water temp

[albie611]

i have run a sucessful 20 gal mixed reef for a few years with and without a heater or chiller. i have also survived and rebounded from both a cold related crash and a heater malfunction related crash.
imo your temp of 80* is as perfect as you can get.the higher you run it over that the more you have to watch it. if your temp is stable and does not fluxuate too much i would say you have nothing to worry about.
i also would sugest a fan if you can't get it down below 82-84 . there much more inexpensive than a chiller, but with the cooler weather comming i dont think you should need it.
for corals the more important issue is the stability of the water quality......what are your parameters?

if they are within sugested limits and stable you could start with any soft coral.....
(leathers, polyps, mushrooms, and kenya tree are what most people start with because they are more forgiving of water quality and light and usualy are a bit more hardy)

with only 65w p/c's i would stay away from most lps and sps corals because they tend to need more light(unless you put them high in the tank and with a 20 gal you wont see them that good at the top

 

[Carlo]

Besides a fan basically only option is something like an IceProbe chiller for that size tank or keep the AC on and the room cooler.

Carlo

Hey Carlo, would the IceProbe chiller work for on a 24G aquapod?

Yes, but you will probably need to drill a hole somewhere for the probe.
Here is the home page: http://www.coolworksinc.com/iceprobe.htm

The white part of the probe is what needs to touch the water. On the right side of the page is an owners manual where you can get a better idea about installation.

Carlo

 

[mynd]

It's so kool to be COOL!

 

[Chris Jury]

Corals from the Fiji area tend to grow faster in the warmer temps but develop "brittle". In the colder temps they "harden" up and get tougher/stronger. In extremely warm years they grow so fast and brittle that they break from their own weight. BTW, carib corals are the opposite.

Hmmmm, may I ask where you got this information? I'm not sure this is an entirely...factual interpretation

cj

 

[Carlo]

Some different research studies. Basically what they did besides the controlled growth studdies was to show cross section cuts of some different types of corals. You could see the growth rings of the corals similar to the rings in trees.

During the cooler months the growth was slower but "denser" and in the water temps the growth was faster but not as "dense".

Forget the carib corals part as I didn't really say what I was thinking in regards to the "opposite" part and it's deceiving.

Carlo

 

[Chris Jury]

High density and low density bands are evident in a lot of corals (most obvious in massive corals--round ones--as compared to branching corals, but present all the way around). During the cool part of the year calcification drops, but linear extension tends to drop more, increasing skeletal density. During the warm part of the year calcification increases, but linear extension increases more, reducing skeletal density. Hence, we get seasonal high and low density bands (actually, with new methods it is possible even to detect daily high and low density bands).

This tends to be true for all corals (no distinction Pacific vs. Caribbean). Actually, most of the early work on this property was done with Caribbean Montastrea spp. The skeletal density never goes so low as to allow breakage due to a coral's own weight. Also, while you can sometimes see these bands with the naked eye, usually you need to X-ray the skeleton to be able to see the bands.

cj

 

[Carlo]

It was Walt Smith who made the comment about the corals breaking from their own weight (go figure). He had mentioned that during excessive warm months the corals would grow so quickly that they became brittle and broke from their own weight. <-- something like that.

Carlo

 

[Chris Jury]

Ha, ok. No disrespect to Walt, but I don't know about that...

 

[Boomer]

Chris

Part of that came from the Walt-Bomber thread at the bottom

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=5089918#post5089918

galleon

No, they are actually generally opposite (excluding stress bands from ultra-cold/ultra-hot anamolies). Tropical West Atlantic corals exhibit low density (fastest growth) bands during cooler months. Indo-Pacific and Red Sea corals exhibit the highest density bands during the coolest months

 

[Chris Jury]

If they could show me a good amount of data to support that I'd be intersted to see it. Otherwise, I'd have to say they they are mistaken. Tropical Atlantic corals (just like any other corals) form high density bands during the cool season and low density bands during the warm season. I mean, the original concept came from work with Montastrea annularis complex corals (M. annularis, M. faveolata and M. franksi are now recognized as sibling species, but folks thought they were just different growth forms at that time).

cj

 

[Carlo]

Thanks Boomer, I was going insane trying to find that. Had I stopped and thought about it for 10 seconds I'd have realize the link just came up not to long ago. I guess the brain does start to loose functionality when you're approaching 50. :

I know the growth bands/rings part is true but what about the "but reeks havoc on the reef as corals shoot up and break off under their own weight" quote from Walt in that thread? This to me seems like something Walt should know about but it's hard to say for sure if he's just making a "glorified" generalized comment sort of larger then life or if he's personally seen it.

Chris from you research and studies would you call this one another "Walt"ism? How about you Boomer, what's your thought?

I'm sure it's not really applicable to the home reef but still wouldn't mind knowing.

Carlo

 

[Chris Jury]

Humans are not objective creatures, by nature. We recieve information with our various senses but our brain interprets this and puts it in a context we can understand. Our interpretation of this information is, by definition, subjective. It is only by rigorously taking measurments, analyzing this data, and seeing what stats tell us and doing all of this in an unbiased manner that we are able to get objective information.

Walt is a person, like you, me, or anyone else. People, without rigorously designing an experimental design that will give us unbiased information, can only come to subjective conclusions about the world. Walt's opinion is not without merit, but there is no data behind it. It is subjective--it is his interpretation of the world. How accurate this interpretation is I can't say, but it is an interpretation nonetheless. Any of us in his place would be able to do no better as we all bring similarly subjective interpretation to the table. It is the scientific method and peer review that get us factual information and this is because we purposely and systematically take the human influence out of the equation.

cj

 

[Carlo]

Chris are you sure you weren't a diplomat in another life?

Thanks, question answered.

Carlo

 

[Chris Jury]

The older I get and the more I see (not that I'm that old or have seen that much ) the more I learn that I need to carefully consider what everyone has to say, even if it seems ludicrous to me at first (not that Walt does, I'm just saying...). I need to avoid jumping to conclusions. I also need to be courteous to everyone. Everyone deserves courtousy I think...at least until they prove me wrong, ha.

 

[Carlo]

Yep, I was right.

 

[Phyl]

The older I get and the more I see (not that I'm that old or have seen that much ) the more I learn that I need to carefully consider what everyone has to say, even if it seems ludicrous to me at first (not that Walt does, I'm just saying...). I need to avoid jumping to conclusions. I also need to be courteous to everyone. Everyone deserves courtousy I think...at least until they prove me wrong, ha.

Very well said. I think we could all reflect on this and learn something of ourselves and those around us.

Thanks.

 

[jazzsam]

The older I get and the more I see (not that I'm that old or have seen that much ) the more I learn that I need to carefully consider what everyone has to say, even if it seems ludicrous to me at first (not that Walt does, I'm just saying...). I need to avoid jumping to conclusions. I also need to be courteous to everyone. Everyone deserves courtousy I think...at least until they prove me wrong, ha.

I love the way you put that. Just recently within the past few months I have been trying to take a new view on life and that is a key part. No one knows everything and the person that that things they do is wrong. There are a quiet a few proverbs about this and I really love them all. (Never spend time with the person that says they have found enlightenment only the person that says they are trying to get to it!)

 

[Chris Jury]

"If at first, the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it." --Albert Einstein

Hypotheses, explanations, models, etc. that might seem completely nonsensical can turn out to be exactly correct. If we dismiss ideas, though they may seem absurd initially, we will never figure things out. I'm sure that when I publish my thesis folks with think I'm wrong and just plain full of it, but I am neither. My results surprised the heck out of me, but that's why I'm running the tests--to find out the truth, and not simply further our preconceptions about the world which are, as it turns out, not entirely factual.

cj