Happy World Oceans Day

Posted by gerg On 11:05 PM 0 comments
Really??? is it really exist? hahaha damn its true! anyway its not official, please refer to this link from wikipedia for more info bout the World Ocean Day.

For quick info World Ocean Day celebrate on 8 June every year and for this year theme is "Our Oceans: Greening Our Future".

I dun have so much to celebrate anyway and even dunno any reason to celebrate on this date but i dun oppose to this ideas also. For me whatever work relating to save our ocean or whatever should be done regularly not just any on certain date or occasion.

Anyway Happy World Oceans Day to everyone. ;) 

May 2011

Posted by gerg On 11:39 PM 0 comments


Replace video that i uploaded directly to blogger cause its really @!@#

Slow motion aka merangkak post

Posted by gerg On 10:56 AM 0 comments
Makin lama makin slow posting kat blog nih ... nak kata masa tak cukup .. dah cukup tuhan bagi 24 jam satu hari, ini bermakna kelemahan diri sendiri menguruskan masa =D. Walau cam mana pon, memang tak ada apa nak di post kan kat sini. Balik balik cerita benda sama bosan plak.

Hari yang di tunggu makin dekat, makin berdebar jantung menanti. Ikan pon cam biasa semua pon ok jek, ikan Copperband dah masuk 6 bulan idop .. so ok lah dia buat kije. So far just makan brine shrimp lelain tamau .. ampess nya ikan. Doctor fish baru nak masuk 5 bulan, happy sesangat ... sebab bukan senang dia nak idop lam aquarium nih ...

Lelain kes tak der, cuma re-position leather coral, sebab makin membesar dan dah masuk ruang plate coral, tu pon gila malas nak cabut dia dr batu tu. Buat masa sekarang nih coral tu cam hot dog goreng jual kat pasar malam kena cucuk ngan lidi ... hehehe.. kalau tak buat cam tu .. nampak nya melayang lah dia entah kemana. Harap dia cepat cepat lah melekatkan diri kat tempat baru.

Forum Malaysia Marine Club pon dah tak berapa nak gi browse, bz laa .. kije pon banyak. Aagak nya cam macam benda menarik ada.

Last Month?

Posted by gerg On 8:22 AM 0 comments
Nothing much to update, tank just like it was since last year .. not really any significant changes .. so let skip bout the new new addition or anything with "new" in the name :D cause i dun have any.

Been busy with work and family lately, not really have time for my tank either. My skimmer almost make sick tho.. with the loud sound etc until recently i clean up the "Beckett" part... the result ...marvelous ... run like new again... really make me forget bout the vibrating sound from RIO pump.

The ATO pump and float switch also died already... already replace it but bad news is if the switch broken again, need to find new type cause element 14(formerly known as farnell) no longer carry that product. Anyway lucky me cause getting the last stock they have LOL.

Finally reef paste available here. Saw the product demo at the Oceanic, and i'm impress.. fish really love it but i dun really put my hand to my tank, so i pass this for now. The price quite interesting, if not mistaken its cost less than RM 30 for the smallest bottle.I think it also available at the other LFS.

March Update

Posted by gerg On 8:30 AM 0 comments
Been busy and lazy to update... too many other thing todo ... too much work? ... some of the excuses of course hehehe. Anyway so far the tank maintenance.. WC etc has not been neglected yet... so its cool but i really dun have anything to add/post bout new addition to the tank.

Lets start with a salt brand that i recently used. In early days, i used Red Sea salt then followed by Instant Ocean until last month. Been battling with low Ca level since and later required to always add additional Ca buffer... even thou doing some correction by several wc but its not help much! the weekly wc not able to keep up with the update. So rather than nyusahkan diri with dosing Ca, now trying with other salt brand which have higher Ca compare to IO. So far Red Sea Coral Pro giving some positive feedback after 1 month. Without testing the Ca level in the tank, the growth of my SPS is noticeable compare to before. The only bad thing i think intermittent red slim algae which is not necessary  causing by the salt itself... anyway the algae not really bother me at all cause its just exist in very small number and only at one place. Maybe because of the dead spot.

One of anthias i think undergoing sex transformation. The color slowly change to male version now which is from orange to pink... but its not too obvious as to date. Will keep posted bout this. The copperband still live strong and fat! love this fish... right now the only food taken is frozen food. Brine and mysis shrimp become his only food right now. So for now can say good bye for aiptasia. The doctor fish also still alive.. too early to tell if it will thrived in the tank... so far its bout 3 months let see what happened after several months more. But i'm happy this fish eat and social well with other tank mate ;)

I also stopping NP Biopellet for awhile now, not because of the product not effective or what so ever... i just very lazy to go LFS to buy a new stock.. hehehe thats the only reason for temp stop. Will start again once i buy a new stock.

Other than above ... most of the free time has been spend for shopping/window shopping etc etc for a next newborn. Because of this .. now WC time been change to monday instead of normal saturday ... hehhe.. penat woo

Sex on beach!

Posted by gerg On 8:25 AM 0 comments
Checkout this video from National Geographic bout annual march of beach spawning grunion.

Jalan jalan Puchong LFS

Posted by gerg On 6:50 PM 0 comments
Since nothing much activity for today, went to jalan jalan around Puchong LFS.. GV and Oceanic. GV have new fish shipment for today and more for tomorrow. For full list of new fish shipment, please refer to this thread. While Oceanic will only have new fish/coral shipment on early March, as appear on their facebook.

Anyway finally Oceanic have the filter sock and the holder on their shelves.. but the price its a bit higher compare to what i have before. Since i dun really want to wait i just bought several more of the filter shock so i can start using it again after the disaster last time.

Yesterday

Posted by gerg On 8:37 PM 0 comments
Went to GV yesterday, not sure if the corals and fishes just arrived or old stock. I'm not going to any LFS recently so not quite sure BUT they have another more shipment for fish and coral for today. Anyway that's the news i got yesterday, so not sure if the stock arrived.

Other than looking around, managed speak to a couple who are interested to terjun masuk lubang ... heheheh. To be honest i can't advise them much about the setup coz they really looking for a minimal requirement and budget for a start. Hope they'll doing fine with that and read more about this hobby.

Anyway if you are reading this, maybe for next time u may need to consider buy/do :
  • new tank with sump
  • skimmer
  • add some rock
  • buy salt + hydrometer (dun buy prepared saltwater)
  • read/join Malaysia Marine Club (please read sticky topic 1-6 in this forum)
  • enjoy
Since i promised to lend my chiller, i also bring the chiller along with me and leave it at the store. Hope he manage to get it soon ;). Other than that nothing interesting happened... life goes on.

FISH Philosophy

Posted by gerg On 7:46 PM 0 comments
Joined this FISH Philosophy Training at the office yesterday... however it not something related to any tank! Its just like motivation course. Its a good course i think which is basically cover 4 main points "Be There","Play", "Make Their Day" and "Choose Your Attitude".

Well its licensed training program which i believe really make my day by joining this course. Ermmm... so far not many course/training which i really can appreciate  but this is one of i think worth my 2 hours. Its fun .. its educational .. its useful and its really help me to always think positive and enjoy whatever i do. to be exact even tho i did enjoy myself before but i do limit some of the element for a certain group of people instead of everyone. To gain more self satisfaction in whatever i do i believe i should apply what i've learn to every group of people.

Good luck for me and for further reading please refer to this site

Coral Reef

Posted by gerg On 7:54 AM 0 comments
Recently read bout coral reef writeup which is a very good explanation bout coral reef here. Coralscience.org explained very well bout the coral anatomy, zooxanthelle, how coral reproduced etc and the most important its very easy to understand.

Expecting newborn in June ;)

Posted by gerg On 9:45 PM 0 comments
Alhamdullilah .... am i too excited? not sure myself ... but i'm happy for myself and my family for future addition to family ;) been trying to refrain myself to add or buy anything new to my tank but i did add cleaner fish last month which i think its ok since the fish not cost the bomb.

So what next? maybe slowly shopping for newborn instead of aquarium equipment and LS. Till then i'll continue with my usual thing with my tank and hope will not spend too much on this tank thing!
Coral Shop releases new organic test kit which is suppose to check DOM level in tank. This is interesting test kit which is finally i believe i can stop thinking about skimmer performance.

All set.. jom balik kampung

Posted by gerg On 8:10 AM 0 comments
Been a week plus already trying to finish up regular tank maintainance. Lots of thing happened... as for yesterday during skimmer cleaning, i broke the Rio pump impeller. Not really a big thing which i can glue it back. I broken the front part while trying to pull it out. I did tried out what and how good the pump running without that part but its only produced good flow at limited time only... after that it went kaput. Enough of trying... i just glue it back, hope its good as new. Anyway this skimmer's pump cleaning resulting a bit annoying vibrating sound... the old like a new pump sound is back! After trying several times, its just not going anywhere... the sound still there! Since dun really want to waste time and most importantly more money on this, just trying to get the slowest vibration sound possible and let it be. I dun really know what happened and why the sound is back (before this not as loud as this), its the first time for this kind of loud happened after a long time.

About the Ca level, everything is back to normal. I'm not trying to get 400+... as long as its same reading as newly saltwater mix its ok for me. Been doing WC bout 4 times i think with about 10-20% each time plus adding some Ca buffer, now its increase from 200 to 360.. so its cool.

Other than that, i also removing the filter sock which is causes banjir last time. Its also needed lots of cleaning since i only have several of that. So for now i'll skip this first.

Next will be away from tank for awhile and jom balik kampung!.. Till then happy CNY and Selamat bercuti.

Berkarat ke?

Posted by gerg On 9:39 AM 0 comments
Aku suka soklan@statement nih .. nanti satu rumah berkarat sebab ada aquarium air masin dalam rumah. Untuk makluman tuan tuan dan puan puan statement tu adalah salah .. kekkek

Kenapa? kalau pernah belajar dedulu kat sekolah ... air yg tersejat tu tak ada mengandungi apa apa kan .. cam air suling tu .. apa kandungan dia? kalau ada garam sekali nampaknya hujan air masin lah .. tak gitu? sama lah dengan aquarium nih... air yang meruap masuk dalam rumah ... lalu ikut kipas sikit .. say hi to lampu sikit.. semua tu takkan jadikannya berkarat!

TETAPI .. ada tapi dia .. jangan lah buat tumpah air aquarium tu kat besi ke apa .. dah sah air tu air masin .. ehhehe.. kalau tak caya jilat lah ... hahaha.. so confirmlah akan berkarat.

Jadi setakat nih dah 3 thn ni tak der pulak lampu kipas ke yang berkarat disebabkan benda nih. So tak yah lah lagi tanya soalan ni .. kan dah belajar dulu zaman sekolah... cuba ingat balik ok ;)

Great Barrier Reef

Posted by gerg On 9:19 AM 0 comments

Macam macam

Posted by gerg On 8:51 AM 0 comments
Last week i tot i wanna do big water change .. but instead turned out only just a 30% wc. Very super slow water pressure last week make the wait more painful. Already waiting a day before that for container to fill up and wait another tong to fill up not my liking. Since the pump will not auto off when they full so i have to always check it... so I just gave up waiting and continue with whatever i have at that time.

Instead of doing big wc, i just opt for monthly cleaning on other thing such light and pump. It was a tiring day to open up everything and clean. Anyway not manage to clean up all pumps that day.

Since dun have anything to be done yesterday... decided to doing more wc and maybe one more time for today. Maybe time to buy a bigger water reservoir... thinking to have something like this tong biru in the future. If can have 2 of them should be ok i think. Keep dreaming first.. heheh

Even tho already did 2 wc within short period and adding some Ca buffer, seem Ca still low. So decide to check the new prepared water Ca level... its not bad 360ppm ... but tank still as low as 220ppm. Long way to go i guess. Anyway i dun really think its really a problem cause so far all LS still ok regardless low Ca.

I might want to start my 2 part dosing after everything is back at what its suppose to be. Even tho im not in hurry mode, i think time to start doing some price check on LFS. Not really worried bout the pump just need to check the media first. If the price not within the budgeted range... then i have to go for reactor option. Anyway i'm not decided when to start this thing cause something more important to my life coming up... till then lets see

Feed a fish

Posted by gerg On 7:33 AM 0 comments
Its not hard to feed a fish isn't it? But dun expect they take whatever we throw at them! I think the first principal is need to know type of the fish, is it herbivorous or omnivorous or carnivorous? For my case the herbivorous should be the easiest to feed. At least can be feed using nori sheet. But most of us will prefer the fishes take the pallet food. Yeah its a lot easier, we can simply put in food timer and just needed minimal time to check if empty.

Most of the time if the fish refused to take food offered because of stress or loss appetite. In this case i always separate them in a net or whatever before put them in a main tank. Normally i just release after they have taken food offered for sometimes. 

Anyway there is a guideline how to feed finicky fish. Please refer to this site OR this site about that. Other than that just try with a proper size of pallet (this might be the goal) with several brands of pallet and mix it with frozen food.

Current LS

Posted by gerg On 8:56 PM 0 comments
Not much of colorful coral in tank so far, all coral are only cheap cheap coral so dun expect it to be a stunning coral. As for now i might stop adding any to the tank for awhile cause something big will happen soon ... ;)

Ikan : Cleaner Fish @ Dr Fish

Posted by gerg On 9:56 PM 0 comments
Been added this fish bout several weeks ago... it seem doing fine till now.. eating and clean well =D. This fish also known as "Oscar" in Shark Tale. As seen on the movie the main function for this fish is clean clean clean the other fish ... and not necessary tongue scrubber!

This fish known as hard to keep and should not been in trade anyway cause it will end up die. Anyway its was my daughter request so i can't really ignore it anymore. So far .. i think its doing fine in the aquarium. As for now its already taken mysis, F2 and hikari pallet so its cool. The only problem was, the six liner will keep chasing it time to time for the 1st week... after that it should be ok.

For the other info regarding this fish, please refer to this site.

Thinking to reset water parameter

Posted by gerg On 9:27 PM 0 comments
Its been awhile already since the Ca and other element is out of safe points. As for Ca alone its always at range 340-280... It will be wasted if i'm try to correct it by adding more Ca etc.. that what i thought. In any case water change is always my favorite... even doing large water change is required more salt, its much cheaper compare to add more Ca. What if something goes wrong? more money and more time will be wasted. So water change will be best option for me.

Even tho nothing bad happened yet.. like a coral stress because of low Ca but its a good practise to fix it before its become a problem at the later stage. I'm not really concern bout the low Ca before cause i'm not into SPS. But since i'm slowly adding more SPS it will need more attention to this parameter. It will be a bit tiring process for sure. For now i'm not really sure yet how long it will takes to fill all 3 my tong ... the other thing after that should be simpler.

Anyway i plan this on coming holiday ... bit boring nowadays... nothing to do and everything seem to move slowly. I hope this water change will bring all other parameter to a good point. I'm not really sure if this will effect something else but hopefully its not =D

Early morning disaster

Posted by gerg On 5:11 AM 0 comments
Fuuhhh ... i'm lucky cause i was slept nearby my aquarium, just jangan pikir aku kena halau dengan bini heheeh ... So i call it lucky cause i cant sleep because of sudden loud noise from skimmer pump.Sound like water level in sump not high enough... u know... the splashing sound and that familiar sound only happen during i doing the water change... Arrghhh!! must be something wrong ... just like that terus wakeup and check.Damn it its just 4am!

So the problem was related to filter sock that i'm currently use. I should change it by today, i really dun expect it to clog that fast! I just change it yesterday! This really need to rework so the upper level of the sock inside the sump. So in case of the same situation it will not flood my house.

To add another disaster, auto top off water keep filling the loss water, after a while its run dry and the pump kaput because of overheat. I'm not really concern bout the pump but since aquarium water is a free flow to my house and ATO is adding more water, this actually lower my salinity! Just hope LS doing fine with that ... wait for me :D

Anyway i'm also lucky to have my standby saltwater in hand. So i can quickly adding to my aquarium, now its left only to correct salinity level. Since adding more salt directly to aquarium is not a good thing, i think it time for water change.

So today both of my daughter agaknya mimpi berenang dalam laut. They are closer to tank and cool je tidur dalam air .. apadaa... kesian.. and i have alot of thing need to wash .. from carpet .. langsir, selimut in short everything in that area ... just lucky i can work from home ;) and not so lucky its a rainy day..

Malaysia Marine Club TT

Posted by gerg On 1:07 PM 0 comments
Went to gathering this morning, arrived quite early i think... not many people yet. So just went straight to mamak nearby the Oceanic. At first i just not really sure if that the correct place, its my first time to join them anyway... so just try my luck and saw some of them wearing "chuisui tshirt" so its time to introduce yourself ;)

Anyway each time i said i'm "GERG" i have to repeat myself again... i dun know why, maybe i'm sof spoken person? ahahaha... but i think to know every of them in person is cool experience. The pack slowly buildup until mamak and Oceanic full of them ;). Thanks to Oceanic for providing the foods and discounts for a lot of items. Since my T5 bulb is almost expired, its time to buy a new one ;) ... i'm not into buy anything else at the moment, so most of the time i just spending my time to look at the other people busy with their list :D

I wish they will organize something similar again near the future. In mean time visit Chuisui for more info about Malaysia Marine Club.

Exciting day for them

Posted by gerg On 9:20 PM 0 comments



First day at school ... agak excited laa jugak yang berdua nih nak pergi ke sekolah baru. Arisha dengan darjah satu dan adiknya decide to put at same school .. so apa lagi 1st day pre school jugak. Both tak nangis macam kanak kanak riang .. hehehe.. dan tak ada lagi cerita lawak like budak berak dalam seluar etc etc like Awin's story ;)

As for the first day, everything went well... exciting and tiring for them and bit tiring for me. Since its a first time for everyone in here, i just decide to stay up to after rehat. After that cannot tahan already sit doing nothing! so pergi lepak at Oceanic and talk nothing .. heheheh... may be will be my destination for several days after this untuk hilang boring. I might bring my hdd tomorrow so can go directly to Rifdi house for more HD movies stock.

Tomorrow will be a new day again for them and for us, need to train them how to go to my wife's place. Just beside the school anyway but so far they never walk alone as long as that. Ah susah jugak nih, 1st thing 1st need to train Ariana to wait for her sister before walk to my wife's place. My wife might not be able to walk them everyday so its good to have them know.

There are a lot other thing need to be consider and plan.. but for now let them comfortable with a new changes first.

2010 Recaps

Posted by gerg On 11:24 AM 0 comments
Its was a great year for me, lot of thing happening in this hobby. For me bio pellet was the best product i experienced in 2010 but for the others it might be different. I have no comment bout that since i dun experience any of that ;)

In other note, Jan last year was only several months away after my 1st coral. Anyway i lost all my polyps which i start with in the beginning last year and still maintain the other corals ;). Its a journey to gain more knowledge by experience it, what i can say it a lot of different compare in reading material but the basic is there.

There were some mistakes and i learn my lesson. There also never ending battle with aiptasia which is come and go. Anyway i'm happy with NO3 and PO4 struggle was ended by NP Biopellet.

On the last day of last year, decided to use filter sock instead of filter wool/span simply because of the maintainance cost. Before this i pay about RM 16 a month as i changes twice a week but with filter sock i can use for several times (i believe more than "several") for each filter and the cost is much much much cheaper in the long run ;). As for now just have several of that and will adding more when the time is needed.

Lastly Happy New Year!
It is basically an escape. Also as a soothing element to relax in stressful environments. Some believe that seeing fish swim about helps us to forget our worries and ease our minds.