My choice of macro among other things.

[jun41]

I've been planning on starting a refugium since I've got some serious algae growth in my show tank. I have been reading around here for about an hour and found that a lot of people use chaeto and graciliaria together in their refugiums as a nutrient export.

I was wondering whether I could use both these macros in one of those big rubbermaid containers which would act as my refugium. I will probably be using the rubbermaid containers since my refugium will be going in the garage behind my tank. The garage isn't very level at all so I decided not to use any glass or acrylic tank for it.

If I remember right, graciliaria needs some current so I will be hooking up one or two powerheads into the rubbermaids.

My question is, am I headed in the right direction with this? I'd like to get that refugium started soon so I need to find out basically what I'm doing.

 

[kmk2307]

Hey jun41,

I think you have a good plan. What kind of lighting do you plan to use? The powerheads might be a problem if they get algae stuck to their intakes. You might want to build an eggcrate partition cut to fit the shape of the fuge and put the pumps on one side of the partition and the algae on the other. I'm not sure that gracilaria likes a lot of water flow. I'm not sure what your garage is like but I know I would have trouble controlling the temp of the water in my garage. Will that be a problem for you?

HTH,
Kevin

 

[xfactor]

I read a study on Graciliaria and it says they grow better in calm waters.

 

[jun41]

Thanks for the responses.

Instead of going to all the trouble of plumbing and what not of the rubbermaid containers, I have decided to just purchase a sump from Andy at My Reef Creations. My own sump is unbelievably ill equipped to be able to house a refugium. I have no experience with acrylic so I decided I might as well ask Andy to do it for me. I have heard great things about his products so that is another plus for me.

I'm not sure what kind of lighting I'm going to get but it probably won't be too much of a "bump" down the road. I can head over to HD and get an LOA fixture. I'm not sure, I still need to read up some more.

One more thing, does anyone know if a 36"x15"x18" sump can fit into the stand on a standard 75 gallon stand? And I don't mean from the back. The tank is already filled with water so there is no way that I'm going to empty it out and put the sump in from the back. If it doesn't fit, I can just ask Andy to lessen te length of the sump that he'll build for me.

I've got to get all the info ready for my parents before they get anything for me.

Thanks

 

[kmk2307]

jun41,

I am a big fan of using the screw-in PC lamps that are around ~40-45 watts from Wal-Mart in metal dome-shaped light fixtures for fuge lighting. The LOA fixtures don't seem to last long in humid places. Keep in mind that these PC bulbs and the fixtures should never get wet either. I can tell you that a 36"x15"x18" sump would never fit under my home-made stand which is somewhat like a manufactured aquarium stand. What brand stand do you have?

Kevin

 

[jun41]

The stand is an oceanic.

I've been thinking and it makes sense that I don't need all the fancy stuff that comes with Andy's sumps. I can take a standard tank and glue two sets of baffles into it and turn the middle into a refugium. Just a thought.