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#26
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Now will sit tight and start to study the method. Thank you! |
#27
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Despite what is commonly seen on the boards there are many of us naturalists out there. Good Luck. |
#28
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One thing about my sump is the LR rubble, I have tons of it and am making room for more. The other thing that I have found to be an excellent "natural" filter is bleached dead coral, there is about forty pounds in the first section as you can see under the LR rubble. IMO it is the stage before "LR" and the grass roots of "reef builders" and has served me well for many years- you might want to consider some. |
#29
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T-Man--what's the advantages of mangroves in mud or a rock and rubble refugium...........or in my case is there an advantage of having both--the external refugium and a section in the sump for mangroves and mud.
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"evrr bean to sea Billy--evrr smelled a fish?" "Aye capn..experience is the best teacher" |
#30
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whats your lighting cycle for your chaeto?
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#31
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24/7 with a 25 watt energy saver bulb from Home Depot.
A month ago I had the bulb on for 16 hrs at night in reverse of the halides over the main tank---so as to minimize the nocturnal shift in pH. But since I have had it on 24/7 its tripled its mass in one month
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"evrr bean to sea Billy--evrr smelled a fish?" "Aye capn..experience is the best teacher" |
#32
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pledosophy:
I'm just starting to collect the information, if you remember any links - post here, please, it will be helpful for many people, who will read this thread over and over later. I was frustrated an year ago, when after reading and trying, appeared, that the natural filtration and skimmerless tanks are possible only for sparsely fed tanks... |
#33
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dendro982--that's kind of an oxymoron----if you have a natural filtration system and are adding your own inverts---then you should only have to feeding sparcly
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"evrr bean to sea Billy--evrr smelled a fish?" "Aye capn..experience is the best teacher" |
#34
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:Sigh:
I wish, but have to ocean, only the tanks, too small for the tasks: - one, 90g for keeping a large and messy fish, which eats a lot and wastes a lot, - two, Christmas tree rocks in 10g, and they require a lot of feeding, - tree, 6g nano, filled to brims by non-photosynthetic corals: chilis and gorgonians. The feeding cannot be reduced, only cleaning and filtration could be improved. Tried to use refugiums for all of them, each refugium ended with red cyano, acoel worms and some with dinoflagellates (bubbles in the red cyano), even with a plenty of flow, 25x and more turnover. It was not good for the tanks, had to disconnect refugiums. The self-sufficient 5g hex, I was talking about, was set as a trial do establish the live sand from the bagged live sand, using the virtue of patience. Ended up almost abandoning it, and dumping there the corals, that had no other place to go. Here is my miserable practically self sufficient tank (relatively speaking: very rarely changed 1/10 of water, regularly added alkalinity supplement and top-off water, may be once a week or in two-tree weeks - drop of food for mysids, power filter and later pump - for water movement only), half of year old: Started this way: Then become: Later: The clam is here temporarily, may be for a month, until the problems in the nest tank ended. Now, with the main mass of chaeto and ochtodes removed: But I would like to learn, how to manage refugium-like tanks, without red cyano and such, for the sake of all other tanks. Any advice is greatly appreciated. One pitfall - the sumps/refugiums could be only with the same water level, not below the tank. |
#35
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that tanks looks good--if you are after the variety of stuff you have in there---and that is what this thread is about
perhaps you fuges didn't work out because they were not big enough? the 30 gal tub was 20 dollars---light, substrate, cheato another-50 dollars. I am actually thinking about running two refugiums---the way mine is now is that the flow rate is reduced to the point to encourage the grow of inverts and protect them, introducing them to the main tank slowly. Cheato does such a fine job consuming nitrates and phosphates (if you harvest it ) that I was thinking of turning my sump into another refugium where the increased flow would assist the filtration of my system. this is why I became interested in T-man's system don't give up---I see this as the future and true filtration way to go. As for controling the cyano and algae growth run two phosban reactors one with carbon and the other with phosban--they do wonders and a reactor is about 35 dollars. Here's a pic:
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"evrr bean to sea Billy--evrr smelled a fish?" "Aye capn..experience is the best teacher" |
#36
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I'm curious about the benefits of a rubble refugium also?
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#37
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"evrr bean to sea Billy--evrr smelled a fish?" "Aye capn..experience is the best teacher" |
#38
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Don What have you got to lose? |
#39
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I know exactly where your coming from. I am almost overskimming my 120 with a modified octopus skimmer. I need to start dosing low ammounts of mag and iodine as well as bump up water changes. I also have a couple of mangroves and have been fairly happy with them though there growth rate sucks.
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Brad |
#40
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Now, the rubble works virtually the same way as the larger rock in the display with the advantage of more surface area. Nitrates have never been an issue with the mangroves and yes, I totally agree that "You need the low oxygen area that is deeper into the rock". That is why I use the mangroves and mud. One thing that I have not explained is my theory of success with LPS and clams. While I was in the Marine Corps twenty years ago, I spent two years in the Pacific basically around the Marianis island chain and the other side of the equator (south Pacific) in the coral sea to include the great barrier reef. I spent every precious moment of my "liberty" in the water and grew quite interested in the "lagoonal" species specifically LPS and giant clams- I was hooked! I knew then that the only way to have success with keeping anything for extended periods of time,I would have to emulate the natural "biotope" of the lagoon. This is what I've come up with, a slightly lowered PH and salinity due to the buffering by the surrounding sand bed and the mangroves, well......they keep the nitrates at bay. I can only say from my expirience, anecdotal as it is, it works for me. TinMan |
#41
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Interesting, That sounds almost like the "for a wet/dry" thought. One could run a wet/dry for the fast removal of Am ,nitrites. Then the mangroves for the nitrates.
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Don What have you got to lose? |
#42
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That's where the catch22 comes in and why I am thinking of the second refugium with slower flow to protect and enduce the growth of copopods for the tank.
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"evrr bean to sea Billy--evrr smelled a fish?" "Aye capn..experience is the best teacher" |
#43
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My delima is still regarding flow If I use my external refug for copopods etc then the flow has to be reduced If I use a second refug--like the mangos and mineral mud--then can I increase the flow through there to get the denitrifying affects? In the case of my flow--its coming into the sump pretty intense even though 10 percent is diverted off to the fug....that still leaves about 2000gph going through the sump.
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"evrr bean to sea Billy--evrr smelled a fish?" "Aye capn..experience is the best teacher" |
#44
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I have also deepened the sand bed in the main tank so as to support some of the life I am creating in the sump. I relied on the life rock taking the hit and it seems to have been ok--no spikes before: after 35 lbs of argonite
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"evrr bean to sea Billy--evrr smelled a fish?" "Aye capn..experience is the best teacher" |
#45
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Nice looking tank
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#46
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"evrr bean to sea Billy--evrr smelled a fish?" "Aye capn..experience is the best teacher" |
#47
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I have managed to increase the sand bed from 1/2 inch to four inches in the main tank.
Do you think it would be wise to create another refug--with mineral mud and mangos etc to act as the primary filtration from the main tank-- that way I could keep the flow rate to the second refugium at a minimun like right now to produce the variety of inverts that I want. My system is pictured up a couple of posts. or should I reverse the functions?
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"evrr bean to sea Billy--evrr smelled a fish?" "Aye capn..experience is the best teacher" |
#48
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hey Capn
what have you done since w/ your filtration??? have you added the mud/mangroves ? your tank looks great!... and after seeing your fuge (once or twice ) it was nice to finally get to see your display! regards |
#49
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speaking of au natural
does anyone know about setting up a system el natural w/ multiple tanks attached and no skimmer or pumps - heard this mentioned in one of calfos books - may have been him setting it up or had it already had it set up - anyone know how would this/could this be done ? regards |
#50
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I used to meditate on an archimedes screw (NO that's not a new mixed drink ) to fill a surge bucket in a way to not run everything through an impeller, then cascade the multiple tanks, so each overflows the next
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Only Dead fish swim with the current. |
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