I'm a bad reefer are one you too ?

[festus]

It started when my latest kid was born and the house descended into pandemonium. I fell behind on my water changes. Aw heck one more week won't make any difference. Pretty soon it turned into quite a long time. Then morbid curiosity got the better of me. Just how long can this water go before the tank starts showing any ill effects ?

I run a 125 gallon with a few chromis, yellow tang, damsels and clown. I have a bunch of mushrooms, zoos, and an en ever increasing amount of pulsing xenia. I run sumpless with no carbon just a hang on skimmer on the back. My circulation is 2 maxijet 1200 power heads.

This was never the plan. In fact I've got a lovely sump and some mag7s and a half built closet behind the tank that was going to be setup last fall when the kid arrived.

The tank has looked great for a grand total of 7 months and now there is a couple small patches of cyano starting to show up. So this weekend its time to start up the water changes again. And I'll start setting up the sump too I guess.

While I'm not advocating keeping your reef this way I'm sure I'm not the first to fall off the wagon for a while.

Whats the record for the longest successful go at not changing water to date on this forum ?

 

[sloshes]

I don't know but that's got to be a top ten at least.

 

[marinelife]

I had a 120 that never had a water change the 5 years it was running, it ran just fine

 

[piranhaking]

i have a feeling there is a bashing comming soon

 

[marinelife]

why

 

[festus]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6933949#post6933949 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by marinelife
I had a 120 that never had a water change the 5 years it was running, it ran just fine

What was the reason it stopped running ?

 

[marinelife]

I wanted a 300 tub for my fish that were getting to large and my wife wanted the space for her to use because it was in teh bedroom. So I sold it and got a 300 tub and put everything that was in the 120 in the 300, She now wishes we still had it so she could have seahorses

 

[Sports Girl]

I haven't done one in about 6 months on my 60 gallon reef.

 

[Mr.Furious]

For the people with the most recent replies was this with softies or sps? Or was it FOWLR?

 

[fish are life]

ya i had a couple stretches where i didnt do a WC for a good 3 months, and my fresh water tanks went about 6 months

 

[Amphiprion]

I know someone who hadn't done water changes in 7 years. Had a tank crash and still didn't change the water.

 

[Sports Girl]

Mr. Furious-

My tank is mostly softies, and a couple LPS. I know I couldn't get away with it w/SPS tank. I also know I shouldn't be getting away with it now, but I add top-off water weekly and test weekly and ammonia, nitrites are @ 0; nitrates slightly detectable; pH @ 8.2, salinity 1.025. And come to think of it, I don't think it has been whole 6 months, but definitely 3 at least.

 

[marinelife]

softies with a few montipora corals

 

[jjmg]

People can also live with horrible air, water and nutrition for years before becoming ill. So why be so proud of going six or seven months before making you pets sick?

 

[Sports Girl]

Hey man, I never said I was "so proud", just answering the question in the thread, so you don't have to put words in my mouth. I am, however, proud of the fact that all my corals have grown, if not doubled in size since introduced into my tank. I'm not condoning not doing water changes; just giving my experience.

 

[PiscesLou]

Festus, I had almost the same experience except for the kids, had a 75 gal w/o a sump just a skimmer and a canister filter . I to got curious on how long I could go w/o water changes...I went about 5 months, cyano everywhere, last month, broke down the tank, added a sump and a phos reactor and doin water changes every two weeks. I guess the reason why for me was I just got tired of always having to tinker with the tank on daily basis, you know, adding this and checking that, as of last month my #1 goal is to setup my tank to where I don't have to check stuff as much.

 

[Volitan_Lion_13]

i have a friend who has had a 55 FO for years and doesn't so water changes..simply doesn't do them

 

[whiteshark]

Yeah, I tried this once, went about a 6 months w/o doing a water change. It was because I had just started college and was pressed for time. Nitrates got high, but I only had a minor hair algae problem that the snails took care of. When I got over the initial semester in college, i bought an RO and did a 10% water change every day for 10-13 days. I got the nitrates down to nearly undetectable levels. Now I do a 20% water change every week. At the time of the waterchangeless 6 months the tank was FOWLR.

 

[deansreef]

i do mine every month, I just feel to guilty waiting any longer...

Dean

 

[chucksta1]

It would seem to me that "how long" would be better put as "how much use". A car needs it's oil changed after "X" ammount of miles, or after so many months, even if the miles are lower than specified in the manual. Conversly, if you put on a lot of miles, you need to change it more often.

If you have a lightly stocked tank with tons of live rock, heavy skimming, etc, how long is it going to be before trace elements are used up? The time and ammount of water change required can't be the same as in a heavily stocked tank.