where have all these concerns in reefing come from? is it just commercialization of bad product?

[Eagle_Steve]

Sure but we get many repetitive questions to basic things that are in the stickies which leaves me to link the sticky...

 

[BeanAnimal]

Sure but we get many repetitive questions to basic things that are in the stickies which leaves me to link the sticky...

People consume information and learn differently. Some folks like to research, some like to be told or re-assured. Some people have poor reading comprehension or have no frame of reference to even start, etc.

My post count at RC was well over 20K when I stopped posting close to 10 years ago. The bulk of those, answering the same questions over and over. That is what makes it a "forum" and not an encyclopedia. People ask question, engage in conversation and get diverse opinions. That is the whole point of this venue. Not being trying to be a jerk, but if don't like answering the same question over and over, then don't... but don't make those asking feel like they are doing something wrong.

 

[BeanAnimal]

Because if you don't do the nonsense where you add bottled bacteria and then dose ammonia for weeks, and just follow the directions on the bottle and put the stuff in, then add your first fish - you end up in the same place, just way faster, with basically no risk.

It's faster than adding a damsel, and has none of the perceived ethical issues about ammonia exposure.

There's no place else in reefing where you can kick your tank forward 3 weeks for $9. (and of course, Live Rock is absolutely a better way to start)

faster... to what? Being able to dump 20 fish in there and hope you built enough bio capacity in 7 days? For an aquarium that will continue to mature for years. I don't get it, and never will. "Hey they guys from tanked are coming and going to put an 800 gallon tank in my office overstocked with with $40K of fish and coral and it will be ready on Monday...



then crash 2 months later anyway, because the little bottle of crap did not magically create a diverse and in-deth ecosystem that can handle the bioload.. It just made a bunch of non-diverse, no hardy nitrate eaters and nothing else.

 

[brandon429]

they did not die from lack of ammonia control, see any seneye post ever uploaded to the web

I would claim fish disease killed the 200-tang setups, but not inherent lack of ammonia control, and certainly not delayed lack of ammonia control.

if the added fish couldn't have waste filtered, they all die in 48 hours, not two months later.

*missing biota from all dry/plastic setups certainly doesn't help in disease suppression, but those $150K setups had cabinet filters with transferred biomedia sufficient enough to run zoo exhibits of the same size and stocking ratio

I would never assume that they built that multi million dollar home + business aquarium business not understanding basics of surface area ammonia control.

disease control? I think that's the loss cause/same for us forum reefers pretty much. in my opinion 90% of fish deaths on this site are delayed disease onset deaths, and none are from acute lack of ammonia control in the setup. 10% are your hardware failures, kids dumping two bottles of feed all at once, salinity shocks etc. 0 are initial non ammonia control in my opinion, or we could find 5-10 seneye examples of that occuring vs none.

 

[Tamberav]

People consume information and learn differently. Some folks like to research, some like to be told or re-assured. Some people have poor reading comprehension or have no frame of reference to even start, etc.

My post count at RC was well over 20K when I stopped posting close to 10 years ago. The bulk of those, answering the same questions over and over. That is what makes it a "forum" and not an encyclopedia. People ask question, engage in conversation and get diverse opinions. That is the whole point of this venue. Not being trying to be a jerk, but if don't like answering the same question over and over, then don't... but don't make those asking feel like they are doing something wrong.

This is a discussion, so I am discussing...

Literally some questions that are basic answers and no discussion really needed or they keep asking new questions that are legit all laid out in front of them and it is pretty obvious they didn't bother to read what was shown them at all.

Some people maybe want to discuss and some perhaps have poor readings skills but you know what? Some are just plain lazy or like I said... fishing for answers for confirmation bias as well.

 

[Cthulukelele]

This is a discussion, so I am discussing...

Literally some questions that are basic answers and no discussion really needed or they keep asking new questions that are legit all laid out in front of them and it is pretty obvious they didn't bother to read what was shown them at all.

Some people maybe want to discuss and some perhaps have poor readings skills but you know what? Some are just plain lazy or like I said... fishing for answers for confirmation bias as well.

I definitely feel the fishing for confirmation answers one. I've had to fight the urge to start threads that were essentially "someone please tell me a longnose hawkfish won't eat my cleaner shrimp to make me feel better"

 

[Cichlid Dad]

Don't you get the same kick being "the smart guy"answering the question? If not why would you even be looking at the question?

 

[Cell]

conflicting people is the same thing as conflicting info, a consensus is just whoever's veiwpoint is more outspoken.

Not sure on the first part, definitely not on the second.

 

[Cthulukelele]

Don't you get the same kick being "the smart guy"answering the question? If not why would you even be looking at the question?

I like answering questions solely because I remember the anxiety of my first few weeks of owning a reef and how much I freaked out about every little misalignment or pest. I like feeling like I'm taking care of that feeling for someone even if I'm not quite a grizzled deep knowledge vet quite yet

 

[Cichlid Dad]

I like answering questions solely because I remember the anxiety of my first few weeks of owning a reef and how much I freaked out about every little misalignment or pest. I like feeling like I'm taking care of that feeling for someone even if I'm not quite a grizzled deep knowledge vet quite yet

Exactly the right reasons for looking at and answering the questions

 

[Cell]

Exactly the right reasons for looking at and answering the questions

Whether you answer questions because of empathy or maybe you just like to be right, I'm not sure it matters so long as your answer is helpful/accurate.

 

[Cthulukelele]

Whether you answer questions because of empathy or maybe you just like to be right, I'm not sure it matters so long as your answer is helpful/accurate.

I 100% agree with this. You're here to be a shared resource not for kudos

 

[92Miata]

faster... to what? Being able to dump 20 fish in there and hope you built enough bio capacity in 7 days? For an aquarium that will continue to mature for years. I don't get it, and never will. "Hey they guys from tanked are coming and going to put an 800 gallon tank in my office overstocked with with $40K of fish and coral and it will be ready on Monday...



then crash 2 months later anyway, because the little bottle of crap did not magically create a diverse and in-deth ecosystem that can handle the bioload.. It just made a bunch of non-diverse, no hardy nitrate eaters and nothing else.

Why all the strawmen? Can we have a discussion without the hyperbolic nonsense?

It gets you to the point where ammonia is no longer killing all of the things you want reproducing in your tank a couple weeks faster. Things like copepods start reproducing faster, coralline shows up faster, etc. Getting out of that period where ammonia is killing everything as fast as possible is beneficial.


And "long term cycling" is not a thing. Whether you establish nitrosomonas by dumping a culture in the water and adding fish, or dumping a culture in and dosing ammonia for weeks, or putting in a shrimp, or whatever - it all ends up in the same place - succession happens and nitrosomonas gets outcompeted by heterotrophs and corals and algae and becomes largely irrelevant.

Spending extra time at high ammonia is not in any way helpful for anything, and leads to drastically lower biodiversity. A bottlebac -> fish in the first 24 hours tank at a month has significantly higher biodiversity than a month old dead shrimp/bottle bac and ammonia tank because it has consistently had no ammonia and has had a fish crapping it's gut bacteria all over the tank for a month.

 

[MoshJosh]

I like bottled bacteria. . . on paper sounds legit, helps me sleep easier at night, and I have spent way more than $9 on far worse things.

 

[nuxx]

I'd agree a lot can be figured out with google, but sometimes people just wanted positive reinforcement.

Also when I started losing smaller fish to something unknown in my tank, it was worth asking for opinions.

At the end of the day, I couldn't figure it out and neither did any suggestions I got. Tested water in depth, changed the chemicals the house cleaners were using, etc... just ended up taking the tank down before anything rare died.

 

[brandon429]

I would have referred you to the stickies in Jays disease forum, or any forum on Humblefish's site for the fish retention win.

 

[BeanAnimal]

And "long term cycling" is not a thing. Whether you establish nitrosomonas by dumping a culture in the water and adding fish, or dumping a culture in and dosing ammonia for weeks, or putting in a shrimp, or whatever - it all ends up in the same place - succession happens and nitrosomonas gets outcompeted by heterotrophs and corals and algae and becomes largely irrelevant.

Spending extra time at high ammonia is not in any way helpful for anything, and leads to drastically lower biodiversity. A bottlebac -> fish in the first 24 hours tank at a month has significantly higher biodiversity than a month old dead shrimp/bottle bac and ammonia tank because it has consistently had no ammonia and has had a fish crapping it's gut bacteria all over the tank for a month.

Hyperbolic? Only if you are ignoring context in hopes of a useless fight...

I did not say spending time at high ammonia was beneficial. As well, I did not say bottlebac was not an option. I indicated that I don't see the need given that we get where want to go without it anyway. I also facetiously indicated that people use products like that and think that 7 days later they have a fully functioning system capable of supporting anything they throw at it.

Moving on now - enjoy.

 

[Lebowski_]

Because we live in a world of social media and people want to be spoon fed information. Especially if there is a YouTube video about it.

Another thing is to fish for information that already aligns with your thinking. Confirmation bias.

The replies I see on instagram make it pretty apparent that there are a ton of people out there that just want the show tank with none of the blood sweat or tears.
It’s always telling when they end up tearing down their tanks 8 months later because they are bored of it.

No healthy reefer ever gets truly bored. They might redesign, swap coral themes, etc, but the love for the healthy tank never goes away.