=Jwin's 9 GALLON MANTIS CUBE - Nano Wave 9

Well here's an update. Two things:

A) I got a striped damsel today. He's shy hiding in the rock work, but when he thinks I'm not looking, he comes up a bit. Was brave enough to grab some food when he thought I wasn't there. So so far so good. Like this: Four-striped Damsel, Black-tailed Dascyllus, Dascyllus melanurus

B) I ordered a fan upgrade kit to try and solve my heating problem. The kit is from nanocustoms.com. I'm pretty excited about getting it...I want this heat issue stabilized.

EDIT: here's an update in an update. This guy's getting braver by the minute. I'll have him eating out of my hand by tomorrow (ha ha...not...) But he has graduated from being 2 inches above the rock to 10 inches, and he has about a 6 inch left and right range now. It's an improvement. I'm not going to name him, because I named the last fish gregory...and he died. My friend Will says any fish he gets that he names, dies. So i might be getting some bad juju with damsels.

 

I don't have 30 years experience but I do have a decade worth. If he's now changed his mind, fine. But Dr. Roy always said they should exercise them. I've also witnessed mantis that lost their raptorial appendages and it always seemed to be friends who didn't give snails and crabs that had this issue.

 

Cool. My girlfriend likes the 4 stripe damsels. When I get my peacock mantis tank set up, it is going to have a 4 stripe buddy/lunch.

 

Whoops. I was looking for the thread on another forum where I thought he said it, but I messed up the posters name somehow and credited Dr. Roy with something someone else said. Sorry.

I don't think it matters if he would lose them or not. I think the point of owning a mantis is to watch him exercise his rapts. ;D

 

Well, it looks like I made a mistake. It's actually a 3 striped damsel. I mean, come on, the only difference is the four stripe has a black tail. I didn't even know there was a 3 stripe Anyways, he's still alive and kicking, eating, etc. He's skittish when something he doesn't know comes up to or in to the tank, but other than that he's king of the place.

I got the skimmer up and breaking in as well. I can't wait to see if it pulls some gunk out. The first couple of hours of operation filled the tank with micro bubbles though...but after that it clears up completely.

Still waiting on some cooling fans and a website update. Patience. The longer the wait, the more prepared the tank will be, right? In theory anyways.

 

5 watts per gallon would support some nice coral

 

It sure would I'm not going to add any coral until the mantis gets the rocks how he likes them...I don't want him burying frags with any re-aquascaping.

 

Little Damsel aka Orca has lasted 4 days now. That's twice as long as the last guy!

Still waiting on Stomatopod.com to contact me back. I'm really hoping my fan kit comes in today. It was 4 day Fedex...and today's the 4th day. Maybe a stroke of luck will bring it to my door step today.

 

No package yesterday And now I have to leave for a Scuba Diving trip in the Bahamas...Woe is me!!!

I'll update after I get the fan kit installed in a week

 

I feel so sorry for you....you poor poor thing!
Enjoy scuba ;D