How many prop tanks out there?

[ahenson]

I'm curious how many people have prop tanks. It'd be cool to know purpose, goals, results, biggest mistake or tricks. Seems like this is good topic for Anthony's board. I am in planning stages and looking for advice.
Thanks
Andy

 

[NaH2O]

Hey Andy - I plan on having one....if I had some growing corals to propagate - lol. What types of corals do you think you will propagate the most?

 

[ahenson]

I started thinking beginner stuff like leathers and zoo's. I love lps but they don't grow fast enough. My bedroom tank will be all lps. And will produce occasional frag. I am rethinking maybe all varieties of zoos I can find, leathers, gsp and maybe some sps. I've spent so much on my tank My goals are to pay for the hobby and the future dream tank. I have 30g cube now but I'd love to have a tank like yours. Are you going to prop for trades or are you going to sell stuff? I'm hoping a mix of both. Haven't explored a lot of outlets to sell but I'm sure there's a market. I'd also like to help new reefers stock tank with frags. A fellow from Illinois started me out with a bunch of frags and I need to pass that on.
Andy

 

[ahenson]

By the way how's your tank doing? I took all my rockwork and corals out tonight to reaquascape and add more sand. Can you say milkshake.
Andy

 

[wooddood]

:razz: ummm i can say strawberry milkshake :badgrin:





dave.

 

[NaH2O]

Andy - for lighting you will want to go with what will work best for what you are propagating. SPS have different needs than leathers, so plan for what you will concentrate on. Depending on the size of the prop tank, you could always divide it up, and/or create an egg crate shelf to raise higher light requiring corals. I plan on trades and selling/credit at Premium (who always is taking my money ). Tank is doing alright - having an algae issue right now, and my blenny decided it likes to eat digitata and tri-color acros, so I have to catch him....grrrr.

 

[Hooked]

Hi Andy,

I have a prop tank for growing zoos and sps frags. It's a 20 long with a 250W DE halide pendant over it. I have rubble in the bottom for the zoos and a small eggcrate rack for sps frags.

I plumbed it into my main system with a maxijet 1200 in the sump as the return and an additional MJ in the prop tank. I'd like to have more current, but as of now I have an end sectioned off for my rose bta until I get it's new home built and it doesn't like too much flow.

HTH

 

[Beckmola24]

lol Nikki, my blenny eats monti digita too. It was a small free frag tho and he hasn't touched anything else yet. I am hoping to set up a prop tank once I am settled somewhere. I would like to propogate SPS. Like Andy said, it would be nice to fund the hobby a little

 

[ahenson]

Katrina I'd like to get some zoos from you I missed at meeting. Dumb name tags. I'd take about anything. Mine all have very few polyps.

 

[ahenson]

What kind of blenny? I'm trying to decide on fish. I've never had space for tangs before. Any suggestions? 100g rubbermaid.

 

[Beckmola24]

My blenny is a bi-color... What types of filtration, lighting and water movement do people use for prop tanks?? Do you need a skimmer if there are no fish??

 

[NaH2O]

hehe - my blenny is a bicolor, too. Becky - I plan on having a skimmer on mine because I figure with all the light, there will be some algae growth, so I'll have some snails in there. I was thinking about having a fish in there, as well....to provide some waste for the corals. Even though they receive the majority of food (talking sps) from light, there still is a small percent that they don't. I'm thinking a couple of powerheads. If a set-up is done like Katrina's, then you will get all your filtration from the main system. My prop tank will be in the basement, so I won't have it tied in.

 

[Ritsuko Nashida]

I am currently running a few of the rubbermaid 50 gallon Cattle water troughs with SPS corals and some softies. These are pretty cheap, easy to plumb, fairly shallow which makes great use of the lights without having to invest in big stupid dollar lighting set ups, and provide a lot of space for frag placement. They are about 4.5 feet long and a dual VHO fixture is just about right for Zoos and Mushrooms. The SPS one had dual 250 watt halides for the time being and three VHO tubes. At a whopping 50.00 bucks or so a tank....its a heck of a lot cheaper than a glass or acyrlic tank. Granted you cant see thru it like you can a glass tank and it does look kinda ghetto but its utility at its best!

 

[ahenson]

Do you have pictures of your setup? Plumbing pics?

 

[Ritsuko Nashida]

Wait a minute I got to resize them...

This pic is a couple of months old and at the time had 56 SPS/Softie frags in it. I am about to add at least 24 more or there abouts in the next week or so if I would quit procrastinating so much... This tank is about 5ft x 6ft oval shaped about 2 feet deep. So with that few frags its kinda looks empty as you might very well imagine...

 

[Ritsuko Nashida]

This is going to be painful....

 

[Ritsuko Nashida]

Here is the above the tank refugium that is plumbed to the tank. If you look in the first pci you can see the hoses plumbing the water to it