How enchanting!

So I went to see the new Disney movie Enchanted on Friday. I wanted to see it as it looked like a good parody of the whole fairy tale Genre. While it starts out as animated boy meets animated girl looking for her prince, things take a drastic turn when they are thrown to real life New York!

Suffice to say good laughs and a non typical script make this movie fun, if only we could lock up the throngs of 10 year old girls that arrived just prior to the movie start. Still it was fun and I would reccomend it to my friends

updates..

The aquarium is going great still, we have had a few casualties lately unfortunatly. Notably Ferdinand the 2nd (the new firefish) rolled over and died one morning. The Serpent star is behaving very wierd in the last few days in that he has decided to lose his legs. He is now a mass of stump legs. I didnt think he would make it past the last couple days but hes still moving around so who knows.
On another front I had a bit of an algae bloom, but now the algae is receeding pretty well, and unfortunately that includes my chaeto! It has gone from a ever growing mass to about 1/2 the size it once was.

On happier notes my cleaner wrasse (AKA Wade junior) is doing very well, he is very sociable and comes out to see anyone walking by the tank. I will likely get him a new friend very soon :)

bad blogger :(

Yes I have been a bad blogger but I will try and do better I am sorry for the lack of updates.

NEWS!
Tonight I will be at the Canadiens game vs the Boston Bruins. Melanie and I watched the game Sat night at "La Cage" on Cote vertu against Buffalo and although the seats were not the best (wood chairs FTL.) The game itself was great entertainment.

I got a few snails known as Turbos, the first 2 I got were anything but turbo and did little to solve a small hair algae problem I have started to develop. I got 2 more on Sat to instant results. Its pretty funny I have a couple rocks now that look like they got haircuts.

I also got a bristle star, its been shy hiding under a rock and hasnt really moved at all but you can catch its tentacles reaching out every once in a while.

I'll try and get some pics soon

Terminator Salvation

So it seams the Terminator franchise is to be resurrected in Summer 2009. The new film is called "Terminator Salvation: the future begins" The script is written by the same guys that did T3 so to be honest I dont have much hope for it. I really didn't find T3 enjoyable at all. That being said though this one FINALLY takes place in the future, the battle of man vs machine. It is to be a trilogy so expect a huge clifhanger to draw you into the sequel(s.)

On other news, the clown fish is no more, "Nemo" it appears was eaten by a crab I never even knew I had. After he disappeared I consulted some people and was advised to put out a crab trap which I did. The culprit was caught within a few hours. Melanie was distraught with the death of the fish, (she had hand picked it) and the crab was disposed of.

I am looking to add 2 Ocelaris (clown fish) and a Anenome shortly which should add a lot of action in the tank, pics to come of course when added.

Fish

I would like to introduce my new firefish ! I got him and a tiny ocellaris (clown fish) this past saturday afternoon. I only have a picture of the firefish as the ocellaris is playing hide and seek. Both Melanie and I are now playing "Finding Nemo" in real life!

Let there be life!

My tank is now "Alive!"

I have been a bad blogger so I have a few things to catch you up on. The first being the tank now has life! In the main display and to a lesser extent in the sump I now have "Live rock" this rock is alive as it has a multitude of bacteria living inside it not to mention algae, and the possibility for other life to be packed inside nooks and crannies (such as crabs and sponges.)
The other life that was added chaeto otherwise known as chaetomorpha, It is a macro algae and is good for a tank because it competes with other algae and therefore reduces phosphates and nitrates (nutrients if you will.) It's also a great place for critters to live.

I managed to get 2 balls of chaeto 1 shipped from Toronto (priority overnight mail.) and 1 from the same guy I got most of my rock from. This helps promote biodiversity in my aquarium. In the chaeto itself I ended up with a few different critters, and have noticed some very small things swimming around as well as what I can only guess is a bristleworm (looked like a centipede!)

View of the refugium, with my chaeto (on the left under the light)

I have the live rock sitting in the aquarium now for 2 weeks, you need to give the tank time to grow the bacteria needed to process the bio load. The rock has a certain amount of die off and it starts the “cycle” ammonia ->nitrate->nitrite. A bacteria processes ammonia creating nitrate, anther consumes nitrate and produces nitrite, and yet another consumes nitrite and produces nitrogen gas which floats away. Each kind of bacteria needs to grow till the levels of each in the water undetectable. When this is done then the cycle is done and I can add fish (ETA 1 week.)

View of the display tank with the new live rock.

Bday Party!

I want to thank everyone who came to my Bday party. I truly had a great time, as did everyone else from what I could tell.

This birthday I decided to let out my Asian side, I booked a room at "The music box" which is downtown at 486 Ste Catherine st W (2nd floor,) for some kareoke. I think my friends and I were the only non Asians in the whole place, so you know it was "authentic." Not only that but I was also wearing my most Asian Astro boy t-shirt(see below.)

The party ended at 2AM and we all crawled to bed with what voice we had left. The next morning some of us managed to get to Eggspectations for some yummy breakfast.

Birthday suprise!

For those that dont know my Bday is this Sat the 15! Last night I got a call form 250 area code, and knew it was my Grandfather, it turns out he is in Ottawa with his GF and he asked what I am up to Sat cause SURPRISE guess whos coming? I am really happy to have him come its been almost a year since I last saw him and I have never met his GF from NZ. Of course this makes the Bday itself a bit more hectic as not only do I have to prepare a plan for that evening but now I will spend the afternoon with family.

More work ahead

After I found some moisture on the inside of the cabinet I did some conferring with the experts at reefcentral.com and it was decided that I need to get some ventilation insode there to cut down on the moisture level. For the moment I am leaving the cabinet doors open which allows ample ventilation.

I spoke to my hookup for the remaing items I need for the tank and I am meeting him on Friday night to get my hands on 2 new powerheads (in tank pumps,) 20 pounds or so of Live rock, bulbs for my lights, and some live sand (its live with bacteria, worms, etc.) so as of saturday I will be testing my water daily till the the amonia, nitrate and nitrite levels are at zero. Once they are then I can get a fish! It is possible I may cave earlier and get a shrimp, crab, snails, or some such.

Salty water!

This morning with the aquarium finally full of freshly filtered water it came time to add the Instant Ocean brand salt I had purchased weeks before. After adding 18 Cups of salt the salinity was at the desired level.
It was a HOT day in Montreal today, it seems taking out the AC last weekend was a tad over zealous. Summer it seems has some spunk left in her and is trying to melt all the nay sayers.
I left my apt with Melanie around noon to partly escape the heat.
We did a tour of the Aquarium stores looking for inspiration and I ended up purchasing a light timer. Its pretty cool as it is a power bar with 2 sockets on "day" 2 on "night" and 4 constantly on. This allows me to plug the aquarium lights into it and alternate the 2 main lights in the display for the day and the light in the sump and the moon lights (seen above!)

I should be getting a batch of live rock soon, I am just waiting on a guy to get back to me.
Oh I also ordered some "chaeto" which is a macro algae, I should have it arrive at work on Tuesday. Will explain about that then!

Water ho!

Water is finally going into the tank!
Last night I siliconed the square around the bulkhead (hole in the side of the tank) which then allowed me to start adding water. I managed to filter about 15 gallons of water yesterday and I put it in this morning.

Here is as it looked before I left for work:


The water is a little murky from the stirred up sand, but should clear up soon. you can see on the right corner of the tank the new box I siliconed in, and the rock formation I created this morning!

More pics whent he tank is full.

RO / DI problems!

So I started up my fancy pants RO/DI filter this past weekend in the hopes that I could start filling the aquarium with good "pure" water. I let it run for a bit then go test the water with my trusty TDI meter (see previous post if you are wondering what that is) and find out the water coming out of the tap and the water coming out of the filter are about the same! I had heard that some of these need to be "broken in" so let it run for a while but to no avail.

Thanks to the people at the reef central forums, (http://www.reefcentral.com/forums) it seems my filter came plumbed incorrectly. I will try again when I get home and hope to get water flowing into the aquarium!

On a bright note I did drain all the fresh water out from testing all the plumbing on the tank, and I added all the sand and the base (read not live) rock.

Only a few minor things remain.
1) Silicone a water trap around the bulkhead, so that surface water falls in and then out the bulkhead and into the sump. Most proteins and other non desirable stuff floats on the surface of the water.
2) Add the water, and mix the salt.
3) wait a few days then buy live rock.
4) let the rock aquarium "cycle" what this really means is let the life cycle get underway and give the bacteria time to grow so that it can handle the waste from the inhabitants to come.

Hockey season is almost here!

As many of you probably know I am not the biggest of sports fans. This may suprise those that have seen how I am about hockey but its more than just the hockey that I love. I regularly get involved in fantasy leagues with friends and that adds a whole other dimension to watching a game. All of a sudden I care if Nashville wins or losses games, I listen attentively to the sports highlights to see if my players have had a sensational evening, or become injured.

As another season of hockey aproaches, I am again joining the SSFHL fantasy league. Last year Scott found this leage and the two of us had decent seasons, Scott even (thanks to a little help from me) one the playoff. If you enjoy Fantasy hockey or want to check out how it works visit the site http://www.ssfhl.com/

As trash talk is part of the fun in these leagues I'll just say "I'll enjoy taking your money"

A local legend passes

Ernie Butler owner of the Comedy nest in the Pepsi forum and the host of the CJAD died this morning. As you may or may not know I often listen to CJAD and I enjoyed Mr Butlers comedy show almost every weekend for the last few years.
It seems from what I have read that he was battling stomach cancer for about a month. I know I heard him doing his comedy show not that long ago, and thought it wierd this past weekend when another host was subbing for him.

Ernie, thanks for all the laughs.

3, 2, 1 .. GO!

I decided to go another route and instead of using
the overflow to moving the water from the display tank to the sump, I instead got my tank drilled! I brought my tank out toe the Waste island to "Big Als" where they proceeded to take a drill with a diamond tip circula drill bit works its way through the side of my tank. As a added bonus when there they had just started feeding thier shark (!!) and we got to see this small (3-4 Ft long) shark go to town on a huge chunk of fish.


Here are the pics of the Bulkhead (plastic thingy) in the new hole:

The tank is still a little dirty from the drilling
process. As the water that lubricates the drill bit
becomes full of glass, the glass dust mixes with the water and goes a milky white color. What you see is the residue that I have yet to clean.


This weekend will see the special water filter come into effect which means 50 gallons of water into the tank and more than I would want to think down the drain!


More pictures to come of course and updates with (hopefully) the tank full of water and running!

Another weekend done

Well another weekend is done, and it wasnt very productive, besides some grocery shopping that is. After an exhausting Friday where I left the office at 7PM (and thats after coming in early) I met Melanie downtown and we saw Rush hour 3. IT was a good time but in my mind not as good as the first 2. The story was pretty flimsy (but thats not suprising,) but Chris Tucker was awsome as usual.

Today I picked up a couple more pieces of glass. This is to complete the Sump for the salt water aquarium. I wanted to raise 2 of the baffles a couple inches to give a little more room for error. This way I know the water is flowing the way I want it to. If I get home at a decent hour I will go and install these (and try not to die form the silicone smell!) I have also decided to remove one potential source of worry and to get the tank drilled. This means having a 1" hole drilled into the side glass of the tank. The downside is the $40 (or so) fee, and the risk that the panel shatters. The upside is that I dont have to worry about the overflow failing for any reason, and flooding the floor, and ruining my pump.

Melanies Bday - Success!

Thanks to everyone who came out for Melanies birthday weekend. On friday we went to Weinstein and Gavinos had a great dinner with a small group of friends. On Sat we spent the day cruising around then went to her Aunts for a familly get together to celebrate her birthday. On Sunday my littlest sister Ceri was in town and "the crew" all met up for some Dim sum. Oh how I love my Dim sum!
After I rolled out of Kam Fung Mel and I headed to Laval to check out "La maison de reve." It's a house in Laval that you is being raffled off. It includes 5 years of property tax, hydro, satelite tv, a hot tub, excercise room, 500 bottles of wine in a huge wine celler, a loft above the garage (its like a whole mini apt in the house!) Plus all kinds of furniture. The value I heard was over 1 Million, I bought a few tickets, after all the money is going to charity and the odds are way better than the lottery. If you would like to check it out its online as well at http://www.maisonderevebmo.com/

Vancouver?

The start of September should see me in Vancouver!
My good friend Scott who is now living in Victoria is getting married on Sept 3rd. I have managed to get some work for the first week of September lined up and everything is looking good. The best part about this trip is I will get to see my Grandfather (living in Vancouver) and I will also get to see my cousins (in Kamloops!) Nothing is set in stone yet though but things are looking good so far.

In other news I saw "The Bourne Ultimatum" last night with Mark and his posse. I dont know what all the hype is about it wasnt a bad movie but there are so threads, and it jumps around so much. I am glad that I had seen the other 2 movies as I think it is really a pre requisite.

This Saturday is Melanies Bday, on Friday were doing a dinner with some friends / familly at Weistein and Gavino's on Crescent. I only need to get her a present .. hmm....

Back from camping / Aquarium test run sucess!

Melanie and I survived our outing to Mt Tremblant for a weekend of camping. We stayed in the L'asumption sector which takes a more round about way to reach. The good part about it was that our campsite was a little out of the way, and was right on the river. Anyone who has gone camping with me knows I prefer being as far from others as possible, and although this wasnt exactly the case (people were visable) it wasnt the end of the world.
(pictures to come)

When we got back in town on Sunday I wanted to finish testing the aquarium, I cut the overflow, glued it to the main body and proceeded to fill the aquarium with water. The testing went really well, I had many simulated powerouts and the overflow was easily able to restart the siphon with no external help (VERY important.) I may still get the tank drilled for peace of mind. I would hate to explain to the guy living below me how the water was coming in via his roof ...

Pictures!

As I finally got around to breaking out the camera I took a few choice pictures of my work so far on the tank.

On the right is a picture of the return I made, a (non kink) hose I bought at Nature pet center is clamped to a 3/4 hose attachment and the run through various 3/4 " piping

The flow rate out of it is pretty good, it will be fun to see how much of a current it will make when the tank is full.







On the Left you can see how I have drilled the side of the stand. I bought this cabinet from Ikea and as it has not intended for Aquarium use it has required some "Do it yourself" modifications. I bought a 1 1/2" drill bit and borrowed a drill from Gregg and went to town. I use the upper one for the hose and the lower one as a access port for the various plugs coming from the sump.







This isn't the best picture but shows the 2x4 wood brace I added to the underside of the cabinet. Mark expressed some concern that the cabinet would not be able to hold the 400-500 Lbs of weight from the display tank. I had thought about getting those L metal brackets but opted for the wood brace option instead. The Home depot gut gave me a PERFECT fit, so perfect I didn't need to hold the wood in place when I drilled the screws into it. I was seriously impressed (exactly 96cm in case you cared)


Below you can see the picture of the sump itself in the cabinet. The water level will not be as high as you see it here (this is the water from testing the return.)

The first section is where the water will enter via the hose you see coming down and into the water. The protein skimmer is next to it which uses a process of mixing water and air to draw out organic particles (the particles are attracted to the air bubbles and are carried to the top which then gets collected in a cup.)

The second section will be the Refugium, essentially it is a place for Macro algae to grow and to allow lots of critters a safe place to grow without getting eaten by fish.

The 3 dividers are known as a bubble trap. When the water comes down from the display tank and the protein skimmer is done the water can have many micro bubbles in it. The bubble trap makes the water travel a little further and is designed to allow the bubbles a change to escape out into the air.

The third section has the pump which returns water into the display tank and the return which you saw in the first picture. The pump can handle 600 gallons per hour which sounds like a lot but after pumping water up a meter the rate actually drops to about 350 gallons which is apropriate for a 33 gallon tank.


More pics and info to come, I will have the overflow installed soon which is now glued but I need to cut a pipe so the tanks water level will be higher. Hopefully tonight I will have this done which will allow me to fill the display tank as well and to test the whole water circulation system as a whole.

TDS meter arrived!

I finally got my TDS meter today!

What is a TDS meter ?

A TDS meter measures the"total amount of substances in the water other than the pure H₂O." What it really means for me though is that I can test the water out of my Ro/DI water filter and make sure that it is coming out with a reading of zero or at least close to it. The lower the reading the better the water is for the salt water aquarium. Tap water has lots of phosphates and other stuff that promote algae growth which I certainly would like to avoid as much as possible.

On a similar note I have the hoses clamped and with the help of Mark tonight I should have the ABS pipe I am using for my overflow all glued together (its like plastic melt / fuse glue) then fill it with tap water and let er rip!

as always more to come as they happen!

LAN weekend was SICK! (in the bad way!)

The LAN weekend in Kingston was a grand success! As always my Ontarian and American friends and I all stayed up late drank many a beer and tried to avoid Matts flatulence.

Unfortunatly on the drive down to Kingston I decided to not stop and have a bite to eat and instead wait till I arrived at my destination. This proved to be the stick that broke my immune systems back as not long after I got to Kingston I started not feeling to well. I thought it was just the hunger, but after some cheerios seemed to have no effect at all I questioned my early analysis. By Friday night I had popped an extra strength advil (thanks again Darren!) and as you may or may not know about me I rarely take any medication at all. The fact I asked for an advil to put me out of my misery speaks volumes.
Fast forward to Saturday and things were not all that much better, I woke up famished and despite eating a copious amount I still felt hungry... yet full... wierd feeling.
I decided to eat many carrots and drink plenty of water (and I admit pepsi!)

By Sunday morning I was in good shape but unfortunatly the weekend was already mostly over. We played a little Ghost Recon to finish off the morning then Trent had to go, this was the queue for the rest of us to start packing up as well, and withing an hour or so I too was on my way home.

more tools! and a LAN weekend!

This weekend I head off to the no mans land known as Kingston Ontario (why not Jamaica?!) There I am meeting up with fellow members of "The Purge" a guild of like minded gamers that I play World of Warcraft with. I have done 2 other events like this at Mike's Cabin and both times was a great time so I am anxiosly looking forward to the weekend.

That being said I also wanted to have water in the Aquarium by now, I need to clamp on the hoses and found just pulling the hoses on the spout ends of the pipe pretty difficult! I am going to head to Home depot during my lunch hour to aquire one of the best tools ever invented. The Vice Grip!

You may be thinking what is so special about this tool? If you have never used one you will just not understand. I am wondering now how I lived so long without one!

More to come as always ;)

Productive weekend!

So I finally got the stand I bought from Ikea drilled, and reinforced! I had put it off for a while but Sunday morning I did a quick trip to Home Depot got a 96cm length of 2 by 4 and some hose clamps and went to work.

Tonight I am planning to cut the hose to length and clamp them on. Also have to glue the ABS I have (finally) once thats done its time for a test run with tap water.

Let the salt water gods have mercy! ;)

First post!

My first post!

I finally caved in and decided to create one of these Blog thingamabobs. I am planning to first outline my adventures in creating my salt water aquarium!

more to come including pictures!