How long can you leave your tank?

W

Whispre

Premium Member
I've been working hard lately on my tank, adding a closed loop, a new sump, upgrading my skimmer, adding a phosban reactor, a new AquacontrollerIII, and several other things, as well as planning for the future... Once I get my algea outbreak under controll I will start stocking, but that begs the question of what to stock.

You see, at times, I need to go out of town for 7-10 days at a time. I have been trying to get my tank so it can (mechanically at least) go 10 days without human intervention. Now I'm trying to think of how to do that with livestock...

thinking of fish / corals who need minimal feeding, fish that eat algea/pods, corals who mostly use photosynthisis for feeding (hope thats the right word, having a brain fart)

so, all of that got me to wondering... how long can most reefers leave their tanks when going on a business trip or on vacation before they have problems? What do you do when you have to be gone a while?
 
i have left mine for a little over 2 weeks and had to add alot of water when i got back, but thats it fish were fine, hungry, but fine
 
Maybe I am paranoid but I never leave mine unattended for more than 24 hours. At the very least when I go on vacation I have a neighbor feed and topoff.
 
Yep, I've got another thread going entitled 'what to tell an inexperienced tank-sitter' that's also on this topic, and it's pretty scary to contemplate. I think water topoff has got to be the most critical: feeding isn't going to matter much in a well-established tank. But hyper-salinity could be bad...I'm looking for an auto-topoff, and hoping there aren't emergencies.,..
 
i leave mine for 5 days every week, as the tank is at my parents house and i come to school. My tank has been fine so far, just make sure your skimmer cup is large enough and also your auto-topoff. My topoff holds about 10g and i drilled my skimmer cup at the top and put a JG valve there that drains into a 3liter pepsi bottle that sits on top of the sump. I know its not the best thing, but if my skimmer ever acts up then it overflows back into the sump and not on the ground. That also compensates for toppff. this way the salinity will stay pretty close to the same becuase if the skimmer were to start overflowing, all 10 gallons of my topoff would get dumped into the tank, by doing this, only about 1 gallon gets dumped into the tank because of a failed skimmer. This works well in my case- also i have my parents feed the tank on mondays and wednesdays. his works well for me, but i feel that if someone would come to my house once every 3 days i could leave my tank for a month if needed.
 
I can leave my tank for up to 1 week with no human intervention. The auto top off resivor will last 8 to 9 days. And my skimmer will fill its collection cup in 7 to 8 days. So without anyone performing maintance I would only leave 7 days max.

As for food, a week without feeding is no big deal, the fish will eat a little algae off the rocks and stuff while you are away. As long as you don't have a huge fish load your corals and fish should be fine without feeding for a couple weeks. Granted there may be some exceptions to the rule, but with my very light and easy fish load I feel they could go this long (although never gone longer than a week without food).
 
thats good to know about the fish and corals... in June I'll be gone, house will be empty as the family takes a 10 day trip back east...

I'm setting up a large 2 gallon container to collect waste from my new skimmer, I have a tunze osmolated for auto top-off and have ordered a 15 gallon drum for my ro/di water storage. I think I can put a float switch in that container and connect it to my AC3 and have it send me a low water alarm if it starts to run out, then I could call someone and have them fill it up... not sure how to do that though.
 
Very easy, everything of mine is on timers and controllers. The only thing I have to do with my tanks is test the water, which I don't do! And feed! They would be fine for 10 days though!
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7006045#post7006045 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Whispre
thats good to know about the fish and corals... in June I'll be gone, house will be empty as the family takes a 10 day trip back east...

I'm setting up a large 2 gallon container to collect waste from my new skimmer, I have a tunze osmolated for auto top-off and have ordered a 15 gallon drum for my ro/di water storage. I think I can put a float switch in that container and connect it to my AC3 and have it send me a low water alarm if it starts to run out, then I could call someone and have them fill it up... not sure how to do that though.
Click to expand...

An easier solution instead of having it give you an alarm when it is low is to have a micro controller watch the level. And have the micro controller hooked to your phone and then call in and it will just beep once if everything is okay. Or 3 times if something is wrong. Or something like that. This is assuming you can do a little embeded programing, but that is what I would do.

Also it would be easy for the micro controller to determine the level with a simple float switch you could make yourself (does not need to be fancy since it is not critical for anything to live).
 
I can leave mine for up to 10 days with no intervention.

(Everything is automatic - even a 20g supply of fresh water to replace the evaporated water).

-Nathan
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7006310#post7006310 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by jent46bow
An easier solution instead of having it give you an alarm when it is low is to have a micro controller watch the level. And have the micro controller hooked to your phone and then call in and it will just beep once if everything is okay. Or 3 times if something is wrong. Or something like that. This is assuming you can do a little embeded programing, but that is what I would do.

Also it would be easy for the micro controller to determine the level with a simple float switch you could make yourself (does not need to be fancy since it is not critical for anything to live).
Click to expand...

hmm, ok well, color me strange, but that sounds MORE complicated :P I'm not even sure what a microcontroller is!
 
I've left mine for a week before with no problems. I had an autotopoff though. I wouldn't leave it that long without one.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7006413#post7006413 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Whispre
hmm, ok well, color me strange, but that sounds MORE complicated :P I'm not even sure what a microcontroller is!
Click to expand...

YGPM
 
Definately need auto top off, can get automatic feeders for flake (flake is better than no food my fishies say). I also know the owner of my LFS pretty well who does service calls, I leave their number with the tank sitter just in case something goes horribly wrong. Probably need auto shutoff on the skimmer also, haven't had to deal with that yet as I just added a skimmer after not having one for a long time. I'll be setting the AC Jr to handle heat issues should they arise, but thats also a new gadget as mine hasn't shipped yet. The friends and neighbors that feed the cat and dog have also learned a little about how the tank works which helps a lot.
 
I can leave mine for about 7days...

Feeding is done via a eheim autofeeder
Top off is handled via a tunze osmolator
RO/DI is on a pressure sensor to top off the 25 gallon res.
Dosing 2 part and coral-accel is handled via a spectrapure litermeter (3 pumps)
Lights are on timers
Ozone has a ORP sensor
Skimmer dumps to a 5 gallon bucket
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7007419#post7007419 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by LOTUS50GOD
I can leave mine for about 7days...

Feeding is done via a eheim autofeeder
Top off is handled via a tunze osmolator
RO/DI is on a pressure sensor to top off the 25 gallon res.
Dosing 2 part and coral-accel is handled via a spectrapure litermeter (3 pumps)
Lights are on timers
Ozone has a ORP sensor
Skimmer dumps to a 5 gallon bucket
Click to expand...

WOW, with all that I figured you should be able to leave for a month..... What is your limiting factor?
 
Lotus -- I need to get the extra pumps for my Litermeter. I'm using it to dose kalk at this point, but I want to automate my water changes, too. :)
 
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