Our reef tank is like a second home, only as much as we WISH we could crawl inside, we can’t. That doesn’t change the fact that there is still work to be done to get the tank and its surrounding areas clean and organized just like a home. You may walk by the pile of damp fish nets, shot glasses for feeding, excessive timers and five boxes of test kits everyday and it is virtually invisible to you, but when your spouse walks by they think “What a huge pile of crap, no wonder my friends think we are crazy.” If you ARE crazy, I can’t help you with that…but I can certainly help you find a better way to hide the crazy. And don’t waste time with a toothbrush over the kitchen sink, scrubbing algae off your power heads or trying to unbend the kink in your old glass scraper on a handle (you know who you are)!

Wednesday’s meeting will be a presentation covering “Spring Cleaning for your Reef” where we will discuss all of the different ways to keep your reef and equipment clean both inside and out, your work space organized, and tips to making an unsightly clutter of supplies disappear with simple storage solutions.

We meet at Stacy Furniture in Grapevine Texas from 7:00pm to 9:00pm. Map to location: Google Maps

Stacy Furniture
1900 S Main St
Grapevine, Tx 76051

The meeting runs from 7pm to 9pm. Please park on the side, NOT in front of the building as requested by management. Enter the building and take the elevator to the third floor. We meet in the common room. At the end of the meeting, we are required to clean the room so please look around your area and leave it super clean.

We meet at Stacy Furniture in Grapevine Texas from 7:00pm to 9:00pm. Map to location: Google Maps

Stacy Furniture
1900 S Main St
Grapevine, Tx 76051

The meeting runs from 7pm to 9pm. Please park on the side, NOT in front of the building as requested by management. Enter the building and take the elevator to the third floor. We meet in the common room. At the end of the meeting, we are required to clean the room so please look around your area and leave it super clean.

The raffle will include a camera and a Top Down Photo Box. You don’t want to miss this meeting.

DFWMAS is proud to announce that we will be holding a Spring frag swap Saturday, April 21nd, 2012 at the St Barnabas Presbyterian Church in Richardson, TX. Space for sellers will be limited so please post if you plan to be there as a seller so we can prepare a table layout for the event. The event will be free to members that would like to sell. All sellers will have to donate a nice frag for the raffle. Non-members that would like to have a table will be charged $10 at the door. The event is FREE to ALL MEMBERS & NON-MEMBERS as buyers. Commercail sellers not allowed, hobbiest only.

Things to remember to bring:
Towels to clean up your area.
Extension cords, power strips, tape, zip ties, etc. required to set up your area.
Pumps, tubing, containers to both fill and drain your display tanks (if you are using them).
Bags, rubber bands, markers.
Cash / coin to make change with.
Pictures of the parent colonies to showcase what the coral looks like normally. (Prints, Laptop, iPad, Smartphone, Photo-Frame….)

St Barnabas Presbyterian Church,
1220 West Belt Line Road,
Richardson, TX 75080-5801 (google maps)

Hours of event:
Noon-1:00 for setup
1:00-1:30 Members only early admittance
1:30-3:00 for the swap
3:00-3:30 Raffle
3:30-4:00 teardown (clean-up)

Please RSVP your interests as a seller by posting in this linked forum thread: http://www.dfwmas.org/Forums/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=95174&start=0#p717625

We are meeting at the Ballpark in Arlington. You don’t want to miss Next Wave. Register now and purchase lunch at the same time. If you want to pre-purchase raffle tickets, you can do that as well. Here’s the link with more details:

dfwmas.org/nextwave

Our next meeting is for MEMBERS ONLY. If you aren’t a member currently, click the blue word membership now and become a DFWMAS card-carrying member.

Our meeting will take place Wednesday, February 8th from 7pm to 9pm at the Dallas World Aquarium.

Dallas World Aquarium
1801 North Griffin St.
Dallas, TX 75202

The speaker is Paula Branshaw and her topic is “The Importance of Quarantining.” The DWA has a huge quarantine facility to maintain healthy animals throughout their facilities. Through breeding and propagation in the QT-section, they even are able to raise livestock for other public aquariums to receive. It’s a great topic, and a great place to have this meeting.

Entrance to DWA will be free that night to all DFWMAS members. Bring your membership card, sign in at the door and get a name badge. You will have to pay to park your car at one of the nearby lots. It is easiest to pay for parking with your credit or debit card, then place the receipt on your dashboard.

Proceeds from the raffle will be donated to the Conservation Effort by the Dallas World Aquarium: The Manatee Project in Peru. http://www.dwazoo.com/peru-conservation/ The raffle will will include a Reefkeeper Lite, two Boston Aqua Farms Fragging Kits, Prodibio bio-dosings, Frozen Foods, and more. Bring cash, lots of it. You’re saving manatees!

In addition, light refreshments and drinks are provided by the kind people at the Dallas World Aquarium. The presentation upstairs (right above where you entered and signed in) is where our meeting will be held, and where the food and drinks can be found. A cash bar will also be available for those of you that are so inclined. Bring more cash.

Remember: No livestock is permitted in the building. If you plan to trade corals, you will need to do so after the meeting in the parking lot. Odds are the weather will be cold, so plan wisely with styrofoam coolers and heat packs… or handle those trades on another day. There will be no COOP (the DFWMAS coral sharing program) that night.

This information will be updated as needed.

This will be a very special meeting during the Museums Planet Shark exhibit with guest speaker Chris Schreiber from the Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta.

“Chris’ interest in sharks began, like many people, when he saw Jaws as a kid. During college a volunteer position at The Maine Aquarium started him on his career path and he is currently an Associate Curator of Fishes and Invertebrates at The Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta. He has been lucky enough to study sharks in places like Florida, Taiwan, Mexico, the Bahamas, and Bimini doing field research in tagging, genetics, and conservation. He most recently appeared on Ocean Mysteries with Jeff Corwin collecting blood samples from wild whale sharks in Cancun.”

He will be giving a talk on the Whale Sharks and others at their aquarium, some behind the scenes details on the facility, and information on how they get these massive creatures transported. It will be a whale of a good time, dont miss it!

MEMBERS ONLY will get a wristband providing FREE access to the Science Building, Nature Building and Planetarium. Guests with an accompanying member will also be provided a free wristband. The presentation itself will be in their Viewspace Theatre. Entry into the Shark Exhibit afterwards will be discounted to only $8 from the normal 15! Their exhibit is called Planet Shark.

Science Building
1318 S 2nd Ave
Dallas,TX 75210

Please keep all livestock at home for this meeting and if you are bringing items for trade, do it before or after the event. Thank you!

We are doing a White Elephant gift exchange. What is this? “Participants draw numbers from a hat to determine their gift choice order, starting with one, up to the total number of participants. Each person takes a turn choosing a gift. The first person picks a gift, opens it and shows it to the rest of the company. Then the number two participant picks a gift and chooses to either unwrap it or to exchange it for the previously unwrapped gift. If the gift is exchanged, the person who had their gift taken from them gets to unwrap the chosen gift and then the turn passes. When all the gifts have been opened, the game is over.” Each person brings a wrapped fish/marine tank-related item worth no more than $20. If you have something of value that is in nearly brand new (or is brand new) condition that you won’t use that equals that value, wrap it up and bring it; if you don’t have anything, buy something new from your LFS. To keep things interesting, the club is going to pick up extra gifts. Remember, no tags, no markings, no clues.”

Sounds fun right? In addition, we are going to have some games to play; ideas are from the popular show Minute To Win It on NBC. Never heard of it? http://www.nbc.com/minute-to-win-it/ Let’s see what you can do in 60 seconds. The fastest time for each game will be awarded a prize.

Please bring along a dessert or appetizer, so refreshments will be available. The club will provide drinks as usual and other food items as well. Bring your family, some good cheer, and let’s wrap up the year with a fun night. Desserts will be voted on by attendees to determine the best one and a prize awarded.

———————–

We meet at Stacy Furniture in Grapevine Texas from 7:00pm to 9:00pm.

Stacy Furniture – Google Maps
1900 S Main St
Grapevine, Tx 76051

Please park on the side, NOT in front of the building as requested by management. Enter the building and take the elevator to the third floor. We meet in the common room. At the end of the meeting, we are required to clean the room so please look around your area and leave it super clean.

The meeting concludes after workshop and we will have the corals used in the workshop available to take home and will have a raffle on other goods. You’ve gotta be there to win, of course.

We meet at Stacy Furniture in Grapevine Texas from 7:00pm to 9:00pm. Map to location: Google Maps

Stacy Furniture
1900 S Main St
Grapevine, Tx 76051

The meeting runs from 7pm to 9pm. Please park on the side, NOT in front of the building as requested by management. Enter the building and take the elevator to the third floor. We meet in the common room. At the end of the meeting, we are required to clean the room so please look around your area and leave it super clean.

** Water testing will be performed at our meeting. Bring your salt water and tap water samples in brand new ziplock bags to avoid any contamination, and we can test for nitrate, nitrite, calcium, magnesium, alkalinity, phospates and chloramines. These tests are to confirm your own measurements, not to do them for you. We also can test the calibration of your refractometer… we’ve got the right solution (35ppt).

TDS & Chloramines – If you are coming straight from home, please bring a small sample of tapwater in a CLEAN container. We are going to measure the TDS of your water, the Chloramines level, and notate that with your zip code. This information is going to be compiled to create a map of the metroplex to show how our source water varies across N. Texas. Run the (cold water side) faucet for 2 minutes, then collect a sample for us to test. Collect the water in a brand new ziplock baggie [b]filled halfway[/b] and put that in a container to avoid spillage at our event. To get an accurate TDS level, you MUST use a brand new baggie; otherwise it will measure higher than what is actually coming out of the faucet due to contamination.

The meeting concludes after the big raffle. You’ve gotta be there to win, of course.

We meet at Stacy Furniture in Grapevine Texas from 7:00pm to 9:00pm. Map to location: Google Maps

Stacy Furniture
1900 S Main St
Grapevine, Tx 76051

Please park on the side, NOT in front of the building as requested by management. Enter the building and take the elevator to the third floor. We meet in the common room. At the end of the meeting, we are required to clean the room so please look around your area and leave it super clean.

** Water testing will be performed at our meeting. Bring your salt water and tap water samples in brand new ziplock bags to avoid any contamination, and we can test for Ammonia, Nitrate, Nitrite, Phosphate, Calcium, Magnesium, Chloramines, TDS, and Alkalinity. These tests are to confirm your own measurements, not to do them for you. We also can test the calibration of your refractometer… we’ve got the right solution (35ppt).

TDS & Chloramines - If you are coming straight from home, please bring a small sample of tapwater in a CLEAN container. We are going to measure the TDS of your water, the Chloramines level, and notate that with your zip code. This information is going to be compiled to create a map of the metroplex to show how our source water varies across N. Texas. Run the (cold water side) faucet for 2 minutes, then collect a sample for us to test. Collect the water in a brand new ziplock baggie and put that in a container to avoid spillage at our event. To get an accurate TDS level, you MUST use a brand new baggie; otherwise it will measure higher than what is actually coming out of the faucet due to contamination.

The doors open at 10 a.m. and we will wrap up the fun at 2 p.m.
St Barnabas Presbyterian Church
1220 West Belt Line Road
Richardson, TX 75080-5801 (map)

We will have special guest speaker Scott Fellman joining us as well as some of our favorite local vendors with some great selections just for our members. The event will be catered with delicious in house BBQ again this year so bring your favorite summertime side or dessert for everyone to enjoy!

Scott Fellman will be a speaker at MACNA 2011 in Des Moines this year, so take advantage of this opportunity to visit with him and other members and sponsors at the social.
Scott Fellman’s MACNA Bio: linky

Marc Levenson will also be giving a presentation on RO/DI systems, including trouble shooting tips.

We’ll be kicking off the re-designed COOP (coral sharing program), so keep your eyes open for that.

The water testing program continues. If you want to test tap water for Chloramines & TDS, bring it in a clean new ziplock bag. If you want to compare your saltwater test results, bring a tank water sample and request the specific test. We can also calibrate your refractometer to make sure it is reading correctly.

We look forward to seeing everyone there! There will be a TERRIFIC raffle, the 2nd biggest one of the year. Don’t miss that opportunity.