2nd time around

[liverock27]

Good Morning all. I am starting back into the hobby after a little over a year lay off. I have kept several reef tanks in the past and am currently starting to put together a nano reef for my home office. I am going to use the Biocube14 with 3x24w pcs and some other upgrades that I will add. I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions or comments about this setup? I am wanting to keep mainly zoos and mushrooms with some LPS if possible. I have only worked with MHs over reefs before and not sure how the Pcs will do with some corals I have kept in the past.
My other question is that I just moved up to the Dallas/Acworth area and was wondering if anyone knew of some good lfs near me.
I'm excited about jumping back into this hobby because it gave me a lot of joy in the past. Thank you.

 

[ironman58]

I'm pretty new to saltwater and found Optimum Aquarium over on Shallowford road at Sandy Plains to be etremely helpful. I live up off 92 between Acworth and Dallas. It IS a bit of a drive, about 20 minutes in light traffic, but they have a beautiful selection of nano cubes and Greg, the manager, is extremely sharp, professional and friendly. The whole staff is... He spends a LOT of time with his customers, answering questions and offering ideas and suggestions.

 

[james s_]

Optimum Aquarium is a great store. There is a new one(Saltwater City) that should be opening by the end of the month,it is off of 41 and Jiles Rd. About 1 mile N of McCollum Pkwy. That would be your closest bet to Dallas.

 

[bobz]

welcome back! I live in Marietta and the closest LFS (right now) is Optimum. I think there are great too, and have had good success with their livestock. I've been running a nano reef with similar lighting for about a year now and my mushrooms and soft corals are thriving, including some LPS like Frogspawn, Candycane, etc. I have a bunch of Kenya, Pulsing Zenia and Anthelia frags that you can have when you are ready if you want any. Good luck!
bob

 

[ericmcj31]

I agree with the folks about Optimum Aquarium--Greg and his staff are EXTREMELY helpful-and their fish are really superb--but for corals, I would go to Capuccino Bay--I don't think anyone compares to their selection (other than our own Rit) and their prices on corals--it is fairly close to Opt. Aq.--you could mapquest navigation between the two--and to me they both are worth the drive, I would pass five so/so stores to go to these two--and I'm driving even further (from Rome). Hope this helps.

 

[liverock27]

Thanks yall for all the suggestions about visiting Optimum. I stopped by their on my way back from the office and it is a great store. The guys I talked to there were also very helpful and I will be back once this nano is ready to setup. I Have to wait for my office furniture to be delivered first.

Ironman58 I also live up off of 92 right near cobb parkway.

Thanks 46bfinga and Eric for the suggestions on the two other stores. I'm going to try and visit them here soon.

Glad to hear that I could attempt CCs and frogspawns in this setup Bob. I have kept them in the past and liked both and I will be in contact as soon as this tank is ready to add some of your frags.

Thanks again for being so helpful yall and I will post some pics as I go along with this project.

 

[liverock27]

Quick Question or well I guess this is more asking for opinions. I am going to use 1x24w Actinic, but with the other two I am looking at either 10,000K Daylights or 10,000K 50/50s. Any suggestions? I will be having the actinic cut on before the other two in the morning and staying on after they are out. Probably about a half an hour on both sides. Thanks again.

 

[liverock27]

I decided to go with the two 10,000K daylights for the main lights and supplement them with the actinic. I am planning on letting the actinics run for 9 hours and the daylights to run for 8hrs (of course I will build up to this amount of light slowly through the cycle). Letting me have 30mins of actinic only in the morning and evening for the sunup sun down effect. Thanks for the help so far and I can't wait to get this thing up and running.

 

[xyzpdq0121]

If you are cycling the tank, there is no need to "build up to this amount of light slowly through the cycle". There is nothing in there for you to shock witht he light. Also, I doubt with PCs you can really shock anything anyways.

 

[liverock27]

Thanks Xy. I was just worried about algea growth.

 

[xyzpdq0121]

Ya I guess I can see your point. IMHO, You are going to get algae either way, get a clean-up crew in there towards the end of the cycle and keep up with the cycle maintenance and you should be ok.

 

[liverock27]

I stopped by Cappuccino Bay after my last client visit today and all I can say is Wow! I talked with one of the ladies there and she showed me her 28Biocube and now I am even more excited about this new project. Their coral tanks are amazing and I have never seen so many different types of live rock. Thanks again yall for pointing me in the right direction of these two LFS and I can't wait to see Saltwater City when it opens up by me.

 

[xyzpdq0121]

Good nice to know that Cap Bay might be back up to speed....

 

[liverock27]

I was reading a post the other day that someone had said Cap. Bay had a lot of coral tanks not for sale, but the only tanks that I saw that didn't have the corals for sale were the couple of growout tanks in the back. Their fish selection was slim, but they did seem to have a good selection of inverts.

 

[derek_s]

I have read this and that about Cap But in my opinion, they are pretty good. I have only really dealt with Alex and Deborah, but both of them have been very helpful to me as a newbie. I have also compared their prices to 2 other local stores and so far they are better (MUCH in some cases).

 

[cameron]

CBA used to be THE best coral store in GA. So good I recommended going there instead of to GA Aquarium. I was there a couple months ago and things looked rough, but all reports lately have been very positive and seems like they are getting back or are back.

 

[reefscape]

cap bay ...at one time was like my drug dealer..well long story short I have not been in a while ...but I really need to stop in again ...if things are on a turn around ...

 

[liverock27]

I went to CB today on the way to the ARC meeting to get water and they had a lot of nice BTAs. They also had a good selction of lower priced frags of zoas and rics. They also had a bunch of different 1"-2" clams of every type and color.

 

[derek_s]

LiveRock27;136724 wrote: I went to CB today on the way to the ARC meeting to get water and they had a lot of nice BTAs. They also had a good selction of lower priced frags of zoas and rics. They also had a bunch of different 1"-2" clams of every type and color.

I agree they have quite a few nice BTA's, (did you see that HUGE one?) But I feel like they are a little too much $$$, especially for the green ones. But maybe that's just me.

 

[liverock27]

Good meeting you last night corvettecris. I agree on the price being a little high on all of their BTAs, but it is hard to find really nice ones that are that big around here (except for at Saltwater city of course).