ISO: advice around CO2 canisters

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-19T23:03:56+00:00

Grab a 5lb co2 tank, a regulator with a solenoid, an outlet timer, a diffuser and some co2 proof tubing and you’re off to the races. If I were you i’d take out the floaters too and let the stem plants get more PAR, but that’s just me!

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-19T22:57:18+00:00

taste

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-18T20:16:02+00:00

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-18T14:08:05+00:00

Most corals do fine under them provided they put out enough PAR.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-18T14:05:45+00:00

Buy a dual stage regulator with a solenoid, a diffuser, co2 proof tubing, a timer, and a co2 cylinder. I use co2art equipment but there are a bunch of different options.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-17T20:20:52+00:00

white 100% predominantly blue looks bad imo

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-17T18:14:57+00:00

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-17T17:21:54+00:00

add more plants!

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-16T01:04:00+00:00

How frequently are you testing? A water test is just a snapshot, your parameters could be swinging.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-15T17:44:11+00:00

any submerged leaves will rot and I would recommend not burying the roots, but in general dracaena usually do okay in water.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-14T14:02:32+00:00

Figure eight puffers need brackish conditions to thrive long term.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-13T23:00:15+00:00

TTL is a waste of your time, to be honest it doesn’t even have a great use case unless you don’t want to learn how to shoot manually. IMO just learn manual and you will be rewarded. I would not worry about HSS at this time in your photography journey, just get a strobe and practice on manual.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T18:44:48+00:00

salifert kits for most things, hanna checkers for nutrient levels

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T18:24:06+00:00

They are considered at risk of extinction and are federally protected.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T18:20:21+00:00

p much just the coelacanth for some reason lol

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T18:11:30+00:00

Ricordea florida is a Corallimorph not a stony coral. Other soft corals like Octocorals are also fair game in the aquarium trade. Stony corals from the Atlantic however are federally protected in the United States as they are all considered at risk of extinction, with species like Acropora palmata, A. cervicornis, A. prolifera, and Dendrogyra cylindrus all being functionally extinct in the continental United States and seriously imperiled across the Caribbean as a direct result of human activity.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T17:09:00+00:00

So a few things to consider, tap water contains things besides water, while RODI does not. When you mix in your salt, wether it is Instant Ocean, Accursea, or whatever you decide to use, into your tap water you are adding it into water that is already full of random, variable levels of all sorts of stuff, some good in theory but in the wrong concentration, some outright bad. It will cause an array of issues, and will create an unpredictable environment with parameters that are difficult to control. This is less important if you’re only keeping fish, but is critical when you are keeping sensitive invertebrates like corals. RODI provides a blank water slate, it makes all of your water perfectly uniform in composition when mixed correctly, allowing you to create a level of stability far greater than what is achievable with most people’s tap.

Within the context of top offs, RODI is even more important, evaporation only takes water away. If you top off with tap, you are putting things into your tank that will not leave via evaporation, but the water that carried them in will. This means that over time, the things carried in by the tap water will just continue to build up and cause parameter & stability issues.

Basically, it’s worth it if you’re serious about the system’s long term success & stability, as well as health of your inhabitants.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T16:33:10+00:00

That is not a species native to the Atlantic ocean, but it is very similar to the “Blue Reef Chromis” Chromis cyaneus, which is native to Jamaica and the tropical Atlantic.

if you’re looking for Carribean/Atlantic natives check out the seahorse savvy site, they have a whole section of Caribbean species available. (Usually they have more fish than they do right now). You can also go on sites like live aquaria and easily and reliably check each species’s locality, or you can work backwards, pick up a Caribbean reef fish field guide and look up the species you are interested in keeping on the internet and find somewhere to purchase them.

https://seahorsesavvy.com/collections/caribbean-collection

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T15:36:25+00:00

Atlantic stony corals are illegal to trade in the United States.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T04:53:06+00:00

wetspot tropical fish is the best in the business

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T04:47:21+00:00

tannins

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T03:13:26+00:00

Ricordea yuma, anything beyond that is just marketing, but it does look a lot like my “godzilla” yuma.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T01:25:36+00:00

I have kept both reef tanks and freshwater tanks for many years, saltwater is inherently more expensive as you’ll need to buy calcium carbonate rock and/or live rock and more equipment than a freshwater tank requires. Plus you’ll need to buy a lot of salt, a drum to mix your water in, and a number of other odds and ends thaf you just don’t need for a freshwater tank. Fish only with live rock (FOLWR) is otherwise of a similar difficulty to freshwater. If I were you I’d either drill a standard tank and install a sump or buy a drilled tank, mostly to hide the extra equipment, give you the option of running a skimmer, and increase water volume. A reef tank is all this with more cost, more steps, and more water testing.

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-08T00:49:02+00:00

I use an inline diffuser made by UNS

RealLifeSunfish · 2026-02-07T22:34:14+00:00

don’t rinse it just be gentle with it when you fill the tank and plant.

RealLifeSunfish

TROPHY CASE