Well, got a lot of things done so far. Stand is built, need to finish doors for it, easy.
Plumbing is 98% done, just need to plumb in the refugium, easy.

Light fixture purchased: ATI Sunpower 8x39w.
Decided against the LED's for now as I just wasn't going to have the time to sufficiently build a nice looking light rack for them. So now I just need 6 more bulbs.

Water tests have been successful, just fixing some of the normal minor leaks associated with...

Continuing along with my weaning training, I bought some PE mysis, thawed some and then somewhat painstakingly found individual mysis that were intact enough and not as mushy as others to be able to be pierced by the fishing line. The radiata sees that they are shrimp-shaped and have eyes, and are on the end of the line, which is good enough for him. Now to see if I can get him onto food that doesn't have eyes, like regular table shrimp. He'll need to be larger anyway, to eat the smallest of...

Diver's Den had a Pterois radiata for sale, and I snapped it up as soon as it was on the website. It was listed as 2 and 3/4", which is clearly including the entire length of the fish including tail. In any event, I decided to see if I had better luck than my LFS in keeping one alive. In a sense, I could not do worse.

Given that it came from LiveAquaria and it is a lion, I decided to forgo any QT. The radiata (henceforth referred to as 'he' even though there is no way for...

What is Oodinium?

Velvet or Coral Fish Disease is caused from an infestation of the dinoflagellate Amyloodinium ocellatum. The life cycle of Velvet is very similar to the life cycle of marine ich. This organism is parasitic on fish at one stage in its life cycle; during that stage it is visible to the naked eye. The total life cycle for this parasite approximates 3 weeks; but for total safety after a tank is infected two life cycles should be waited (six weeks). The lifecycle is very...

The life cycle of this parasite is interesting and is important to understand when evaluating a treatment. The stage where the parasite is attached to a fish is called a trophont. The trophont will spend three to seven days (depending on temperature) feeding on the fish and that is what you see symptomatically when you see "salt sprinkled on the fish". However ich does not have to be visible in order to be present. After that, the trophont leaves the fish and becomes what is called a...