29 REEF All Natural setup Survived Hurricane KATRINA AUG29th

[Nachtfueur]

Ive been running this tank for 4 years now. It survived hurricane Katrina. I stayed for the hurricane...and survived... I live in Gulfport MS. Yea my neighborhood 360 degrees around us was underwater. Thank god our house is still here and that it didnt flood. 48 hours before the storm. I went on Nasa Gov and saw that the eye of the storm was perfect. I had a feeling that we would be out of power for awhile. Didnt expect about 3 to 4 weeks no power, looters everywhere in the neighborhood, our beach is the only thing left buildings completely gone. This first picture is my tank after the storm i was running on a simple prototype solar powered generator. God and sunlight kept it alive. i slept in a burning hot house (even tho i was offered to stay at a friends house with a generator with fans...) no electricity in the room next to the tank ..every night so i can hear when the power from my generator went off if it did..plus woke up every morning at the crack of dawn to put out a solar panel. Plus i checked the the generator every day,,every three hours to check the voltage,even woke up at night ..and checked it...to make sure it was fully operational. Yep what u see is a yellow tang ..OMG too small tank ..i know that lol i run a business in aquarium maintenance i know .. i have a friend that has 280 gallon reef ..and one that has a 8 year old reef survived the hurricane too..that hes growing coral in it.. i treated that fish like gold. It ate only the best food i could get .. it survived over a year..unfortunately died due to a filter drying up..the sound killed him i know it was a heart attack cause..i sat there for 4 hours ...from 4am till 8:00am to be there when that fish died...so dont think at all i neglect my animals... That tang died April 26 ,2005.. survived the worst hurricane disaster. This is my reef now.. currently i talked to a friend that worked at the Beau Rivage before the storms on their tanks and a couple other plp. Did Research and now its all natural...No filters...only skimmer , water flow, liverock, feather dusters, and a refugium with Chaetomorphia, and a mangrove tree... Oh look another tang lol...i cant help it i love them fish...hes got no ich..plus a cleaner shrimp to help him out if he does get it ...then on top of that ..perfectly healthy bright yellow...i give that to god.....the tang eats off my refugium in between meals that i feed it sushi grade seaweed. its not being neglected i mean the frogspawn in the back is happy ..the water quality is good. My ammonia, Nitrites ,and Nitrates stay at zero.. If the tang gets too big i have customers with big tanks ill give him to them. I just added a piece of Knobby Candelebrum a gorgonia to the tank. This is my colony of pom pom xenia that helps with phosphate and nitrate absorbtion. Also the reef operates on its own chiller too for temperature stability. This is my DIY refugium if anyone wanted any ideas for one intank for a smaller tank with no sump...
This is the solar generator that gave my tank life during the storm...its simple but it saved them.... im currently working on splitting H20 with electrolisis to get oxygen to inject in the tank in the event of a disaster ...any ideas bout that ...send me message ..thx Im working on building a Hydrogen powered generator system now...hopefully it works out...[/code]

[Fishfirst]

WOW!!!! Nicely done

[Nachtfueur]

yea i ive lately been shutting down my skimmer and not running it much ..and using my xenia and fuge as a filtration they look like they do better that way... i just increased my water flow to about 1200 gph im using my liverock mainly as a filter

[Fishboy93]

Nice Setup, I'm worried now because this will be my first hurricane season with saltwater...(Watch out for the tang police)....

[Nachtfueur]

Thnx lol the tang police can bring it ... im not worried bout it ...they wouldnt survive most places anyway unless they have good reliable backup power and that doesnt include gasoline. due to the fact hurricane season hits every year. My system would of been dead anyway if it wasnt for solar..Im running solar powered system as back up and bout to switch over to either hydrogen or biohydrogen... hey man i recommend getting a UPS the ones for a computer connect it to ur powerheads ..that way the UPS will keep ur water flow going then all u need is about 4 hours a day of light to atleast keep the coral alive temporary..