Reef aquariums are notorious for being known as one of the most expensive hobbies today, but it doesn’t necessarily have to be this way. There’s a lot of ways to save money without cutting corners, and one great way to…
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Japan’s CoralMonster is Flexing a Ton of Great Scolies
CoralMonster is a coral dealer in Japan with a knack for scoring some high profile livestock and today we want to take a minute to appreciate their recent haul of Homophyllia australis. Better known as Scolies or Australian scolymia, this group…
Tour of our Dedicated Mangrove & Coral Community Aquarium [Video]
For virtually all of my aquarium career, mangrove trees have been a niche of the saltwater hobby that we’ve admired at arm’s length, but not anymore. As you may have seen from the early videos from the Reef Builders Studio…
How to Hide Your Water Flow Pumps
Aquarium flow pumps have come a long way in recent years and we love seeing them during unboxings and generally appreciating them as self confessed reef gear junkies. However once they go into use on our tanks, we definitely don’t want to…
The Importance of Regular Calcium reactor Maintenance
The Twin Tech Calcium reactor by Deltec has been one of the most critical pieces of equipment for maintaining mineral balance on the largest system at the Reef Builders Studio. For over 18 months this hot rod of chemistry management…
Is a $25 pH Monitor Even Any Good?
When I started keeping aquariums in the mid 1990s a pH monitor from Milwaukee Instruments or American Marine cost around a hundred dollars. Do you know how much they cost today around twenty five years later? They’re still roughly the…
Onna Coral Field in Okinawa Japan
A recent image posted by Lagoon Diving showing off Acropora growth in Okinawa had us curious to learn more about this iconic reef restoration project. The Onna coral field project started more than twenty years ago when, following a bleaching…
Caribbean Corals are Thriving at the Butterfly Pavilion
Around four months ago we reported on a batch of Caribbean Stony corals which were rescued from the advancement of a terrible disease, and entrusted to a Denver area institution called the Butterfly Pavilion. When we first saw these corals…
Tips For Taking Better Aquarium Pictures
Are your aquarium pictures always turning out blue, even when the colors appear bright and vibrant to your eyes? Here are a few tricks you can use to cut out the blue and bring color back to your images. Gel…
Fragging a Nice Orange Bowerbanki at Aquatic Art Inc.
It’s no secret that LPS corals enjoy a strong following with a wide cross section of the reef aquarium community, and one of the corals leading the charge has long been Homophyllia bowerbanki. We’ve documented the various color forms of this large,…