what happenes when you are on a vacation?

[Iam]

Hi everyone...

I am still working on completing my cycle.. My30g seahorse tank is doing great..60g is on its way...
But...I might go on a vacation for 2 weeks in couple of month... All of a sudden it got my attention, thousands of people in this forum and you all go on a vacation (I hope)
What do you guys do?
I don't have any friends who would understand and take care of the tanks..
I'd like to hear your solutions..
Thanks a lot...

[mg426]

I think you had better find one ASAP

[mike89t]

Join your local reef forum.

Here is one for Souther California:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/fo...?s=&forumid=50

I had my neighbor take care of my tank. But I also had some local reefers on call if she had questions or needed help.

[mg426]

Great idea !!!

[sushiking]

Get a tank sitter, quickly! Pay him well and them next time he will do it willingly and eagerly....well worth it in my opinion!

[Safir]

I saw an article on this recently, as I am going on vacation fri-sun.

I have a trusted friend in teh complex who keeps freshwater fish and has been around for most of our setup, so understands waht is imortant, but still....

document EVERYTHING - everything from typical behaviors of livestock (many people panic the first time they see an anemone "sucked in" to itself, etc - pictures are great here) to plumbing and wiring diagrams, daily routines, etc. Give them emergency contact information of a trusted LFS and/or local reef club members (get their permission first, of course) to contact in the event of an emergency, and outline exactly waht constitutes an emergency (one dead fish, for instance, while not pleasant, is nto an emergency - more dead fish is)

prepare food for every day you will be gone, dont' trust them to know how much to feed fish, etc - I will ahve small tupperware containers labelled by day with pre-portioned and pre-mixed food/additives/etc, just oepn a container and dump it in the tank.

make sure to explain to wash their hands before and after every tiem tehy put them in the water, and to keep anything not "fish only" out

explain the need to top-off with fresh water and how/when/how much (mark water levels if possible)

It is much better to have this all written down than try to give it all to eehm in 5 minutes before you leave - you can also have mor einformation than they will ever need avaliable to them, without overwhelming them all at once.

oh yeah, label everything... if you have an instruction to "turn off lights" or "unplug powerhead #2" in the event temperature gets too high, they need to know what switch or wire that is it is also easier in the event of an emergency for them to be able to tell teh LFS or club member "the drain line to the sump is leaking" because they read it off the label, rather than "the big white PVC pipe going into the thingy in the stand"

[Safir]

here is the article, it's from a previous verson of reefkeeping magazine:

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-11/nftt/index.php

[Barto]

Originally posted by Safir

prepare food for every day you will be gone, dont' trust them to know how much to feed fish, etc - I will ahve small tupperware containers labelled by day with pre-portioned and pre-mixed food/additives/etc, just oepn a container and dump it in the tank.

oh yeah, label everything... if you have an instruction to "turn off lights" or "unplug powerhead #2" in the event temperature gets too high, they need to know what switch or wire that is

Safir, good advice across the board, I wanted to add a little to two of your points.

Feeding: I have a bunch of the little plastic condiment containers (catchup size at burger king etc) with lids. Work great, cheap, take up almost no space when not in use.

Labeling: I think it was at Staples or some office supply store, I picked up a pack of "key tags" like the repair shop uses for your car keys.
It's a cheap & easy organizing tip for tanksitters or yourself.


Iam,
HTH and enjoy your vacation!

[Iam]

Thank you all.... I got it...
tank sitter is the way to go...

So anyone in Los Angeles area looking for a job?)

[mike89t]

Originally posted by Safir
I saw an article on this recently, as I am going on vacation fri-sun.

I have a trusted friend in teh complex who keeps freshwater fish and has been around for most of our setup, so understands waht is imortant, but still....

document EVERYTHING - everything from typical behaviors of livestock (many people panic the first time they see an anemone "sucked in" to itself, etc - pictures are great here) to plumbing and wiring diagrams, daily routines, etc. Give them emergency contact information of a trusted LFS and/or local reef club members (get their permission first, of course) to contact in the event of an emergency, and outline exactly waht constitutes an emergency (one dead fish, for instance, while not pleasant, is nto an emergency - more dead fish is)

prepare food for every day you will be gone, dont' trust them to know how much to feed fish, etc - I will ahve small tupperware containers labelled by day with pre-portioned and pre-mixed food/additives/etc, just oepn a container and dump it in the tank.

make sure to explain to wash their hands before and after every tiem tehy put them in the water, and to keep anything not "fish only" out

explain the need to top-off with fresh water and how/when/how much (mark water levels if possible)

It is much better to have this all written down than try to give it all to eehm in 5 minutes before you leave - you can also have mor einformation than they will ever need avaliable to them, without overwhelming them all at once.

oh yeah, label everything... if you have an instruction to "turn off lights" or "unplug powerhead #2" in the event temperature gets too high, they need to know what switch or wire that is it is also easier in the event of an emergency for them to be able to tell teh LFS or club member "the drain line to the sump is leaking" because they read it off the label, rather than "the big white PVC pipe going into the thingy in the stand"

Actually this is almost exactly what I did.

I started by labeling everything with one of those $30 label makers from Staples.

Then I created a checklist for every day and had my neighbor come over and I showed her how to do everything on the checklist.

I then had her come over once again and had her run through a checklist with me just watching.

I also gave her the number of a couple local reefers like I mentioned above. I put the following diagrams next to my tank and online so that they could walk my neighbor through most problems over the phone.

Here is a diagram of what's below my tank in the stand:


Here is an eletrical diagram:

[Sk8r]

An auto topoff is a major help. Having your own ro/di and a friend trained to use it is golden. You can set up separate topoffs for all your tanks for less than the national debt...
I put buffer in my topoff tank, so that helps stabilize the tank.

This will hold you for about a week. It's not necessary to feed the fish daily.

At the 7 day mark, get someone to come in and refill the topoff buckets if necessary, add a prescribed amount of buffer dissolved in that water, feed fish, and look for obvious problems. Give him your phone number.
Here's where adding the buffer in the topoff water helps---because you can now have the friend add a very conservative amount of calcium to the main display without having precipitation problems.

You're now good for another 7 days, with luck...

[Iam]

Thank you for the pictures... this is great... my system is easier actually... I can easily draw couple of diagrams...great

[MCary]

If you have enough money to go on vacation, then you need to buy more stuff for the reef.

Mike

[Jeremy Blaze]

What is a vacation?

[cbock]

Seahorses do best if they are fed everyday. Not feeding them for a week might cause problems since their digestive tract is so short. Also don't make any big changes before you go. It would probably be better to keep them in the 30 gallon that is stable than changing to the 60 right before you leave. How many and what species do you have in your tank?

[Iam]

Hi cbock,
they will stay in the 30g
I have 6 erectus
and 1 sponge
in the tank