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After coexisting for a year+, the mantis shrimp finally ate the peppermint (both in pictures above). And on Halloween, too.
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Nov 1, 2012 13:26
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Picked up a six-line for the 40 yesterday. The clown punked the poo poo out of him so hes very well behaved so far. Also traded in about 10 stalks of pulsing Xenia that I scraped off the It was incredible, 3 stalks sold before I left the store.
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Nov 5, 2012 05:39
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SaNChEzZ posted:Picked up a six-line for the 40 yesterday. The clown punked the poo poo out of him so hes very well behaved so far. I really don't understand why people pay for Xenia when so many people are giving it away for free. Thankfully my tanks don't grow it well (or at all, really).
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Nov 5, 2012 05:58
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Melchior posted:I really don't understand why people pay for Xenia when so many people are giving it away for free. Thankfully my tanks don't grow it well (or at all, really). Wish I could say the same. Started with 1 stalk 3 years ago that came with the used tank, now its literally bowling ball sized. Luckily its stuck on one rock and the back, which is easy to scrape. E: also I don't mind it now that I know I can trade it in for $6.50 a stalk instead of flushing it down the toilet. Frozen Pizza Party fucked around with this message at 07:39 on Nov 5, 2012 |
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Nov 5, 2012 07:33
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I was about to say. I asked three LFS' about what I should do with my excess xenia in my first tank and they all told me to hand it out for free or toss it. (World Wide Corals and many other majors in Orlando included). I have no idea how how got lucky making money on Xenia.
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Nov 5, 2012 07:58
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Really the only people who are willing to pay for it are those who: a) aren't affiliated with a local reefing club b) don't use the internet to find local reefers c) people who can't grow anything else
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Nov 5, 2012 14:29
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Yeah, I guess it sells like hotcakes at the LFS for whatever reason. Also, that flame tip / colorado sunset whatever the hell it's called BTA that I picked up has become 3 BTAs already. Time to make some money.
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Nov 5, 2012 20:02
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Xenia is so weirdly hit or miss. It has taken the gently caress off in my tank and I have to actively manage it from creeping onto places I don't want it. Mine are super thick and puffed out so I dig it for the most part. Anyone have experience with Midas Blennies? I saw one at the LFS yesterday and I want one bad now. They're stunning and the way they swim is neat to watch.
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Nov 5, 2012 21:56
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SaNChEzZ posted:Also, that flame tip / colorado sunset whatever the hell it's called BTA that I picked up has become 3 BTAs already. Time to make some money. Ship to Illinois. 
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Nov 6, 2012 00:02
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Kinda nervous about shipping them, they're such fragile things.
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Nov 6, 2012 00:05
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So starter sps question once again. A guy in my Reef club is selling: ORA hyacinth birdsnest-1.5" frags for 10 bucks ORA green stylo-$5 for 1" frag I'm guessing the birdsnest is a good starter, but what about the stylo?
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Nov 6, 2012 01:55
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Green stylo is pretty much green birdsnest, which is relatively easy to keep. I had it die off in my tank for some reason; I think it was an alk swing. Birdsnests are one of the easiest to keep. Those are really good prices, too.
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Nov 6, 2012 02:12
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Horrific images incoming:  That tank has an awful cyano/GHA problem (at least it's actually and definitely GHA and not turf/bry!) because of the overfeeding (and the mantis shrimp occupancy), but the RBTA and clowns are healthy as hell because of the pods and shrimps (which are because of the algae problem, and aforementioned overfeeding). At some point a few months ago it actually looked like I had the algae problem under control, to where all the rocks were majorly free of it and cyano, but it looks like I've again lost the battle. The war continues! VAGENDA OF MANOCIDE fucked around with this message at 17:05 on Nov 6, 2012 |
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Nov 6, 2012 17:02
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This thread really needs more play. Hey people in the freshwater thread, convert to salt! You won't regret it. Some new pics: Full Tank Shot:  Sunset monti & Pocillipora  Green Turaki  ORA Hawkins Echinata  ORA Red Planet 
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Nov 9, 2012 03:50
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Melchior posted:This thread really needs more play. Hey people in the freshwater thread, convert to salt! You won't regret it. As gorgeous as these look, I love the simplicity of freshwater tank maintainence. Plus all my local fish stores are mainly freshwater stock.
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Nov 9, 2012 05:00
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I have a 75 gallon fowlr that's been running about 2 years, but I've owned it only 3 months. Things are going pretty well, but I have a few questions. There's an exceptionally large rock that weighs about 65 pounds in it and it's a bit of an eyesore. I want to sell it. The rock is very dense and relatively flat. I'd like to convert this system to a reef tank, and replace this boulder with some actual reef rock then rescape the whole tank. Is replacing such a huge piece of the scape going to throw the chemistry way off? Parameters are pretty good right now except for some trace phosphates and nitrates. The only livestock I have are 2 hermits, 1 nassarius snail, 6 tiger conchs, 1 snowflake eel, 1 carpet anemone, and 1 juvenile koran angel. (He was already in the tank when it came into my possession. He's small right now, but don't worry I'm trying to find a bigger home for him.) If it matters I have a 20 gallon sump with maybe 12 pounds of rock and 40 lbs of livesand underneath. Also, I'd like to upgrade the T5's to a broad spectrum LED set up. Does anyone have any experience with the Maxpect Razor? I imagine I'd need two 20" for a 75 gallon? I'm not totally sold on them yet, so if anybody has a better suggestion I'm open to anything. Here's the tank in its current state: 
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Nov 9, 2012 05:06
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So the "orangeish" hammer looks way different in my tank. Me likey.
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Nov 17, 2012 20:11
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Finally got my tank started. 20L with 4x24 T5 lighting. 10lbs live rock and 10lbs base rock. Just got snails and hermits so far. Gonna add fish around Christmas.
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Nov 19, 2012 01:19
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U.S. Barryl posted:Finally got my tank started. 20L with 4x24 T5 lighting. 10lbs live rock and 10lbs base rock. Just got snails and hermits so far. Gonna add fish around Christmas. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be doing a 20L as well. Why did you go with T5 instead of LED?
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Nov 19, 2012 14:50
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I found a 30in T5 fixture for cheaper than I could make my own LEDs. Probably gonna bite me in the rear end in bulb replacements, but I was constrained by my current budget.
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Nov 19, 2012 15:21
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Debbie Upper posted:I have a 75 gallon fowlr that's been running about 2 years, but I've owned it only 3 months. Things are going pretty well, but I have a few questions. There's an exceptionally large rock that weighs about 65 pounds in it and it's a bit of an eyesore. I want to sell it. The rock is very dense and relatively flat. I'd like to convert this system to a reef tank, and replace this boulder with some actual reef rock then rescape the whole tank. Is replacing such a huge piece of the scape going to throw the chemistry way off? Parameters are pretty good right now except for some trace phosphates and nitrates. The only livestock I have are 2 hermits, 1 nassarius snail, 6 tiger conchs, 1 snowflake eel, 1 carpet anemone, and 1 juvenile koran angel. (He was already in the tank when it came into my possession. He's small right now, but don't worry I'm trying to find a bigger home for him.) If it matters I have a 20 gallon sump with maybe 12 pounds of rock and 40 lbs of livesand underneath. Sorry about the late reply! In my opinion you should be able to remove that rock and not have too much in the way of problems with a cycle. It's way too dense to actually have much surface area for bacteria. You'd want to disturb the sand bed as little as possible when removing it, and doing a large water change right after. I wouldn't add any corals until you've got new base rock established in there (get bulk reef supply or reefcleaners.org dry rock). You'll probably have a nitrate spike but for a FOWLR that isn't a huge deal really. Just watch for it to drop back down to trace levels and stay there - once you've got that going for you, you should be good to go for some corals.
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Nov 21, 2012 06:04
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Also, remove it quickly, don't let it drip all the nasties back into the tank. That will help cut down on waste being leeched back in 
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Nov 21, 2012 19:20
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Tank pics!    Current stock includes a coral beauty angelfish, two percula clowns, a scooter blenny, a skunk cleaner shrimp, two varieties of zoanthid, trumpet coral, green star polyps, two mushroom varieties, and some pocillopora, my first SPS. Also, a veritable army of blueleg hermits and astrea snails. My last reef aquarium was ~4.5g, so needless to say, this tank is hilariously easy to maintain, in comparison.
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Nov 23, 2012 23:49
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Yeah, the ease of maintenance is a pretty nice change. I went from a 3gal to a 40+20, needless to say I no longer do weekly water changes. Also, was just looking at the tank, "Oh hey, what's that new orange thing in th- oh.. "  
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Nov 25, 2012 00:13
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This thread be dead, have a video of my fish. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KE5w3CIj5E
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Nov 30, 2012 21:17
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Look what I got: This is going in my office tank. (seen in the background, my 20gal at home, now free of dinos and hair algae once again) VAGENDA OF MANOCIDE fucked around with this message at 18:06 on Dec 11, 2012 |
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Dec 11, 2012 18:03
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SaNChEzZ posted:This thread be dead, have a video of my fish. Thats a rad video. I'm going to try that sometime. Whenever I try to take a video with my DSLR, I always try to pan around and get different parts of the tank. It never really works right.
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Dec 11, 2012 18:46
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I've had two different diamond gobies decide to carpet surf within a week and a half. This is annoying because now I don't have a sand sifter again and one of them was $30 down the drain (the last one was in there 6 months, the replacement did so after 4 days). Odd.
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Dec 11, 2012 18:51
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 Two mini mini carpets (S. tapetum) (NOT maxi mini). Also pictured: toadstool, lunars, rbta.
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Dec 12, 2012 15:54
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I think my office reef is slowly crashing, and I have no idea what the problem could be. It started before thanksgiving.. the zoanthids weren't opening up and the xenia was lifeless. I moved one of the zoanthid frags up towards the light and it started doing better, so I ordered a new light (JBJ 54w LED) to replace the 27w RapidLED pendant I had. I ran the new light at ~30% intensity with the same photo period (9:30-5:30). The zoanthids started coming back and the xenia's color was better and they were pulsing again. The montis were looking great. A week later, I bumped the intensity up to ~50%, then left for a long weekend over thanksgiving break. Came back to my xenia looking like poo poo, my GSP not extending polyps at all, and a diatom outbreak from hell. My birdsnest was looking better than ever and the montis grew about 1/4" in diameter. The ricordea were looking great, and the few mushrooms were better than ever as well. I immediately did a large-ish water change (5 gallons -- 11.4 Mr. Aqua tank with probably 9-10 gallons total). The GSP still hasn't shown itself except for a random stray polyp here or there that recedes again shortly after appearing. The birdsnest is now doing a RTN, my pocillopora is bleaching / RTN, the mushrooms are cupped as are the ricordea. The xenia has just about all melted away, but the hammer and montis are still looking amazing. My zoanthids haven't opened in over a month and they're all reaching for the sky. My skimmer is pulling medium wet skimmate. My params are all normal (0 nitrate, 0 nitrite, 0 phosphate, pH is ~8.0 in the morning and ~8.1 in the evening. I replaced my phosphate kit as I wasn't getting a very good color representation with the old, but still 0. I have ammonia on the way. I've been doing weekly 2.5G water changes with NSW from scripps. I was using reef crystals prior to this, and my top off is from the RO/DI system in front of the grocery store (I haven't tested PPM myself, but I don't measure anything with the kits I have). Not really sure where to go from here. Is it light? Is it bad water? Is it some weird electrical leak or something? Is it biological warfare between corals (how the hell do you test for that)?
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Dec 12, 2012 23:20
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If I had to guess I would say maybe something with the RO from the grocery store (is it RO or RO/DI?) I would say maybe change water sources and do a couple of water changes over the week. You can also run a poly filter to make sure anything like that is removed. Those are my only guesses. What is your alk / cal / mag? Also, what is your temp? Is it possible your temp is rising to or above 84?
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Dec 13, 2012 00:10
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optikalus posted:I think my office reef is slowly crashing, and I have no idea what the problem could be. poo poo thats a shame, sounds like it was doing well. I would stop using the storefront RO/DI for a while and maybe go back to reef crystals or something for a bit. Echoing the guy above, what is the average temp and are you getting any crazy swings throughout the day? Maybe its something that is happening in the evenings? You mentioned a bunch of tests but failed to leave out the trinity of water parameters, alk/cal/mag. Also, I work in an office as well and we have cleaning people that show up late at night. Dunno if you have something like that but if you do maybe they are spraying something near the tank or some poo poo?
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Dec 13, 2012 01:03
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I'm pretty sure the machine says it is DI, but I'll double-check. I'll dump the remaining ATO water and get a new batch tomorrow after cleaning the reservoir completely. The calcium is at 480ppm. KH is between 10 and 11 (179-196.9ppm). I have an magnesium test kit at home that I'll have to find and bring in. I just put my small HOB carbon filter back on with a new carbon bag. Not sure it'll do anything, but if it is bio-warfare, it'll only help. Temperature is maintained between 74 and 76 (currently 75.4) verified by probe (Apex Jr) and glass thermometer. Fan kicks on to cool it above 76, heater kicks on at 74. I know the temp could be warmer, but it is really close to what the Apex's season table says it should be and I have a catalina goby which prefers cooler temps thus I've pushed the corals to the lower end of their tolerance and the catalina to the upper end of its tolerance. Edit: I'm not opposed to getting my own 4-stage RO/DI again, I just don't want to get a huge set up like I had for my 90 (75gpd). Are there any (good) small units that only do about 5gpd that I can fit below my sink at home? Something that would go into a pressurized container would be best, but I could use a bucket and a float valve again if I had to. optikalus fucked around with this message at 01:13 on Dec 13, 2012 |
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Dec 13, 2012 01:07
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visuvius posted:Also, I work in an office as well and we have cleaning people that show up late at night. Dunno if you have something like that but if you do maybe they are spraying something near the tank or some poo poo? I'm here when they come in.. they don't do anything but change the garbage cans and occasionally vacuum. I've never seen them spray anything in any office -- only the break room / kitchenette area. That was my first concern. At this point, I'm kinda fishing for ideas. I am even considering a titanium grounding spike just in case some pump is leaking voltage into the tank. The water feels fine to me and the whole thing is on a GFI, but who knows.
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Dec 13, 2012 01:16
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Found one of my BTAs all balled up last night, went in for a closer look, there was a ricordea sitting inside it's tentacles. I only have one rock with ricordeas on it, and this one was tiny. Where did you come from baby mushroom  Now I have a shot glass in the display with rubble in it 
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Dec 13, 2012 01:48
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optikalus posted:I'm pretty sure the machine says it is DI, but I'll double-check. I'll dump the remaining ATO water and get a new batch tomorrow after cleaning the reservoir completely. Yeah I think there are a couple of small RO/DI units available on Marine Depot for pretty cheap and I think BRS has one as well. I dunno man, if it were me, if nothing else is working and you continue to have these problems, I would slowly start increasing the temp up to 77-78. 74 seems pretty low to me. I know I've seen that number in like books or the occasional chart (74-82) but I've never in my life seen anyone run their actual reef at 74. Lowest I've seen is 76 with the vast majority being 77-78. The goby will probably be fine at the higher temp and if not, would you rather save all your corals or a goby you could trade in to the LFS?
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Dec 13, 2012 19:06
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visuvius posted:Yeah I think there are a couple of small RO/DI units available on Marine Depot for pretty cheap and I think BRS has one as well. 74 is the lowest it'll go, but I'll bump everything up 1 degree first. It was doing fine at that temp for many months, so I don't think it is that. Also tested the Mg this morning.. ~1440ppm, so that should be good too. The GSP has some polyps out this morning, but when it has done that before, they usually go back in by the end of the day. However, I'm crossing my fingers that the carbon is doing something haha. Won't be in time to save the birdsnest.. it looks like a leper now.
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Dec 13, 2012 19:58
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visuvius posted:Yeah I think there are a couple of small RO/DI units available on Marine Depot for pretty cheap and I think BRS has one as well. I've also been looking for low GPD systems. The lowest I found so far was a 35GPD 4 stage at Marine Depot. There is a 25GPD, but looking at the description it may be a 3 stage. Cleaned up my tank for a full shot. Finally took others advice and got rid of the fish in there, added more rock, and let some snails and crabs run around for a while. Now I have two perc clowns and a yellow clown goby along with the CUC. Surprised all my snails are still alive.  
Fermunky fucked around with this message at 16:36 on Dec 14, 2012 |
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Dec 14, 2012 16:19
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I just bought a RO/DI from petstore.com which is marine depot's sister site. I got a coupon code from a poster on nano-reef for 10% off. The code is VIPDANNY and they do free shipping on orders over $75. Edit: http://www.petstore.com/spectrapure-maxpure-rodi-system That's the one I got, which came to $135 after using the coupon. The refurb units at spectrapure's website are cheaper but after their $25 shipping charge it was actually more expensive. U.S. Barryl fucked around with this message at 17:32 on Dec 14, 2012 |
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Dec 14, 2012 17:30
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| # ? May 24, 2024 22:43 |
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Since there's a lot of talk of RO/DI systems I could post the one I've worked on this week.   It can clean the water so well that it's not safe to drink (via multiple passes through the system), although really it's pretty much the same as the small units linked here, just bigger.
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Dec 14, 2012 18:04
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