do zoa's like dirty water ?

[Snarkys]

I'm debating on wither or not to put a skimmer on my zoa propagation tank.

was reading on garf.org that they dont use skimmers because zoa's like dirty water . what yas think ?

will it brown them out ?

[Scribe]

I've heard zoo's do like dirty water. I'm currently cycling my 90 with an ASM G2 Skimmer. Once I'm up and running, I plan on running the skimmer one week on, one week off. I'll probably mess around with the routine to see what happens, but from everything i've read I think the benefits of a skimmer out weigh not having one. I'm sure people have had success both ways. I tend to believe that lighting plays just as much of a role.

[ahenson]

You can add flow to that equation they like good waterflow. I run mine because I have leathers and other corals and fish, zo's only I'd go no skimmer.
Andy

[reefkeeper59]

If they do well in clean water, why have dirty. Especially if you already own the skimmer.

[Snarkys]

guess im wondering what they do better in . one almost has to be better than the other.

[CritterZ]

Great question!!

Anyone have any other insights to this? Experimented? Links to INFO? Deep thoughts? Side to side comparisons?

[LauraBay]

I guess it would help to know exactly whre they are collected from in the wild. Are they found way out on the reef where the water is nutrient poor or are they found in shallower areas where silt & crud gathers creating an area of higher nutrients. I'm guessing there are some found in both areas so their "preferences" may vary quite a bit. I'd especially like to know where the brighter colored zoas are found.

[Snarkys]

I'm not sure that wild conditions are actually the the most ideal possible. I mean they very well might be but take plants for example . with hydroponics and MH or HPS lights you can create an environment that is quite a bit better then the plants natural surroundings and will grow substantially faster.

who is to say that we can't not create a nutrient rich environment that they thrive on and do even better than they would in the wild ?

[ahenson]

I notice one thing, If my zoanthids like the skimmer off, so does aptasia and valonia. I think the skimmer is a definite plus.

[Snarkys]

that's a very good point

[Bullredchaser]

I thing your better off keeping the skimmer on and increasing light and feedings.That will set them off without having algae problems.

[Dewey115]

While everyone is different I know I would much rather have my tank setup in a way that is best for what I have in there, I would never rationalize the use or not use of a skimmer on aptasia. Get rid of it first (I know i know, much easier said than done... :-/ ) then you can do what makes the zoos happier I cant offer much insight into this yet, I am still very early in experiments (if you want to call them that) to see which seems to work best. As of this moment I have 2 near identicle set ups, one with a skimmer, other without and I want to measure growth and health in a few months of a few of my frags and see if there is a noticable difference. I am sure though that just as with lighting there will turn out to not be one answer for all zoos, I notice some of mine like lower light while others have extremely little growth under anything less than VHO lighting (haven;t done PC lighting yet, next set of tests...). Also zoos dont feed directly from the water column they will absorb nutrients, but dont actually "grab" food and eat. Some may be able to (like Palythoa) , but that is not how they feed, mainly lighting supplimented with dissolved nutrients. Just my 2 cents on the subject.

Rick

[Snarkys]

Originally posted by Dewey115
Also zoos dont feed directly from the water column they will absorb nutrients, but dont actually "grab" food and eat. Some may be able to, but in general that is not how they feed, mainly lighting supplimented with dissolved nutrients. Just my 2 cents on the subject.

so foods like cyclop eeze and phyto are of no use untill they break down and enter the water as dissolved nutrients ? meaning live phyto is a waste of time because you need it to die anyways ?

[Dewey115]

I still feed phyto and a few other things to my tanks, and I think I see a difference, not sure of the specifics of how broken down things need to be to be absorbed by zoanthus. I dont feel I am really qualified to answer if adding foods helps them in any way. I personally still "feed" mine even though they dont eat the food directly. I also feel that it will help make sure everything else in my tanks are well fed. If anyone has specific information about this please let us know. I am still trying to learn all I can about zoos and am not even close to there yet :-(

Rick

[spamin76]

Originally posted by reefkeeper59
If they do well in clean water, why have dirty. Especially if you already own the skimmer.

Ditto

[raskal311]

my friend has a very dirty tank and his zoos seem to love it. I'm building a 30gal cube zoo tank and plan on running it skimmerless with very little fish. But like the man said if your zoos are doing well and you already have a skimmer then I would just leave it alone.

[Frijoleros]

I have a 20g full with zoos and it's been running for at least 5or6 months now. all the zoos that are in there came out of my sps tank with real clean water. they grew super slow in there.
in the 5 threw 6 months that they have been in my 20g they have grown realy well. the lights i run are 3 55 pc's and to top it off i have only changed my water 2 times i run carbon and a skimmer thoe if a prizm skimmer counts as a skimmer hahah

[john76]

This is my barebottom 37gallon zoo tank. I just set it up last week. It is an upgrade from my 20long frag tank with a crushed coral substrate. I left out the substrate when I transferred all the contents over and just left an eggcrate bottom. The skimmer is an ES5-2 and the return is a Mag-7. I'm also running phosban and carbon.

So far all the zoos are fine and any remnants of hair algae have died back. There hasn't been diatoms on the glass yet.

I'm planning on running this like a nutrient free SPS tank. We'll see how it goes.

[rplank]

I stopped using my skimmer on my 7 month old tank about 3 weeks ago, and my zoas are spreading much faster now (1-3 new polyps/week vs 1-2/month with skimmer) No more skimmer for me!

[SuperFishy]

i only run a bakpak2 on my 60 with 4 fish.. i consider my tank dirty
:P

[RicksReefs]

i can tell you that atlantic zoos love the crappiest water
they can find. marinas full of oil and fuel, discharge points
for runoff, etc. very few are seen on the reef proper.

[Fishman1113]

I use a CPR backpack on two of my zoo frag tanks. After a few months of slow growth I pulled the tube that fed the air to the venturi. They are all growing much faster now. I am even thinking of just using a hang on power filter on my next tank to just see how well that works.

[Brandino007]

Well my tank turned green as if it was a bottle of DTs and the frag of orange zoos I just had bought doubled in about 3 weeks from 5 to 10 zoos in 3 weeks.
I was so surprized when I pulled them out of the tank.

[Csxno1]

If i can chime in here i will answer at least the question of WHERE zoos come from. If you ever go to fiji or the solomon islands you would see hundreads of thousands of them in turbid lagoonal flats. They come from VERY dirty waters and is part of the reason when we recieve ours we have so much work to do in cleaning them up and making them ready for sale. They live next to goniporas and elegance corals. Very bright sunlight (that's why they thrive under MH lights) and very high dissolved organics. I would NOT say that is the best for them in a closed system though. Because then run into Algae problems and other issues. In my opinon a clean and WELL fed system does better than just leaving it to a dirty tank. We keep ours for sale under 220 watts of Actinic and 2- 175 MH 20k's. This system is HEAVILY skimmed and has a calcium reactor on it. Our zoos seem to thrive after they acclimate for a week or two. Just my 2 cents worth.