refugium

[tephanis]

I just read your article on food production at

http://www.dtplankton.com/frameset1.htm

and you mentioned in there that multipurpose refugiums fail... now does that mean we should have one ref, lets say part of our sump, with macroalgae to export nitrates... and then have a seperate refugium for the breeding of pods?

or did I misread something...

[rshimek]

Hi,

I think you need to reread the article. The pertinent paragraph is:

" Many aquarists set up a refugium in their sump. They stock this with algae for nutrient export, and sometimes put a deep sand bed in it for biological filtration. In some cases they expect this multipurpose portion of their system to process excess unused food, detritus, and feces in the biological filter, grow algae for export, and produce animals to feed their main tank. In most cases, such multipurpose refugia fail miserably at all three of these goals. It is next to impossible to move sufficient detritus and excess food out the main tank to keep the refugium well fed, and the refugium deep sand bed "foot print" is often so small as to be a negligible factor in the overall biological filter. With little food and nutrients available, the refugium animals starve and their populations slowly vanish."

This is really quite clear, I think. It says a small refugium set up to do a number of different things does none of them well.

You need to set up your refugium with distinct plan to ensure that it is well fed, and has enough resources to do what you want it to do.