so
2021 guys it's hard to believe right you know i can remember as a kid
signing my name on the top of the paper in grammar school
saying i wonder what it's going to be like in like 1990 or 95 now we're like 2021.
welcome back new viewers my name is tom this is the tom reefer channel what i wanted to show you
today guys is what i do to prepare for vacation i'm going to be away a week so no water change
wednesday or next sunday video all right guys i'm having my coffee on new year's day it's about 9 11
and i have my tank set to come on at about 9 12. here they come let's see oh there they go see
so what i thought i'd do is just show you how things work
and how i operate before a vacation today so they come on at around nine my 20 gallon
that comes on a little bit earlier that comes on at about seven so does the 10 gallon down
below that comes on a little earlier too these two are set up on what's called casa
i set those up on this app it's awesome they they're wi-fi and they come with a
see i have several on there several devices you could put one per plug it's a plug
that you plug into your wall and then you can set it wi-fi so i have the pico here
i have the kessel a 80 on the 5 gallon and then i have the kessil a80 over the
20 gallon which doesn't come on until about 11 o'clock see that's still off
so that's how it works in the morning here here's what the plugs look like guys the blue light means
it's on this one is for the 20 gallon tank with the kessel a80 that hasn't come on yet
and here's the other one over here that's for the five gallon tall
so they work great i've had them for a year now and they're not really expensive either
let's start out with ato alright guys so what i like to do before i go away is get
everything nice and clean so i'm going to clean the glass i'll just slide this back
a little and then i'm going to clean the glass it also helps me gauge how much is grown while
i'm gone too you know without doing anything now remember i don't have any eating going on in here
i'm not going to touch the sides or the back because that's part of our experiment
this comes in pretty handy this top so that way it can keep the light on
there and you can still see it what i'm going to do is refill the ato back there
all right so let's go get some water so sylvia and i are going to vermont to ski
stratton vermont and for a few days then we'll go into the city
we're gonna bring our masks practice social distancing with everybody else except each other
all right i always have some rodi made up i have the five gallon jug and a smaller size cup to pour
that way i can just bring this right back in there and pour it in
that's filled all right now let's get some cow glosser and add a little in there here it
is this is what i use julian sprung's version of kalkwasser this is a half teaspoon i'm just gonna
put a quarter teaspoon in there if that put that in and then i'm gonna stir it around now i'll fill
this one up remember this services pico 20 and the five now let me show you something in here guys
this is an issue that i've confronted before and you may have this settling out so to speak
of the calcium hydroxide the kalkwasser can get to a point where you're always going to see some
fallout this is never going to dissolve what's left here this could be some of the compounds that
aren't going to dissolve so over time i usually do two refills without adding more calcuasser to it
so i'm going to try one more stir all this up and then see how much is left when i get back after
vacation if there's still an amount left like this in the bottom then i'll empty it and add new
and i'm going to stir this like i do the other so i'll see you next time i i keep note in my
brain what's left of it on how much settled out on the bottom if the same amount appears to settle
out then i just know it's excess compound as far as feeding guys i really don't feed at all
while i'm gone fish have a gland that when they begin to sense that they're not eating enough
or getting enough food this gland provides them for long lengths of time without food
and i've also fed with auto feeders here it is guys it's by eheim i didn't want to make this a
how-to but i just wanted to show you you put batteries in here as you can see it takes
two double a's and see what it does now it's spinning you take this off this comes out also
before you put the food inside there this goes back on it'll feed manually if you
just want to hit this see what it does is it spins one revolution and as it spins the food
pours out the bottom you definitely don't want it to over feed your tank or you come back
with a completely foul tank so you want to make sure it's a good one and it works right
and it doesn't over feed your tank so to be on the safe side what i did is i put some
tape on here to make the hole smaller this was the smallest setting here
and even that was allowing too much food to go into the tank you can set it for once a day
all right now i'm going to have to show you this section here
goes over the edge of your tank i believe it'll work on rimless and non-rimless tanks you tighten
it in onto the glass and then you fill it with food and you'll program it and then it'll do that
tank is looking awesome by the way isn't it guys
this citron gobi here he gets kind of skinny when i go away for a week because he's
very active so i may put the fish feeder on there
clown he'd be fine for a week i don't want to starve my
mandarin either not star but you know what i'm saying guys
i like to do water change too guys i like to do water changes on all the tanks before i go so what
i'll do is i'll mix up a large quantity of water and large for me will be 10 gallons i'll change
5 in the 20 about 2 in the pico and i'll change the rest which would be about 3 right 5 2
7 8 9 10 three in the five gallon what else should i do before i go away i know there's something i'm
forgetting hmm i also want to test the water in the 10 gallon for phosphate it's been a little
over a week since i put in the sand bed and remember we tested the sand bed and it was like
.5 from fish guy mike's so i put it in the tank and let's see what it's going to be today all
right so we're going to test phosphate now guys in the 10 gallon turn this on i have a sample ready
two minutes of this okay we're gonna put it inside and count down my guess guys
is this is going to be a little high and let me tell you why remember when we tested the sand
from fish guy mike's when i tested the sand after being in about two gallons
of fresh salt water overnight 24 hours i tested and it was 0.5
and within the live rock there was a buildup of phosphate in them also i did not test the live
rock when i brought them home i had mentioned this in my other video the phosphate will
reach equilibrium it will lower and then it will come out of the rock or live sand
and go back to where it was until it's completely eliminated which takes a long long time
a lot of water change over a long period of time
and not adding more phosphate to the tank let's see what it comes out to now
all right 0.32 it did reduce a little bit because of the volume of water but it's not zero by any
means it's not really low this is still a bit high but i would accept it because 0.3 of my 20
gallon doesn't seem to be bothering anything all right guys that should do it for this one right
my first i agree 2021. so look have a great new years be positive you can't fight what is
so you might as well make it positive all right have a great day have a great start
to the new year and i'll see you when i get back week from tomorrow a week from today
but i think i'll need i don't know when i'm going to do the next video it'll probably
be the wednesday after i get back which is next sunday all right take care now guys
have a good one this is such a boring video today guys i'm sorry but
it's just all i can do right now all right guys that should do it for all right guys
that should do it for this one i agree i agree yeah all right take care guys have a good one
what else can i show you before i go
away
you