reef tank 2.0
Member
I haven't posted about this in a long time. But a little history.
3 years ago when I started my reef tank up, I used dry sand, and dry rock during set up. For the past 2 years, I have always fought with high nitrates. High as in 50-75, with an occasional 100 (no decimal point). All my inverts, fish, and coral all seemed to be happy. But the fight to lower those nitrates continued regardless. I tried chaeto, less feeding, and more water changes. For the past 2 years, and I'd say 10 months, I was religiously doing water changes every two weeks. Nitrates would never drop. Or if they did, it was very minimal. During these high nitrate days, I was feeding LRS frozen foods. I was led to believe the LRS was causing the high nitrates. So I switched frozen foods, and continued to do my bi-weekly water changes. The nitrates dropped and they are now in check. That was very exciting to see. Blew my mind how quickly they dropped.
I have a 170g system, that includes the sump. Every other week I was doing 50 gallon water changes. As you can imagine, that was a lot of salt. Although I was buying the boxes or Reef Crystals every two months, it really felt like it was more than that. It was exhausting. So in November, I jumped in on a local group buy and bought 5 boxes of RC, cause i knew I'd need it. Shortly after buying it, I sat back and thought, what if I were to hold off on my water changes. That would save me money on salt, as well as maintenance.
My last water change I did was on November 11th. Once I did that water change, I have been testing my water weekly to see how the system would react as time went on. I am now at the 5 week mark, today.
My parameters are all in line as they were after the first week. My alkalinity may have dropped from 400, down to 380/390, but still in the ballpark.
On another thought, Other than the cost and labor of constantly doing water changes every two weeks, is there anything beneficial to leaving the tank go this long without a water change? My parameters are all the same, everything seems happy, and the corals are growing. I thought of going another week, but the alkalinity did drop a few. I realize things can go bad in a hurry, that's the only thing that makes me nervous about holding off longer. I certainly like not doing bi-weekly changes
should I continue to hold off on water changes for another week or more? How quick can things go from good to bad while not doing water changes? I know many do one water change a month to every few months. But this is definitely new territory for me.
3 years ago when I started my reef tank up, I used dry sand, and dry rock during set up. For the past 2 years, I have always fought with high nitrates. High as in 50-75, with an occasional 100 (no decimal point). All my inverts, fish, and coral all seemed to be happy. But the fight to lower those nitrates continued regardless. I tried chaeto, less feeding, and more water changes. For the past 2 years, and I'd say 10 months, I was religiously doing water changes every two weeks. Nitrates would never drop. Or if they did, it was very minimal. During these high nitrate days, I was feeding LRS frozen foods. I was led to believe the LRS was causing the high nitrates. So I switched frozen foods, and continued to do my bi-weekly water changes. The nitrates dropped and they are now in check. That was very exciting to see. Blew my mind how quickly they dropped.
I have a 170g system, that includes the sump. Every other week I was doing 50 gallon water changes. As you can imagine, that was a lot of salt. Although I was buying the boxes or Reef Crystals every two months, it really felt like it was more than that. It was exhausting. So in November, I jumped in on a local group buy and bought 5 boxes of RC, cause i knew I'd need it. Shortly after buying it, I sat back and thought, what if I were to hold off on my water changes. That would save me money on salt, as well as maintenance.
My last water change I did was on November 11th. Once I did that water change, I have been testing my water weekly to see how the system would react as time went on. I am now at the 5 week mark, today.
My parameters are all in line as they were after the first week. My alkalinity may have dropped from 400, down to 380/390, but still in the ballpark.
On another thought, Other than the cost and labor of constantly doing water changes every two weeks, is there anything beneficial to leaving the tank go this long without a water change? My parameters are all the same, everything seems happy, and the corals are growing. I thought of going another week, but the alkalinity did drop a few. I realize things can go bad in a hurry, that's the only thing that makes me nervous about holding off longer. I certainly like not doing bi-weekly changes
should I continue to hold off on water changes for another week or more? How quick can things go from good to bad while not doing water changes? I know many do one water change a month to every few months. But this is definitely new territory for me.
