Refugiums

[LeslieS]

Danny - that was a nice sized fuge. Also, I love that you only had 3 fish. Ronen told me not to get anymore fish back when I only had 3 little ones. I should have listened. I had no nitrates, no phosphates, clear water...The problem is that now I am attached to the fish and can't get rid of them.

 

[smoknreefrs]

I will start with a simple statement. A refugium is not a substitute for good husbandry.

exactly. good husbandry is what makes a tank sink or swim....whether its with a fuge or not.

 

[loismustdie]

As discussed on other threads in regards to fuges, topics brought up were size and bioload. A couple of posts showed how size and bioload play into these and what the overall purpose you plan to use the fuge for.

 

[dgthrasher]

I agree good husbandry does make a tank work or not. For me although the pictures of my tank before I sold it does show some bad husbandry. Mostly because I haven't really had the time for the last year, and have been planning on trying to sell what I could (should have sold it last year) At the time of sale, there was mabye 5 visable hermits, and only one snail. The last water change was done probably 6-8months ago.

However my tank had 0 nitrates. For me nitrates were always a problem. And the refugium solved this problem permentently.
All my corals grew fine. (I even had a plate coral and a hard green coal)

Wheither no not you do a fuge is of course up to you, but I also found more cool things to look at like pods, or baby turbos a while back, that normally would have just been fishfood.

I am thinking of trying to breed come clowfish once I find my new place, and am hoping that the fuge, offers me the same nitrate reduction (and hopefully water change reduction) as I beleive it did in my reef.

 

[danny]

refugiums

Hi! Leslie:

I always like to have large filters, It can't hurt. That is why a fuge will work if you keep your bioload small & have live food in the tank. what the fish don't eat, live for another day. I also had about 25 large mangrove plants in my fuge & when a leaf turned brown I plucked it & tossed. If you read the discussion on mangroves in this section, they do work.

still recuperating from drinking.

danny

 

[ellebelle]

I'm going to bump this thread (been a while).

I argued a bit for fuges earlier, but I think I've changed my mind (that's right Chris, I know you're lurking, YOU WIN). In the month or so since I switched my tank over, I have seen my nutrients go down. I have almost zero algae in my new tank ... not even an algae bloom despite adding more rock, a new sand bed, and moving the whole shebang. I'm using the same equipment with greater water volume and it still looks better. I was going to set up my fuge again, but I think I've decided against it now.

Still interested in other people's experiences with fuges though.

 

[Aqua Pro Builder]

Can you also provide a time line as to when you did what so that we can understand better the relations between your actions and the maturity of the tank?

 

[gnatp2]

I went from a fuge in my sump with DSB, live rocks and chaeto. Phosphate problems due to detritus getting trapped everywhere. I then went without it and had much lower levels of po4, yet my nitrate slowly climbed up and up.
I now just use a small ball of chaeto in my sump with PLENTY of flow on it so detritus doesn't get stuck in it. Nitrates have come down and po4 hasn't gone up.

Nate

 

[bigbris1]

After my recent outbreak of hair & all other types of alga, I decided to do the same; reduce the amount of cheato in the fuge (loose softball size), & increase water flow. I also went back to the DIY 100 micron filter sock due to the large amounts of detritus accumulating in the cheato.

Hopefully, I will see the algae die back. And to think, my tank was virtually algae free when I was running sumpless. I have to agree that unless your vegetable filter is of a considerable size in comparison to your DT, the result will most likely be detrimental vs beneficial.

 

[Killerdrgn]

Well as someone that started the tank somewhere else and can bring in fresh eye's to this. In the Boston Reefers club just about everyone there has a refugium. And the algae i am currently growing is julian's red sea vegetables, or some form of it. So it's free food while sucking up nitrates.

 

[Tim]

Nate I just tested my fuge w/ hanna and got a reading of 1.24 then tested the water in the main display and got .34 .I am going to do some further testing just to make sure the first reading was corect. Fuge is dsb w/ tons of sawblade macro, I will keep updated with new results.....

 

[Aqua Pro Builder]

Nate I just tested my fuge w/ hanna and got a reading of 1.24 then tested the water in the main display and got .34 .I am going to do some further testing just to make sure the first reading was corect. Fuge is dsb w/ tons of sawblade macro, I will keep updated with new results.....

That's an incredible difference. I think you should re check both numbers not just one. How can the system dissipate the PO4 from 1.24 to .34 in matters of couple feet of waters(not special reactors, sand bed, rocks, solution ....)?

 

[ellebelle]

Wing, I took out the fuge when I swtiched from a 1yr old 29g tank to my 40br. I've only had the BR up for 1.5 months now, so I think it's too soon to make any sort of definite conclusion. But anecdotally, I've seen evidence of fewer nutrients despite a greater water burden on my equipment.

 

[inkblue]

i like my fuge, unfortunately I believe mine is pLaced wrong since it comes beFore my skimmer. its the only space i have so it had to be that way.

to be honest, i dont know what benefiTs it has to my tank, but i'm sure the extra water voLume isnt hurting my tank any

 

[Killerdrgn]

if you place it before your skimmer it may become a good trap for detrius.

 

[inkblue]

probabLy is, but cant heLp it... it's the onLy physical space I got. I have a fiLter sock on the drain so that kinda heLps cut down on crap

 

[gnatp2]

Nate I just tested my fuge w/ hanna and got a reading of 1.24 then tested the water in the main display and got .34 .I am going to do some further testing just to make sure the first reading was corect. Fuge is dsb w/ tons of sawblade macro, I will keep updated with new results.....

Wow. that's crazy. I should have tested my rDSB/fuge before i took it offline against my main display. I just tested my main display this morning and got .03. I'll test my sump with the small chaeto ball tonight and see if there is a difference.

EDIT: Sump tested .04.

Nate

 

[Tim]

Just tested again and the fuge reading was .27 and the main display is .30.....

 

[bigbris1]

if you place it before your skimmer it may become a good trap for detrius.

AHA!

My fuge comes before my skimmer. Chaeto was trapping mucho detritus because it was floating. Algae problems-a-plenty.

Trimmed the chaeto ball down to the size of a softball & anchored it to the bottom on some LR. No more detritus trap, plus skimmer is now pulling out a half cup of dark skimmate every couple of days vs previously pulling that out in a week.

Never thought to test display & fuge seperately, thanks guys!

 

[bigbris1]

I think I got to the bottom of my algae problem. I added a piece of rock I took out of my tank over a year ago back in. As rubble to the fuge & a couple of larger pieces to the main display. This rock was in my tank when I was using tap water so I think it was leaching PO4 & other things into the tank.

I can tell because those particular pieces were covered in algae. I have removed them & will see what happens.