfully. One person was kind enough to bring a ban saw and everyone was able to work hands on to learn and have a wonderful experience. Rather than go on and on trying to explain everything, I'm going to let my pictures do the explaining this time! 

Beginning set up. Charlene is tickled pink at the whole day!

Back room where people set up to make private sales

Some of the corals to be fragged

The two fella's explaining at the same time... 

"That's my frag right there"

Raffle area

You glue I'll epoxy....

Ready to bag up frags :)

Removing an anemone from the rock 

Removing some mushrooms straight from the tank as people requested them

Reef Central thread can be found here
http://s.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2185619

Hurricane Sandy & Why Generators Equal Happiness

     When my ex-husband and I bought a home a long time ago there was a threat of a hurricane coming up the coast. Immediately my ex saw this as an opportunity to spend oodles of money on the biggest generator he could get his hands on at the moment. Of course, the hurricane never happened and the generator sat in our garage collecting dust. I'm quite sure that he never would have been able to run the thing anyway...not without electrocuting the entire household at least.

     Who knew that this investment would save me those oodles of dollars later on down the road in my fishtank adventures with the love of my life? If I hadn't already owned my beast of a generator, a different beast would have been bought in it's place immediately following our beginning fishtank purchases. Why? To protect our investment. Duh!  

     Since our hobby has started we have had a few times, almost ALWAYS in the middle of the night, where we have gone into the shed, pulled out the generator, pissed off all the neighbors, and had light, television, and our tank up and running while everyone else is left in the dark. Fridge? Shit! Who needs to plug that thing in as long as the tank is up and running and the Playstation 3 is working! We even have ballasts now that let us run our halides on our generator. When a tree went down across the street and a live line was jumping all over, Chris walked across the tracks to meet his sister to get more gas for the generator just in case we needed it overnight. Anything for the tank...

     When Hurricane Irene hit in late August of 2011 we were ready. We bunkered down in the house with the kids, and I had my mother come stay with us because her area was evacuated and we waited for the bitch to show her ugly face. At seven in the morning we all woke up to something hitting the house. Of course a large piece of a tree came down and hit the house and the generator. No damage done, but one hell of a mess. The next morning, we had a disaster in our yard. 

 

Chris after removing the branch from the generator.  

A tree from the neighbors yard

The branch that fell on the house and generator at 7:00 in the morning. This is later in the day.

Shot from top of the side yard. This is nothing :(

     Seven days, and nearly five hundred dollars in gas that was purchased while waiting in lines for 30 to 45 minutes long, we finally saw these guys....

     Fixing this mess....

     They came down to our place and fixed the wire that had been ripped from the house. Never in my life have I seen the neighborhood come together and cheer so loudly for a bunch of workers! Chris and I got the name of their hotel and the number of their room and sent them a thank you gift. Seven days of cold showers, miserable kids, and praying the generator could hold on because it was running non-stop all that time, and finally, thanks to the New Hampshire Northeast Utilities workers, we had power! 

     Chris' brother brought his livestock to our house to keep alive during the power loss as he didn't have an overabundance of coral at the time. During the seven days we watched the Reef Central boards and shook our heads as people posted about their losses. Some were looking for generators but, the stores were sold out or it was just too late. Some were trying air stones, some were just hanging on to the hope that everything would survive anyway...but, it didn't. 

     So, here we were again, Hurricane Sandy was coming to get us. We had managed to escape the snowstorm that hit our coast the prior season and instead had to loan our generator to Chris' father to keep his tank alive. We actually read too many posts on people losing their livestock during that major power loss too. So, what did everyone learn from these two major storms? Anything?

     I did my usual. I run around the house and gather all the candles. Fill tubs up with water in case our city water gets polluted, and I buy new batteries for all our flashlights. I fill all our tanks with gasoline and then I go around and take pictures of every square inch of the inside and outside of the house for insurance purposes. I then upload those on a private online site, just in case. My family thinks I'm crazy, I probably am. I do stock up on foods like soups and such too but, not like a zombie apocalypse is coming. Just enough for a few days. All the damned stores are closed when there is no power. 

Better Value in Plainfield after Irene

     

     So, everyone just sits and waits. We watch television, play on the computer, I'm watching Facebook to see what my friends and family are writing. In the meantime, we still have power, cable, internet, everything. I get worried at one point because a friend down the road post a picture of that damned telephone pole on fire! I'm just waiting for the power to go out. But, no, nothing. Finally, Chris and I go to bed. 

The children seem terribly worried about the storm as I take my pictures :)

I found it humorous while going through my 'insurance' pictures that this one was
predicting the power outages in the state.  

Chris' frag tank in the basement

           

The fire department and utility company at the pole down the road that was on fire. 

     The next morning we wake up to this....

     Big difference from Irene huh? Yeah, no power loss, no downed lines, nothing. What a relief!

     Reef Central told a different story. Much of Connecticut still suffered a great loss of power and once again there were stories of people scrambling to find generators, talking of using air stones, wrapping their tanks in towels, immediate loss or the hopes of things just hanging in there until the power went back on. In the days that followed, news of fish dying, corals bleaching and smells coming from the tanks that we all know too well, flooded the forums. As much as this saddened me to see people that I know and some that I truly care for, lose their babies, all I can think of is why? Why, after Irene and the snowstorm would you still not have a backup plan? All the time and money that we put into our tanks, why wouldn't you buy a generator in the off season?

     Hopefully we see a break in this bullshit for a few years and I don't have to read of anyone losing their coral or fish because of Mother Nature and instead it will be because of their own hand (whether they admit to that or not lol). In the meantime, I will continue to thank my lucky stars for that impulse buy by my ex so many years ago because it has saved our coral, my food, my neighbors food, my children's sanity and of course mine for the last nine years. Oh, and it was one thing to cross off our 'to buy' list for the fishtank! And that means everything in the hobby!!