Tell us about yourself: 

I was born in St. Louis 38 years ago and I'm still here. My first home was about 2 miles from my parent's home and my current residence is about 6 miles away. I guess you could say I'm a wanderer. :) I graduated from the University of Missouri-St. Louis in 1989 with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration. I went from there to become a CPA and 4 years ago I passed my PFS exam as well (a Personal Financial Specialist is equivalent to the Certified Financial Planner less the tax portion of the test). My hobbies other than reefkeeping are varied. In addition to bonsai, I enjoy animals of every kind and right now I have two Labrador retrievers named Cheyenne and Cherokee and a cat named Caspian. I truly enjoy history and in particular Native American history as my dog's names indicate. Every chance I get, I get out of St. Louis and head down to the Missouri Ozarks and ride horses through the mountains. One of the oddest things about me is that I WANT mantis shrimp. I'm desperately searching for another peacock mantis but at the moment all I have are two tiny Neogonodactylus wennerae. One is in a nano tank and the other one is currently living in my sump and I never see him. Wennerae are interesting too but I guess I miss the excitement of having a mantis that I'm afraid to have my hand around. I guess I'm not only a wanderer, I'm a thrill seeker too like most other accountants. :)

How did you get involved in the saltwater hobby?

During high school and college, I worked out 4 or 5 times per week. The gym was right next door to a pet store that sold saltwater fish (no corals). I went into that store every time I worked out. But the fascination was forgotten for many years after I stopped going to that gym. Out of the blue one day, I got on the internet and started searching for saltwater aquarium information. I found out that you could also keep corals in a saltwater aquarium. I was fascinated and I went to web page after web page for two weeks. My internet searches were not lost on Rachel and she bought me a 7 gallon AGA bowfront nano completely cycled with a sandbed, live rock, a few mushrooms and button polyps, and a baby true percula clownfish for valentines day 3 years ago. I named him Corky for Corky the Clown (how original….sheesh). However, the rest is history.

Tell us about your tank? 

There's not a whole lot to tell at the moment. I have an 18 gallon nano with built in protein skimmer and sump waiting for a peacock mantis. It's current inhabitants right now are only a boxing/pom-pom crab, a bunch of snails, a few zoanthids, cauliflower leather, bubble tipped anemone, a cowfish, and a bunch of snails. My 12 gallon nano has various mushrooms, zooanthids, and very nice frogspawn I got from Hooked. My 75 gallon I built into my wall had a crash when I took out my sandbed which was very sad. I was going to give away most of my softies because I wanted to give SPS a try however I didn't want my critters to leave in this manner. I didn't want to try to do a mixed tank because keeping corals of such different biotopes happy in the same tank seems like a nightmare to me. Right now I'm semi-cooking my rock in that tank before resurrecting it as a SPS tank. I have some corals on some rocks that won't fit in my nanos so I have to give them some light. At the moment, I also have a used 200 gallon FILTHY glass tank soaking in freshwater and vinegar and it stinks to the high heavens. I've been scrubbing on it periodically forever and a year and I'm hoping this will make clearing off all of the dried salt, calcium, etc., easier. This is going to be my new sump/frag growout tank.

How did you become involved with Reef Frontiers? 

I met Mojoreef on another board and he wanted my opinion of certain things that you guys set up on the board. I was impressed and joined.

What is your reef keeping philosophy? 

My primary philosophy is that this hobby should be fun. My secondary philosophy is to have an understanding of the basics of what is happening in your tank so that you aren't looking for "magic pills" to fix the problems you are experiencing because unfortunately, few "magic pills" exist in real life. Read, read, read ahead of time so that you understand the needs of what you would like to buy...then buy the proper equipment to prevent problems.

What is your dream tank? 

This is truly a difficult question. I love cube tanks for some unknown reason. I would love to have a fairly large cube with an island of rock in the center. I would also love a very long but shallow tank that is sectioned off with acrylic where I could safely house many mantis safely. I would also love a huge inwall tank where I could house large fishes and allow corals to grow to massive sizes. One day, I hope to have all three types along with my nano species tanks.

Do you have any advice for others? 

I most certainly do….look before you leap. Don't run to the LFS and grab some product that claims to solve all problems…most likely it will create different problems. Just like anything in life, it is good to have a goal. Look at the goal and look backwards from there to decide what to do now in anticipation of reaching that goal. For example, if you want a colorful SPS tank, you know that low nutrients are necessary. Find out the steps that you need to accomplish to keep nutrients low. If you prefer tanks that can handle additional nutrients, you can decide the best ways to handle them now as well. Decide what you want in the future and do what is needed now.