How much filtration on a growout tank?

[NicoleC]

In another month, I will be out of town for 4-5 days. I have a dog/cat/fish sitter trained to do top-off, but daily small water changes are not going to happen.

This will be no problem in the goby tank -- I don't even really need any filtration in there but there's a sponge filter for good measure.

In the clown tank, however, I have a small HOB filter and a sponge filter going, and it's not enough to get by without small daily water changes. With only 25 small baby clowns in there, I would think it would be enough for a few days, but apparently not. I use Clor-Am-X for control combined with the water changes. No doubt my sitter will overfeed (he always does) plus that clowns will grow a lot in a month, and so I need to be ready to handle even more waste.

So... I am thinking ahead so I can get whatever extra filtration ready and populated with bacteria.

I was thinking about discontinuing Clor-Am-X now, so that it encourages more bacteria to grow. Also, I was looking for a design for a large in-tank filter that is air-driven and I could fill with carbon, bio-balls and possibly filter floss or an additional sponge. Or I could just build a mega sponge filter and leave fresh carbon in the HOB filter.

Thoughts?

 

[Kathy55g]

Biowheel HOB like Eclipse and Penguin would work, but are a bit pricey. Maybe you could score a second hand one. Pm me your address, and I'll let you borrow mine until after your trip.

You could use an automatic feeder to control the amount of food, or a 7 day pill separator to ration the food so your sitter does not overdo it.

 

[David M]

I know it's a bit of a drive but if you wanted to you could leave them here while your'e gone. Maybe not practicle but I'm offering anyway

I can't see why 25 small baby clowns can't be kept in a filtered 10 gallon tank without issue, what is the problem? Ammonia? Can you rig an overflow to another (much larger) tank & fill it with bio-media? What about an ugf?

As for the overfeeding can you pre-measure individual servings and package them seperately? If dry food you could maybe use those tiny ziplock bags, if frozen use a scrap of eggcrate to make little cubes.

 

[JHardman]

Add several sponge filters and you should be fine.

 

[Kathy55g]

You would not be going to IMAC, would you? I am going, and would love to meet up with you.

 

[NicoleC]

Thanks for the offer, David! Probably not practical, but if I don't get the goby trained to come to a feeding station and he still needs to be hand fed, I may take you up on the offer. It's not hard or time consuming, but non-fishy folks would just not have the patience and would probably blast the food in his face.

No bigger system to plumb it into except the main reef tank. Plumbing is not only not practical, but the reef has been up for a long time and has gobs of microfauna and I am leery of exposing the babies to a bunch of new -- potentially harmful -- stuff all at once while they are still little tykes.

Maybe the Clor-Am-X use has crippled my biofilter? Those babies eat a lot but it's hard to understand why I would still see ammonia at this point, considering the overall mass of fish to a 15g tank with that much filtration. Or perhaps my ammo-alert badge is just over reacting, and me with it.

I don't want to add a larger HOB filter, only because of the amount of flow it creates, which they can't handle yet. A month from now may be a different story! It's hard to believe they are only 2 months old.

I will definately pre-package the food, but my pet sitter (a neighbor; we trade off) tends to feel sorry for my poor, starving animals and chooses to feed them more than I put out. He's a little leery of the fish, but last time he used a whole 1 liter bottle of Amquel in 5 days in a rotifer culture. The dog also gained 5 pounds. :rolleye1:

The auto feeder could work for the clowns, but not the goby. I am so tempted with him to get some sterile rock rubble and seed with with copepods from a clean culture and set up a mini in-tank refugium. Hmmm. The continuous food might do him good but I want him to be a good little eater of prepared foods.

I may do the clowns on an auto-filter to reduce his workload and the chances of an "oops." But then I'd have to have him check to be sure the feeder was working. (Yeah, I'm paranoid.) Food for thought.

I think I will built a pipe filter (thanks to Edgar for the design) for the clowns. It looks easy and if I jumbo-size it, it should take me all the way through their growout period, maybe relieving some of the workload. Much easier than the vague design of a DIY corner filter I had in my head.

Sorry... just babbling now.

I'm not going to IMAC -- it's a family thing. My grandparents are renewing their vows in honor of their 60th wedding anniversary. 60 years... wow, that's a long time!

 

[Kathy55g]

I'm interested in that pipe filter. Can you share the design?

 

[NicoleC]

I'll do pics and stuff when I make it.

 

[Kathy55g]

Mine don't seem to have any trouble handling flow at 2 months, but I have 20 gallon tanks, so they can escape if they want to. They do pretty well at 3 weeks, too.

 

[spk]

I too would love to see the design of the pipe filter.

Sounds as if you are going great guns with the clowns.

Good luck

Steve