Maturity Issues

[jgreen1025]

One thing I think we might have to take into consideration is the fact that we might have to go "DSB-less" GASP! to be able to maintain a really nutrient poor system for those precious Acros and Montis and other "clean" water corals OR on the flip side possibly setup a "mangrove" type system with the DSB to keep our soft corals such as the 'shrooms and various other "dirty water" corallimorphs that require higher nutrient levels to survive. Reason I say all of that is because of the experiences I have seen other hobbyists go through in trying to keep a "mixed" system with both "dirty" water and "clean" water corals and the horrific results that are obtained i.e. shrooms and rics and other softies dying when a new, more powerful skimmer is introduced...

I think I've misunderstood something. I had the impression after reading Eric's comments on skimmerless tanks that corals like Acropora and Montipora would do better in water that isn't scrubbed perfectly clean. In fact, I thought he'd called those types "pioneer" or secondary species, and that it would be better to start a new tank with them than things like mushrooms or zooanthids. I didn't realize there was a "clean/dirty water" difference. Can someone clarify this for me?

John

 

[obarrera]

All I wanna know is what should I start with.
Corals,fish,inverts?
I have 152 watts(T5 HO) of light on a 40g breeder,I have nothing in there right now.

I have had success with my 10g tank,but I wanna do better with my 40g.

 

[gruiz1122]

Jgreen, go ahead and set up a tank with a DSB, and no skimmer. Let it cycle and introduce your Acros. Wait a few years and stir up the sand bed "by mistake" i.e. a fallen powerhead or something along those lines. Stand back and watch how fast those acros RTN. There is just too much that can go wrong with a DSB. I understand that there are people that haven't had any problems with their DSB's but I just think that there is too much that can go wrong to justify the use of a DSB......

There is another thread in the Advanced topics forum (I think) that shows a diver going down to the sand in a coral reef and digging a hole. Guess what he found....NOTHING! No cyano no algae, no little nitrogen bubbles, NOTHING. Pure white sand. What I'm trying to say with this is that on the typical "reef", you wont find any nitrification, denitrification, or any other process going on within the sand. It all happens in those little interstisces in the rock and the dead coral skeletons that form the reefs. NOT in the sand that surrounds the reef. That raises the question, where does the detritus, and dead organisms and other "polluting" matter go? It goes into another organism, falls to the bottom of the benthos and gets eaten there, or it gets blown off of the reef and into the lagoonal and mangrove areas where it is processed by something else like your mushrooms and other corallimorphs which like "dirty" water. And where is the "clean" water? Back on the reef where the Acros and Montis grow.......

 

[jgreen1025]

Jgreen, go ahead and set up a tank with a DSB, and no skimmer. Let it cycle and introduce your Acros. Wait a few years and stir up the sand bed "by mistake" i.e. a fallen powerhead or something along those lines. Stand back and watch how fast those acros RTN...<snip> That raises the question, where does the detritus, and dead organisms and other "polluting" matter go? It goes into another organism, falls to the bottom of the benthos and gets eaten there, or it gets blown off of the reef and into the lagoonal and mangrove areas where it is processed by something else like your mushrooms and other corallimorphs which like "dirty" water. And where is the "clean" water? Back on the reef where the Acros and Montis grow.......

Thanks for the clarification but I'm not interested in debating the DSB issue - I just misunderstood your comment. I've never seen anyone growing soft corals in "dirty" water (I assume you mean relatively murky water) and they seem to grow well enough in "clean" water. So I (wrongly) assumed that by "dirty" water you meant an unskimmed tank, as opposed to a tank with heavy skimming where the water is perfectly clean.

But just as an aside, have you read Ron Shimek's articles regarding how the sandbed should be set up? You said the detritus "goes into another organism, falls to the bottom... and gets eaten there." According to Dr. Ron, a healthy sandbed should contain lots of little worms, bacteria, and other organisms that will do exactly what you said. Obviously, you still don't want to stir your sandbed (accidentally or otherwise), but since we don't have the luxury in our relatively small tanks of the large volumes of water that naturally wash over coral reefs to dillute the pollutions, it seems like a sandbed capable of processing the detritus is the next best option. (But I've probably misunderstood your comments again!).

John

 

[gruiz1122]

Problem with that theory is that all those litter critters produce poop of their own! Which in turn gets sucked into some magical wormhole that shoots it out into the galaxy never to be seen again! (pardon the sarcasm )

 

[liusteven]

great thread.. thanks Eric!

 

[EricHugo]

I can't really comment on which corals go into which tank first.

In any given habitat, various distrubances open up various susbtrates for growth and settement. Evebtually predation and competition set in, and you see the evolution of communities. I am not at all against this in tanks either. I have had corals thrive for years, and then failto thrive. It doesn't mean there is something wrong with my tank, just that the tank is changing to support somethings and not others. While it might be sad to se the loss of a speciimen, its also possibly a normal happening. When I see this happen and reall care about saving the species, I typically move it to another tank where it often recovers and thrives again.

As for the DSB discussion, I stay away from it. I have used them for over a decade and feel the benefits far outweigh the downsides. I dare anyone to say my tank doesn't rock and is nutrient poor and supoortss just about any coral (except the azooxanthellate species). Ideally, I think they should be remote. It is true that sand surrounding coral bommies where most divers take trips is quite clean, but thats because of wave action and other physical disturbance. Go towards shore. Go down the reef slope. Its a mess of enriched sediment, often foul with hydrogen sulfide within mm of the surface (and often with corals including Acropora) growing right on top if there is some hard substrate) and that's where the waste of the reef is processed, and that's what is accomplishedd by sand beds in captive systems. Anyone who claims that extremely productive and high rates or organic decomposition, remineralization, denitrification, nutrient regeneration, and biodiersity doesn't exist in areas 50-1000x the area of the reef really needs to learn more about reef ecosystems.

 

[sihaya]

Hi... when you say that disturbing the sand bed is usually not a good thing, does that mean sand shifter stars are not favorable?

I have four sand shifter stars in a 65g. I like them a lot. They keep the algae off the top of the sand and make every thing on the bottom look so "clean" for lack of a better word. (It also cracks me up with they try to climb up the side of the tank) I hope they're not messing things up. I was told they were actually good for the tank because they pushed stuff down into the sand. Is that just BS?

I do have a small 4g refugium with an undisturbed sand bed... but it's not much really.

(My tank is 3 months old... I had the cyano blum about 2 weeks ago, now I guess I'm at what you'd call the "turf stage.")

I was also wondering... it seems like you wouldn't recommend obsessive cleaning of algae off tank walls and such? I typically clean the glass twice a week. Should I not be doing that?

 

[EricHugo]

Cleaning the glass is great - provides "phytoplankton" of sorts.

The tank is very young, and the stars are probably going to starve eventually - even one in a 65 would have a rather tough time of it. THey don't push things down in the sand...they consume it. It takes a lot of food to sustain them - one in a mature 65 with lots of detrital material and associated flora and fauna and a lot of exposed sand might do it...four in a 3 month old 65....yikes.

Personally, I don't clean the glass that often...not until the coralline is too thick so see through, anyway! You sound like your algal successions are going very normally and right in order. Time to make sure you have enough herbivores, now, though so it is well grazed at this point and doesn't become overwhelming.

 

[sihaya]

Thank for the advice! Is there anyway I could feed the starfish? I wouldn't have gotten them if I knew they needed a really mature tank. I only have one fish, so I don't put a lot of food in there as it is. Would it help if I burried some dried seedweed or something in the sand?

 

[EricHugo]

You might want to ask in Ron's forum what would be a good food for them - maybe sinking shrim pellets or something?

 

[Jiddy]

Just curious on how long my tank (220) should cycle with 300lbs of base rock and 100lbs of cured LR, and 50gallons of used water and 170 gal of fresh RO water? When can i add fish?

 

[EricHugo]

You could add fish shortly after the cycle is over. If I were you, though, I'd wait 8 months or a year.

 

[Dudester]

OK, now I'm curious. Why did you say you'd wait 8-12 months before adding fish, just being facetious? Sorry if this was obvious, but I've only had one cup of coffee so far today.

 

[EricHugo]

no, not really...did you read the initial post here? I think that adding fish should come after adding herbivores, tank stability, and the addition of corals.

 

[sihaya]

Not to change the subject... but I read a few of the posts here about "old tank syndrome." I worked at this family owned LFS that has a 200g reef tank that's been around since before I was born. It never got ots... and I think that might be because every month it has a few different corals in it. People buy a few, the owner puts a few new ones in... so it's never the same tank. (except for the few semi-perminant residents... basically corals that no one wants ). THe turnover isn't that fast though because there aren't a lot of people buying coral in that area.

I know that a household reef tank could never have that... but it's a cool tank to look at and think about. THere's a fat mandarin fish in there that's like 5 years old.

 

[socalreefer73]

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bump

 

[EricHugo]

Sounds like "the intermediate disturbance hypothesis: in action. I think my tanks doesnt get OTS o=for the same reason...always changing things around, if not only to keep the fish "not bored"

 

[socalreefer73]

I'm no chemist, but my thoughts on OTS would be related to the fact that waterchages can't ever remove 100% of minerals/metals, etc, unless you change 100% of the water, which would have disastrous effects, for the most part, not to mention the impracticality in large systems. So, if there is something in your salt mix (or from any other constant input to the system) that isn't uptaken by any organism (that is then removed or harvested from your tank) and would be toxic at some level, you will eventually get to that toxicity.

I tried to keep it to two sentences.. lol

 

[jgreen1025]

I'm no chemist, but my thoughts on OTS would be related to the fact that waterchages can't ever remove 100% of minerals/metals, etc, unless you change 100% of the water, which would have disastrous effects...

Hi Matt,

I don't think that even a 100% water change (if possible) would remove all minerals/metals within a tank, because a lot will be sequestered within the sandbed. But if OTS were caused by minerals/metals accumulating within the system, simply changing some corals etc. from time to time wouldn't do anything to remove them either. So, following that logic... could it just be that new corals/frags bring in new (different) bacteria or other tiny critters that help keep the tank from stagnating? You might say it prevents too much inbreeding within the bacterial populations...? Just a thought...

John G.