My visit to Austin, Texas

September 1, 2007: I decided to drive down to Austin to visit some of the gorgeous reef tanks I've only seen online. With the help of the Austin Reef Club, we were able to make it a Tank Tour for the day. Fortunately the weather cooperated.

Mike's 450g office tank

Dudester's Diary Thread on ReefCentral.com

Mike's tank is located in the waiting room at his office, and can be viewed from three sides. The water drains at the far end, which is adjacent to a fishroom that houses all the equipment. Lighting is 3 x 400w 10,000K bulbs, with VHO actinic supplementation. A huge sump was shoehorned under the tank, and at this time a refugium is not incorporated. A Tunze Wavebox provides back-n-forth motion, and a closed loop creates the flow.

Mike with his daughter

Mike and John (Kingfish Aquariums). John maintains the tank with weekly visits.

The cabinets are only accessible with a magnet to release the latches. Very neat feature for a public area.

In the fishroom, two water storage containers hold RO/DI and saltwater. This larger one hold 100g of saltwater.

Deltec skimmer

Deltec Calcium Reactor and beneath is the RO storage container.

The power panel hides all the electrical. bmwaaron in the reflection

Cooling with a fan. Plans for a chiller are in place.

Lighting

Surface area

Last equipment shot, on to the livestock!

Acanthastrea

Moon coral

Meaty corals

Tang, juvenile Palani

Trigger, blue chin

Glass Eye Cardinalfish

Hermit crab

Huge cucumber

Gorgonian

Urchin with colorful spines

Brain coral

Leopard Wrasse

Ricordia

Clams. Notice the tiny rics (pictured above) for a sense of scale

I took some topdown shots as well.

Tired of all the beauty? There still more...

Back to the ground level for the remainder of the pictures.

Montipora sp.

Lobo

Wall Hammer

Acropora sp.

Blastomussa

Christmas Tree Worm in Acropora sp.

Acropora sp.

And lastly, his Superman Montipora colony

That's it. Go cool off your modem after all these image downloads. ;)

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