thanks Instar, that means a lot. Preperation to me, is the end all be all of a goo danything, you lay a good foundation, you will build a good house.

My mind is swirling with options right now, I am building the stand my hex is going to sit on, which I have realized, does not mean I need to conform to wha tis out there now... I think I am going to build a cabinet/case which will allow for a much larger refugium.. .I am not sure yet, I may stick with what I have... the odd shape of the tank (hex) leaves little room for work in a normal stand, so I was going to buy another 30 hex and use it as the main tank (no scratches) and move the old hex into the stand. I figured the verticle height in and of itself would lend itself well to a DSB and a refugium.. I believe the sides are 9 and 1/2 inches * 6, not sure what the square inches work out to be on that.

Also, I talked to my wife, while we are sure we want to see an anemone/clownfish relationship going on, we aren't dead set on the maroons... last night I showed her some pictures of clowns I liked, and she picked out some black perculas. I think those would work well, and if membery serves, they host in e. quadricolor as well, and I have not read that they are overly agressive. while that is all that we plan on putting in there now, it does leave us open to expand a little more than the maroons did... I was careful to pick inverts that won't bulldoze corals and what not, so I am certainly not going to put a fish with a scrappy attitude in...

I guess I am also right in the thought I need to get the anemone in before any corals so that it settles in to a local and won't move around stinging everyting?

I am not planning on any hard corals at this time, some xenia up top probably, some zoo's, and mushrooms down low... maybe a clam...

I will be getting a larger tank in the future, but, I don't want to back myself into a situation either where I have to get it, or trade out a specimen because it has outgrown the system. Slow and steady wins some races.