Please help with my dedicated macro tank set up

[Angel*Fish]

I just bought a used 29g tank with 2 x 65 w pc
Still has all the old sand..

Instead of LR, I bought a large single biowheel "nitrate factory"

The tank came with a hang on skimmer - should I sell it? Or will it be useful for a macro tank?

Would it be good to add Miracle Mud or is it better to manually dose iron & other minerals? If so what should I dose?

In addition do you have any ideas/suggestions?

Thanks!

 

[Cody Ray]

Without Liverock where do you plan on putting your macro algae?

 

[Angel*Fish]

I just meant I'm not going to fill it full with liverock & that the tank will depend heavily on the biowheel

 

[Samala]

You can put plenty of macros in the sand bed - Caulerpas, Halimeda, Udotea, Penicillus and (of course) all the available seagrasses will love the sandbed. Many macros do not really require rockwork.. they holdfast to a very small amount of rocky substrate and grow from there, you could get away with attaching the macro to small peices of rubble in fact.

Now.. a little LR would be nice just to give the tank a wee bit of shape and interest.. but you certainly dont have to wall up the tank like the typical coral garden aquascape.

>Sarah

 

[The_Nexis_One]

I would also keep the skimmer... you don't have to run it with aggressive skimming.

I would run it with mild skimming to aid in oxygen/CO2 exchange and to help with any mishaps that occur while you aren't watching - like a sporulation event... A skimmer could help clear the problem before it causes a tank wide failure of your macro's. (IMHO)

John.

 

[DaMan]

Re: Please help with my dedicated macro tank set up

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7060154#post7060154 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Angel*Fish

Instead of LR, I bought a large single biowheel "nitrate factory"

The tank came with a hang on skimmer - should I sell it? Or will it be useful for a macro tank?

Would it be good to add Miracle Mud or is it better to manually dose iron & other minerals? If so what should I dose?

In addition do you have any ideas/suggestions?

Thanks!

I have a tank planted with many species of macroalgae, and a few vascular plants. I have a pretty strong pump going through a spray bar. I've found that the areas where the the water is slow or stagnant are difficult to keep the algae clean of nuisance algae. I don't think a biowheel will give you adequate flow. It will also not provide more NO3 than any other aerobic filter, mechanical or biological.

You might consider a closed loop with an external pump if you don't have a sump.

I don't run a skimmer on my planted. With adequate circulation and surface agitation, I find it unneccessary.

I have never tried Miracle mud. I can't see how it could be an unlimited supply of neccessary FE+. I have to add FE+ quite frequently. I add NO3, mgso4 less frequently.

I am trying to get macros to be background, foreground and focal points, so I have found that I must have rocks for them to climb up. C paspaloides can be used like a fw stem plant, but most of the macros I have found grow in a trailing pattern, easily trained to grow where I want them. By using their shades (darker in front, smaller textures in back) we can add depth to our tiny underworlds.

I've found many helpful aquascaping concepts on Plantedtank.net. They are a bit anti-marine, though.

Good luck.

 

[Angel*Fish]

Thanks for the detailed post, DaMan
I don't think a biowheel will give you adequate flow. It will also not provide more NO3 than any other aerobic filter, mechanical or biological.
Thanks I'll add 1-2 powerheads. The thought about the biowheel is that it can convert to nitrates faster than a skimmer can remove stuff that might otherwise be converted to nitrates

I have never tried Miracle mud. I can't see how it could be an unlimited supply of neccessary FE+. I have to add FE+ quite frequently. I add NO3, mgso4 less frequently I had a MM fuge a few years back - I think it's supposed to slow release minerals into your fuge at a rate that can be taken up by your plants with less of it being used in the main tank. I guess I'm just worried about overdosing, but I'll get the hang of it

If you're directly adding nitrate then that makes sense that you'd have less need for a skimmer. I guess I need to figure out whether I'm going to do that. I'd never heard of adding it until a day or so ago reading here in the algae forum.:reading:

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7064692#post7064692 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by The_Nexis_One
I would also keep the skimmer... you don't have to run it with aggressive skimming.

I would run it with mild skimming to aid in oxygen/CO2 exchange and to help with any mishaps that occur while you aren't watching - like a sporulation event... A skimmer could help clear the problem before it causes a tank wide failure of your macro's. (IMHO)

John.

I like this idea, thanks.

Samala - Thanks for your post- I agree

 

[The_Nexis_One]

as an aside - I dose Nitrates as well, but also agressively skim (frequently tinkering/modifying the skimmer to get better performance out of a cheapo ). My thinking is that if I can pull protiens/detritus out of the water before they break down, it'll remove not only the source of nitrates, but more importantly, the source of PO4, ammonia, etc. Moreover, protection from the previously mentioned sporulation or any issues with my Eel going on a rampage and digging up half the tank in search of imaginary crabs....

I'm happy to dose nitrates, if it means not having as much phosphate problem.

I can't wait to see pic's of your upcoming setup.

John.

 

[Angel*Fish]

There's not much to see yet- I hooked on the biowheel... but as you can see I didn't even clean the glass yet. I love it though -- the sand is a nice oolitic type & full of life, worms, snails - the previous owner even left me some chaeto & some of that stick algae the dwarf seahorses like to hang on

Quote:
I'm happy to dose nitrates, if it means not having as much phosphate problem
The_Nexis_One, I thought phosphate was good for algae? Or is that just for bryopsis filamentous types?

 

[The_Nexis_One]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7071022#post7071022 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Angel*Fish
There's not much to see yet- I hooked on the biowheel... but as you can see I didn't even clean the glass yet. I love it though -- the sand is a nice oolitic type & full of life, worms, snails - the previous owner even left me some chaeto & some of that stick algae the dwarf seahorses like to hang on

Quote:
I'm happy to dose nitrates, if it means not having as much phosphate problem
The_Nexis_One, I thought phosphate was good for algae? Or is that just for bryopsis filamentous types?

It's good, but tends to be in excess in our systems. I think the ratio of consumption is 16:1 NO3/PO4. I've always had a problem with Cyano in my system and I'm finally learning that it's due to NO3 being zero and PO4 being present (at some level). I tend to do everything I can to limit PO4... part of that is dosing NO3 to facilitate growth in Macro's/Seagrass.

Best of luck,
John.

 

[Samala]

My system is moving towards 20:1 NO3O4 consumption these days. Different tanks will have different rates.. but the real take home message is that the plants need more N than P. If you have too little N in the tank the plants arent going to be able to get all the P you have floating about out of the water and exported as tissue growth.

>Sarah

 

[The_Nexis_One]

yeah.... what she said ...





LOL
John.

 

[DaMan]

Won't a heavily planted tank eventually consume the available PO4?

I do not skim, feed heavily, add NO3 and have the lowest level of PO4 I can test. I still have more macro room, so I think to have a planted tank that looks like a FW planted, I will eventually have to add PO4...

 

[The_Nexis_One]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7073874#post7073874 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by DaMan
Won't a heavily planted tank eventually consume the available PO4?

I do not skim, feed heavily, add NO3 and have the lowest level of PO4 I can test. I still have more macro room, so I think to have a planted tank that looks like a FW planted, I will eventually have to add PO4...

Yes, it's possible - But if you are feeding, it's likely that you are supplying enough PO4 via food additions to keep from ever seeing a PO4 limiting situation. It really comes down to a "how much you add vs. how much is consumed".

For those of us who have lagoons/refugiums/algae scrubbers attached to larger systems where nutrients are plentiful from Bioload - manual removal of PO4 is helpful (IMHO/IME). In my case, while I'm growing my stock of Macro's/Seagrass, and before when I had none, to be able to keep up with basic PO4 inputs(food only) my efforts were/are to remove the PO4 at every opertunity to limit the Cyano that grows in my system.

Now, with several healthy groups of macro in the system and having already reached both the FE limiting, and NO3 limiting factors (causing daily dosing), the last one that I'm working towards is a PO4 limiting factor. At this point, my cyano growth is controllable and if I keep up with dosing, it receeds. At the point that I reach, if every, a PO4 limiting situation, I'll add a couple more fish and feed more regularly/heavily than I do now and most likely not have to dose PO4 to sustain/grow my macro/seagrasses.

The only person that I know who has reached a PO4 limitation was Samala here on RC. That was in one of her heavily planted systems, with zero (none) fish and the system had gone without feeding for 7+ days (if memory serves).

I'm sure she could comment in more detail than I on this topic.

Thanks,
John.

 

[Samala]

John is precisely right, its possible to get to P limiting situations, but it is not common. You have to almost consciously starve the tank. I still feel that a tank that has a typical bioload will not easily reach P limitation. There are notes on this in the CO2 Magic thread in this board.

>Sarah