xCry0x
Active member
+1
Usually dont see fw tanks with mounds of rock or a scoop full of pond mud to add fw critters like a marine tank has (except sand.. not mud).
people who go with "almost" no Water Changes needed!
- Thread starter Enzel
- Start date
+1
Usually dont see fw tanks with mounds of rock or a scoop full of pond mud to add fw critters like a marine tank has (except sand.. not mud).
d0ughb0y
Active member
I am going to cut back to once a month WC's, and see what happens.
make sure you monitor you nitrate and phosphates (or if you start seeing algae in your tank). If you see your nitrate building up, you need to go back to your weekly water change until you can figure out how to keep nitrate at 0. Less frequent wc would be applicable to tank where nitrate and phosphates are completely under control. I have been doing 6 weeks wc and everything seems fine. I just did a wc over the weekend and the next one is on the first weekend of 2012, after which I will switch to once every 3 months.
@mikeweber3
Hy Mike, I just found this thread and am very excited because I have been thinking about the stupidity to remove a lot of "things" and replace it by the same elements only becaus we dont´t know anything better. But I have a question: Why did you choose the elements Sr Mo and Ca to be added to your system, is it because of conclusion or can you see anything missing, like color or growth?
Whats about Iodine or Fluorine?
Best regards Jochen
Hy Mike, I just found this thread and am very excited because I have been thinking about the stupidity to remove a lot of "things" and replace it by the same elements only becaus we dont´t know anything better. But I have a question: Why did you choose the elements Sr Mo and Ca to be added to your system, is it because of conclusion or can you see anything missing, like color or growth?
Whats about Iodine or Fluorine?
Best regards Jochen
saltfishnut
New member
Water change
Water change
I change 5gal every 2 weeks on my 75gal tank.
Water change
I change 5gal every 2 weeks on my 75gal tank.
saltfishnut
New member
But today I did a 20gal water change
sneaton
New member
i didnt do a water change for 6 months....i also didnt dose anything,everything looked awesome(growing faster with better color)for the first 3 months or so....i started getting tissue recession and went back to weekly 10% WCs, i also bought dosing pumps to keep alk,cal at desired levels.....my trates and phos were always kept in check with my biopellets so i assume it was from alk and cal levels.....im tempted to try going to monthly 10% since i have the dosing pumps now
In my SPS dominated tank, I typically go 2 months between water changes. I have found that things always look better when i get back from a vacation too, but i probably just missed my tank. I have a 180 DT with a about 30 gallons in the sump. Everything is on a neptune apex and i dose my own two part using randys dosers. I occasionally add some vitamin C when i remember. Im using a SWC skimmer and have what i consider to be a pretty heavy bioload with 6 anthia's, 2 yellow coris wrasses, a dragon wrasse, tailspot blennie, two clowns, a shrimp/gobie pair, a yellow tang, blue tang, and a foxface rabbit fish. So 16 fish.
lmsmith
New member
I did 1 WC every 6 months for 2 years on my 5ft. When I did water changes, I would do large ones (40%).
I dosed vodka, and wet-skimmed. I evaporated sea salt and added it (with tap water, shock horror!) to keep my salinity and other things in check. Didn't lose any corals. I did lose a CBB after 20 months after he choked on something and never recovered.
I dosed vodka, and wet-skimmed. I evaporated sea salt and added it (with tap water, shock horror!) to keep my salinity and other things in check. Didn't lose any corals. I did lose a CBB after 20 months after he choked on something and never recovered.
I have not done a water change in over a year. Before then, it was about 2x a year for a couple of years. Basically I have changed my water apprx 5-6x in 5 years (about 20% each change). I also have stopped dosing kalk and now only dose rodi topoff. I don't dose anything else but do think it is time to maybe do a 5% change. I have roughly 60% sps, 30% lps, and 10% softies. For fish, 2 maroons, 2 chromis, 1 vlamingi, 1 kole, 1 yellow tang, 1 orange spotted goby, 1 yellowtail blue damsel, 1 cleaner shrimp, 12-14 various snails, 6-10 various hermits and one huge Derasa. I have not added any livestock in over 18 months. My tank specs are in my sig.
I've done this for two reasons. First I believe once a tank is established, and I mean really established, it's best to keep your hands out of it and not fiddle with changing any system components unless absolutely necessary (like lights for example). Second, I started down this road cause I found myself getting a little lazy doing small weekly water changes. Over the years, as w/c became less frequent, my tank continued to look/act healthy with corals colorful and growing. In fact, I have to frag a couple colonies severely back every six months or so because of growth.
Granted, I have had some Oh Sh** moments like when my 12" Derasa spawned and my skimmer went crazy that I *should* do a w/c. I still didn't do a w/c but I did run carbon for a couple of days when that happened.
I've done this for two reasons. First I believe once a tank is established, and I mean really established, it's best to keep your hands out of it and not fiddle with changing any system components unless absolutely necessary (like lights for example). Second, I started down this road cause I found myself getting a little lazy doing small weekly water changes. Over the years, as w/c became less frequent, my tank continued to look/act healthy with corals colorful and growing. In fact, I have to frag a couple colonies severely back every six months or so because of growth.
Granted, I have had some Oh Sh** moments like when my 12" Derasa spawned and my skimmer went crazy that I *should* do a w/c. I still didn't do a w/c but I did run carbon for a couple of days when that happened.
You are able to keep SPS without doing waterchange or dosing?
I ran a successful mixed reef for a year and a half with water changes every 3 or 4 months at the most. It was a 125g dt with a 40g breeder sump. the fuge took up about a third of it. i have used caulerpa prolifora and chaeto. I would get algae buildup regularly, but it was not extreme. I ran no skimmer, no filter sock, or any other media reactor. I topped off with mrs wages saturated in ro/di. the system was great and had awesome growth. I did not realize I needed to add mag, so when that was down to 600 or 700 I had problems. the tank went great tho. my only cleanup crew was dibs turbo snails and about 3 hermits. i did have a very light bio load.. 3 to 5 chromis, 2 clowns, a 6line wrasse and one other fish. i forget what it was now. that ended a year ago.
NatureNerd
New member
I have an old tank. When my sons were born, many years ago, things were crazy at my house. I stopped doing any tank maintenance. I went almost two years without a water change. I only fed the fish 3 times per week and used tap water for top-off. Did the tank survive? Yes, of course, but once I got back to routine water changes, growth rates went up and SPS color improved. Pest algae started to die back down and my clownfish spawned more often. It took about 3 months of weekly 5g water changes to really see a difference in the SPS health.
I agree, it's all about the filtration and supplementation really.
For a nano, water changes are a piece of cake and keep a tank in in check (both import and export needs). For a larger tank, it may no be so easy to change that much water out all the time and that's where big filtration systems and computer driven dosers come in.
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-12/totm/index.php
"With the processing capabilities of the equipment and the extensive filtration built into the system, I do not perform any water changes. So, on this tank there have been no water changes in 11 months and on the prior 300-gallon tank there was none done for the two-year period it was in operation. However, I must say that I do not recommend this to many hobbyists, unless they have the ability to process the water as this system does. Beyond occasional testing of water parameters, this is about all the maintenance I do on the tank."
It's impressive how some reefers can figure out how to balance things like that so well.
For a nano, water changes are a piece of cake and keep a tank in in check (both import and export needs). For a larger tank, it may no be so easy to change that much water out all the time and that's where big filtration systems and computer driven dosers come in.
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-12/totm/index.php
"With the processing capabilities of the equipment and the extensive filtration built into the system, I do not perform any water changes. So, on this tank there have been no water changes in 11 months and on the prior 300-gallon tank there was none done for the two-year period it was in operation. However, I must say that I do not recommend this to many hobbyists, unless they have the ability to process the water as this system does. Beyond occasional testing of water parameters, this is about all the maintenance I do on the tank."
It's impressive how some reefers can figure out how to balance things like that so well.
SCIFI_3D_zoo
New member
There are other factors too. What is your BIOLOAD, what type of coral you have, etc.? You're not gonna have a lot of SPS doing water changes once a year.. but you can get away with a month or two. This is what I've noticed from talking to TOTM'ers for the past 7 years or so. For those that are willing to push it I didn't see any of them with a full complement of fish and expert level corals go over 2-3 months. I've had some 90 Gal, few fish, soft corals, etc. and you can get away with murder.
THEN you have June 2012 TOTM... no wtr. chg in 3 years? Bio-Pellet use if fairly new too though.
THEN you have June 2012 TOTM... no wtr. chg in 3 years? Bio-Pellet use if fairly new too though.
Last edited:
I have a 90 gallon with a 7" DSB and a 20 gal refugium and a skimmer and I only change about 10 gallons every 2 months. Many LPS corals grow well, but there are some that I cant keep. My tank is very colorful. I have 2 clowns, 2 wrasses, a mandarin, a 3" hippo tank and a bully 2" fire angle fish. It is my easiest tank to care for. I also have some nassarius snails but no shrimps or crabs or anything else that would disturb the DSB.
