Newb! Clear Lake

Good day folks.  Just registered here.  My name is Al Laake.  I have an aquatic addiction.  I competed in Car stereo competition on a national level for many years but after almost 5 years and finally reaching my goal of world champion I began dabbling more and more in aquatics.  My parents brought us up in a house with tanks and naturally I kept with the spirit and started on my own at about 14 years old.  I got in deep about 4 years ago.
Predatory fish are my fascination.  Started with your typical Oscars and knives but quickly grew tired of "common" preds.  After joining up over at MFK and Water Wolves it became painfully obvious I had yet to be enlightened as to exactly what is available for predatory fish.
I have learned the hard way that Potomotrygon species are very predatory.  I have lost most of my prized Characins to them but still have a few with them and have some new juvies in growout.
I have a couple big tanks and a pond in my basement.
I am here cause I love meeting new people that share this common love for the hobby.
I am not into reefkeeping YET as my rays chew up every available minute I can spare, BUT I know I will eventually give in.  I currently have a saltwater tank with some eels, Monos, and a stonefish. I hope to learn a lot while I'm here and look forward to being educated.
My fishkeeping is always evolving and I'm always looking for the stuff I need to feed this. 
I was turned on to this site by a buddy that is fairly new to fish keeping when I mentioned I was in need of a few pumps for some upcoming projects.  This is where I was able to locate a very polite and helpfull gentlemen named Darren who sold me a couple Dolphin pumps and a sump.  Best part was I didn't have to drive hours upon hours to pick them up.

 

Thanks for the welcome Joel!!!
Yes, interesting would probobly be the best way to describe it........LOL
The ray pond is roughly 1K gallons... With entirely DIY filtration. It houses 10 Rays (8 Marbled Motoros, 1 Henlei/Motoro crossbreed, and 1 white seemed Jaguar Ontorongo), 4 Odoe Pike, 1 Rhaphiodon Vulpinus, and a few spotted pictus and Rapheals as the clean up crew.
Unfortunately the size of house I'm living in really limits what I can have set up.  I'de really like to triple the size of pond and be able to set up the BIG tanks in storage.

 

I'll try to get some pics tonight. I have to take some anyways for a before/after. The filter is NOT pretty by any means but it seems to work well as the rays are healthy and I believe at least one female to be pregnant. The filter is a 150 gallon rubbermaid with 2 wet/dry bio towers each roughly 40 gallons. I believe close to 1500 pot scrubbies and about 20 gallons of bio balls. (4) 2 in returns (only using 2 right now) ran by a Pondmaster hydrive 4.8K. Original plan was 2 pumps but decided that ponds are really tough to keep fish in, so started funneling money into BIG tanks...... So kinda just left the filter unfinished. After running the pond for about 6 months I have a list of things that were VERY VERY poorly designed. So withing the next month or so after I get the growout tank for the smaller rays up and running and get them moved I will be tearing the pond down and redoing it...... Hopefully a LOT closer to right this time.

Really starting to get curious about SW rays.......... Man they are cheap compared to FW rays..... Was recently down to Iowa pet food and aquatics and they said they could bring them in for around $125. The wheels just started turning.

 

Am I correct in assuming the main differences between reefs and FOWLR is lighting and water movement? Would you use the same skimmers? What else is required to keep a successful reef that is NOT required with FOWLR?