Pier Pressure

This question would draw more of a response on the canreef forum. Not a lot of salt on this forum. I have a small saltwater aquarium but I do not have sexy shrimps so it has never been an issue.

We went through quite a few spawns with our Red Jewels when we had the 150 gallon up and running. Those two would take over at least half of the tank and have babies and G*D HELP whatever other fish got anywhere near them. I had them in with African lake cichlids and the Jewels were by far the most aggressive when they had babies. We moved them to a 33 gallon but they would not breed in there, so we moved them back to the 150, and they immediately began breeding again. We found that the best way to save the most fry was when they were hatched and still hanging out in a kind of ball formation, we would siphon them into a doubled up breeder net. We doubled the net because the other fish could suck the babies right through a single net. Keep in mind there may be some major size differences amongst the fry and the bigger ones have no problem chowing down on their smaller brothers and sisters. Anyway we had so many spawns that several local fish stores that we deal with refused to take any more of the babies. Tank crashed soon after that so that was the end of our freshwater.

Golds has some for sure. Not sure about the price. I am feeding reef roids and I am really starting to wonder if these extra foods we buy for the saltwater aquariums are really necessary.

Welcome to the Board! Keep your eye on the buy/sell forums as you just might be able to stock your tank without using any local fish stores by buying livestock from other members. A must-see fishstore in Calgary is Golds Aquariums located in the NE. They have great prices and a very knowledgable staff.

Hey, thank you, sharuq1. That was some interesting reading. I know from doing research that there is no way I can save the babies, but I like the idea of having such a natural food source in the tank. Everything was going crazy feeding that night - from the fish, to the inverts, to the anemones. I figure if something is not getting quite what it may need nutritionally - having this natural food source might help. Really cool to watch and I do not really like the idea of the babies being eaten - but they look like bugs as opposed to perfect little fry so it is not that bad.

Would amphipods not be present each and every night if they are living in the tank? We only had these things show up one night - and there were millions of them. I only have a 28 gallon saltwater reef - would that support a million of these things? I am completely convinced they were baby cleaners, especially considering I have been watching the adults get bellies full of little green eggs!

Won't a single fish get lonely? How about a pair?

Not to mention you will see things in there that you never see in the light of day. Might be your best chance to catch that hairy, red-eyed crab who is eating your livestock! Without the moonlights, I never would have seen the cleaner shrimp hatch out. That was quite a sight to behold.

Whoops - I also meant to say "nitrite spike". I sure wish nitrite and nitrate were not so very close, when they mean such totally different things!

We need more information. How big is your tank and how heavily is it stocked? Did you do water tests and if so what where your readings? If the water change appears to have fixed your problem, I would guess that you had a nitrate spike of some sort that took out your fish, but without more information it is really hard to tell.

So I found out last night we are definitely dealing with cleaner shrimp babies. I was checking out the cleaner shrimp and one of them was twice the size of the other and kind of acting weird on the glass at the back of the aquarium. A closer inspection of the shrimp showed that there were millions of tiny little white eggs in this gooky stuff attached on her belly. We tried to take some shots but the algae was fairly deep on that side, but I shall post a picture if we find one that shows the eggs. I cannot imagine parting with the saltwater now!

Yes we have used the siphoning method with great results. Have pulled whole batches of fry out of a 150 gallon tank, and that includes demasoni babies, which are quite small. We just used a siphoning hose and siphoned them into a five gallon pail. Worked awesome. The best time to get them is when they are still really young and hanging out in a sort of "ball" formation.

Duly noted. I have had a lot of interest in the saltwater but I will put you on the list. It is our last tank and we will definitely be keeping it for a while.

That is so very wicked. Sea horses are my favorite creatures. If you do raise them put me on the list for a pair as well! What kind are they?

Well, after having two 150 gallon aquariums blow out on us over the course of eleven months, we decided to get out of the hobby completely. Any hobby that can cause a blood pressure spike like that is not a hobby we want to be a part of. So we are in the middle of selling off all the freshwater stuff. But now that we are just about down to one saltwater tank - we are getting very reluctant to part with it. Might just stay on the salty side for a while, at least for the length of the life of our livestock.

Now those are some awesome shots. Thank you for sharing that - and I do believe I had baby cleaners. Finaddict was over at my place the other day and she told me my shrimp are definitely in the family way - the neon green things in the bellies are the eggs, but the fluttering things I was talking about are actually legs and have nothing to do with it. Way, super cool. It is hard enough getting rid of all my freshwater stuff. I am not sure I am going to have the guts to actually get rid of the saltwater.

There was no property damage. We were there when the tank went and spent eight hours Christmas Eve cleaning up the mess. The tank was located in the basement on a tile floor. There is some water damage to the grout, but that needed to be replaced anyway, so not worth a claim.

As most of you know, I have had two 150 gallon perfecto tanks explode in less than a one year period. I am pleased to be able to report that I received all of my money back - tank and stand - from PetSmart and I did not have a hard time trying to get it back, either. When I took it back last time, I did not have a receipt and it did not matter - they know the look of their tanks and replaced it no questions asked. When I took the second one back the only receipt I had was the return receipt and they accepted it no problem and provided a full refund. I cannot complain about that :smokey: .

It was totally sweet, man - whatever it might have been. I looked up baby cleaners on the net and they seem to have long tentacle dealies that I did not see on these creatures - but they were super tiny and under the blue light and hard to make out. Checking the tank under the blue light nightly now! If we come across it again I shall take a video and see if I can figure out how to download it. I bet it has happened before - we were just lucky enough to catch it this time. The cleaners have these neon green things on what I would call their bellies, and sometimes they pulse and strobe (flutter back and forth kind of motion) and gain in size. I tried to look it up on the net and figure these might be the eggs but the articles I read were really technical and I get bored easily. Way cool whatever it was.

They were not copopods. I know what those look like and these were definitely not them. These things were a whitish/grey in colour, as opposed to the more brown colour of the copopods, and they were also smaller. I have never seen a swarm like that in my tank before, and as it is only a 28 gallon with about 35 pounds of live rock - I cannnot imagine that I am hosting that size of a copopod population.

A couple of nights ago, we turned a blue LED light on to have a look at our saltwater setup after the main lights had gone out. We got lucky and saw what appeared to be thousands of these tiny little grey pod-looking things. The fish and tube anemone were going crazy eating them, and once the lights came on the next day, they were all gone. I only have a pair of clowns and a pair of cleaner shrimp - everything else is a single - and so we are thinking these were probably baby cleaner shrimp. Has anyone ever raised them? How would a person go about it? They were so small I do not think that a breeder net would be an option.

It sounds like you might need more scavengers. I have a 28 gallon with about 35 pounds of live rock in it. I have what seems to be thousands of bristle stars, some bristle worms, crabs, snails, cleaner shrimp, etc. I have "lost" two fish in there so far. One was a small clown and the other was a firefish. I have not seen either one of them for months, neither Rod nor I removed any bodies, and we did not get any big spikes or problems. All I can think of is that they did indeed die but the scavengers cleaned up the bodies before any harm could come to the water quality.

We have considered it. Trust me! However, to update you, we tried out that cool 2x4 trick and managed to get the top off the tank. Rod actually used a 4x4 and said it worked awesome. Now we have some of that silicone be gone stuff on there and we are going to try to break it apart this weekend. Thanks again for all the great ideas!

Thanks a lot for all the great ideas. Definitely going to try them out. I never thought I would be trying to tear a tank apart before!

Is that what they told you? The first 150 gallon aquarium we bought from them that exploded the seal was three years ago. At two years old it gave way. The last one (exact same - replacement tank and stand) did not even last a whole year. rudy, that is so strange that our tanks blew up on the exact same night!!!