people who go with "almost" no Water Changes needed!

I run an ATS and top off with RODI/kalkwasser/vinegar mix. I havent changed my water in about 8 months, have no current plans to ever change it. This is the same story as most of the people on algaescrubber dot net.

Right now I actually have a slight brown algae problem, not bad but starts getting long enough to sway a bit in the breeze about 2 weeks after cleaning. Since I have no nitrogen based wastes I think my phosphates are starting to creep up a bit.

Increased phosphates can happen with ATS when you have other nitrate removal, because lack if nitrate limits algae screen growth and so it limits phosphate removal. Basically I have too much live rock. I just upgraded my scrubber lighting significantly (it was rather weak before) in the hopes that the increased lighting will caused increased screen algae growth even without nitrates.

If that does not work I will either get a small amount of GFO or dose small amounts of diluted ammonia.
 
Some LPS are easy to take care of. And some might like slightly dirty water. But as with everything else in this hobby the answer is... "it depends"... on a lot of stuff. But I will have to study this latest TOTM. I'm shocked it looks that good and that colorful and he hasn't done a water change in almost 4 years. This for me is like... they contacted alien life on Mars. Pretty shocking. I'll have to look over his tank for awhile and ask a lot of questions to figure this one out. I remember being told even if things survive you can have build-up of toxic stuff in a tank over time... and just have this unexplainable mass die-off. This guys tank blows the lid off of all previously known conventions.
 
WOW...

I change 5 gal water EVERY Saturday or Sunday

I have biocube 29..

I m assuming if guys have small tank like nano and could do water change more often due to small tank say uner 40gal ? no ?

I do have skimmer tunze 9002 and ATO, but no fuge or sump.

Im curious to hear your comment about small tank..

THANKS!
 
SCIFI_3D_zoo said:
Some LPS are easy to take care of. And some might like slightly dirty water. But as with everything else in this hobby the answer is... "it depends"... on a lot of stuff. But I will have to study this latest TOTM. I'm shocked it looks that good and that colorful and he hasn't done a water change in almost 4 years. This for me is like... they contacted alien life on Mars. Pretty shocking. I'll have to look over his tank for awhile and ask a lot of questions to figure this one out. I remember being told even if things survive you can have build-up of toxic stuff in a tank over time... and just have this unexplainable mass die-off. This guys tank blows the lid off of all previously known conventions.
Click to expand...

Water changes aren't that effective at keeping water clean. With the knowledge and equipment available to the hobby I view water changes as more for trace element replenishment and ionic balancing. Whether these even need to be addressed has yet to be answered. In certain circumstances it may not work but i have seen many amazing tanks on this site where people seldom change the water. Of those tanks im guessing most did a water change because they felt like it, not because they looked at the tank and said OMG I need to do my bi-yearly water change.
 
I can go about 2 weeks on my 75 before I see diatom levels creep up. Then a 5 gallon change helps everything.

I wish I could go a month.
 
I think that you have to be an experienced, disciplined (stocking/feeding) individual with a keen eye to get away with the "less is more" approach on water changes. That being said, I simply don't feel comfortable being part of the group. If you can get away with it and have a flourishing tank with everything thriving then I say go for it.

I will say this though:

There are a lot of people on this thread touting their success with less water changes, but most of them apparently don't own a camera to show us pictures of their tanks. I'm not trying to call anyone out on this, but let's see these thriving tanks (especially SPS if available). Maybe there's something we can learn from you that aquarium salt manufacturers don't want us to know.:D
 
There are a lot of people on this thread touting their success with less water changes, but most of them apparently don't own a camera to show us pictures of their tanks. I'm not trying to call anyone out on this, but let's see these thriving tanks (especially SPS if available).
Click to expand...

I own a lot of camera's :crazy1:

I am not sure if you would call my tank a success and it is
Certainly not the best tank on here but I change about 100 gallons a year and it is a 100 gallon tank which has a bunch of SPS, some of which are quite old and the tank is over 40 years old. Some of the fish are 18 and the last pair of hermit crabs lived to 13. I feel too many water changes is detrimental. There is a reason new tanks with all new water have most of the problems and old tanks don't.

IMG_1947.jpg


IMG_1824.jpg


In this video (with the pumps off) you can see some of the SPS

 
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I only change about twenty gallons very month or two, depends on circumstances. To those people who do no water changes, I am curious if you ever change the oil in your car? If you do, do you know why? If you don't there is no need to explain why you don't. If you have a RO/DI do you ever change the filters or membrane? Do you know why you do? Again, if you don't there is no need to explain why.

Some tanks are set up to consume nutrients better than others, some export or consume nutrients better than others. The important thing is to deal with whatever is put into the tank, in some way or other. Doing no water changes is walking a thin line, not skimming is making the line thinner. Everything that is added to the tank must be dealt with.
Some people can drive 100 mph on the freeway daily and never get caught or have an accident, but it is not something that should be attempted by everyone.

These threads have popped up numerous times over the years, it seems most tanks with the no water change system have an average life of about four or five years, based on those who have responded in the past. Maintenance is important with just about everything, why would our tanks be any different? I won't chastise anyone for not doing water changes, but salt and water are the two cheapest things in this hobby and water quality is one of the most important things for coral health, it just makes sense to keep it as clean as we can.
 
Most of the guys, that say they do less water change or none. Are not posting picture to back them up...lol
 
AcroporAddict said:
I'm about to take delivery of a custom 465 gallon, and like someone else said, the wheels they are a turnin'.
Click to expand...

You should check out Reefkeeper2's TOTM setup. He has it documented better than most. His tank is a 437gal and he leverages a Dialaseas to automate his water changes. Among other things, it changes out about 2 1/2 gallons of salt water a day and that works out to 75 gallons a month. He has a great video about it here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jq-XumCtH4Y&feature=channel&list=UL
 
sirreal63 said:
I only change about twenty gallons very month or two, depends on circumstances. To those people who do no water changes, I am curious if you ever change the oil in your car? If you do, do you know why? If you don't there is no need to explain why you don't. If you have a RO/DI do you ever change the filters or membrane? Do you know why you do? Again, if you don't there is no need to explain why.
Click to expand...

Bad examples, oil breaks down under heat and friction, particle filters get full (often without an easy way to clean them), RO membranes wear out or get torn, DI resin becomes saturated.

Saltwater itself does not wear out. Nutrients and chemicals go in, export (via whatever) goes out, the frequency you change you tank water should be a inverse relationship to how well you balance those while maintaing the required levels of macro and micro elements as required by your critters.

sirreal63 said:
Some tanks are set up to consume nutrients better than others, some export or consume nutrients better than others. The important thing is to deal with whatever is put into the tank, in some way or other. Doing no water changes is walking a thin line, not skimming is making the line thinner. Everything that is added to the tank must be dealt with.
Some people can drive 100 mph on the freeway daily and never get caught or have an accident, but it is not something that should be attempted by everyone

These threads have popped up numerous times over the years, it seems most tanks with the no water change system have an average life of about four or five years, based on those who have responded in the past. Maintenance is important with just about everything, why would our tanks be any different? I won't chastise anyone for not doing water changes, but salt and water are the two cheapest things in this hobby and water quality is one of the most important things for coral health, it just makes sense to keep it as clean as we can.
Click to expand...

Clean is not the issue. Dealing with nutrients in/out are easy, that should not even be a discussion here. The only hard part of not doing water changes is the macro/micro elements issue, and honestly keeping Cal/Mag/Alk is not very difficult either.

So what you really run into when you seriously consider no water changes is simply trace elements, both making sure the tank has enough available and that you dont have anything building up to toxic levels, that is the core of the issue with reefkeeping for long periods of time. However unless you are doing 100% water changes there will always be build up and depletion, sure water changes act as a buffer, but the same issues still apply.

Maintaince is always required, however maintaince and water changes do not have to be the same thing. Also I would argue that "an average lifespan of 4-5 years" is probably higher than average for any style of reefkeeping.
 
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I don't believe in short term tanks, but I suppose some people think of it that way. Randy has discussed the need for water changes here.
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-10/rhf/index.php
You can argue it with him if you like. If you take the time to read all of the article above you will see why it is a good idea to do water changes.

And another good discussion that HighlandReefer did an excellent job of explaining this.
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2056840

Corals are far more adaptive than we give them credit for, however if given a choice they would probably prefer water that has what they need in the correct amount than water that does not. An ATS is a fabulous way to keep the main things we monitor in check, but by itself it is not capable of keeping everything in check. Every time you add anything to the water, especially food, you are adding things that the ATS will not be able to completely remove, by not having some method of removing them they have no choice but to build up.

It doesn't really matter to me if someone doesn't do water changes, but over time almost all of the best tanks in the world employ this simple method. To me it is just silly to not do it.
 
You may as well read this one too, it pretty much sums up why you should be doing water changes and is the last in his series on "How To Guide to Reef Aquarium Chemistry for Beginners". If you disagree with him, I would suggest starting a thread on it the Chemistry Forum and show him why it is wrong to do water changes. :)

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2007-09/rhf/index.php
 
I think a new thread is a good idea. Something official by Randy or something would be nice. Maybe an official RC article. That would be better.

Looking at new TOTM it's obvious a lot of the things we thought and were told may not be entirely , not not true, but maybe not necessary. Even if you did a wtr chg once a year, once every 3 yrs and 8 mos. (#'s for latest TOTM with no wtr chg). that's a HELLUVA lot better than what a lot of us are doing now . We could save money, time. I don't care what some 10 year old article from Randy says... the proof is in the pudding. I read all of those articles too. And until now I sit here like a lot of people, a disciple, a convert, of what I have read b/c I trust the experts here. And a lot of other people around here with TOTM's have too. They have been a great influence over us all. But you can not deny that a guy from Indonesia with not a lot of money has showed us something incredible here. He put together a tank, with no nice stand even, on a shoe-string budget, used old filtration methods, and lots of other crazy stuff.. and he has done something incredible. It's like some poor kid from an african village used his spear to learn how to play golf and become a Tiger Woods. It's incredible. We should be very interested in what he's doing. Not so hesitant to change our ways. I've read that last article too... from 2007. Lets get on board with this and be open to updating this hobby... HELL... lets turn this mutha upside-down on it's head.
 
SCIFI_3D_zoo said:
I think a new thread is a good idea. Something official by Randy or something would be nice. Maybe an official RC article. That would be better.

Looking at new TOTM it's obvious a lot of the things we thought and were told may not be entirely , not not true, but maybe not necessary. Even if you did a wtr chg once a year, once every 3 yrs and 8 mos. (#'s for latest TOTM with no wtr chg). that's a HELLUVA lot better than what a lot of us are doing now . We could save money, time. I don't care what some 10 year old article from Randy says... the proof is in the pudding. I read all of those articles too. And until now I sit here like a lot of people, a disciple, a convert, of what I have read b/c I trust the experts here. And a lot of other people around here with TOTM's have too. They have been a great influence over us all. But you can not deny that a guy from Indonesia with not a lot of money has showed us something incredible here. He put together a tank, with no nice stand even, on a shoe-string budget, used old filtration methods, and lots of other crazy stuff.. and he has done something incredible. It's like some poor kid from an african village used his spear to learn how to play golf and become a Tiger Woods. It's incredible. We should be very interested in what he's doing. Not so hesitant to change our ways. I've read that last article too... from 2007. Lets get on board with this and be open to updating this hobby... HELL... lets turn this mutha upside-down on it's head.
Click to expand...

I change 10% a week always have...always will. Whether someone does or not isn't a debatable issue for me.The only proof is in my pudding. As far as Randy's articles/opinions go.... whether recent or from the pas...t they remain relevant and held in my high regard.
 
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