I have three clams in my display, although I'm not sure what impact they will have on nitrates? Wouldn't expect much. I also dose Coral Vite, iron and iodine once a week. I have been through a lot of steps to reduce my nitrates over the past couple of months, but I still haven't been successful as yet. I suspect that it's the total bioload. I have 15 fish, mainly smaller fish and 30+ corals including a couple of medium-large anemones and three clams. I feed the fish twice a day. One cube of mysis in the morning and one cube of brine in the evening. I add "veggie flakes" to each of the feedings as well. Every second day I mix a shot glass of DT phytoplankton with the equivalent of 1 to 1 and 1/2 cubes worth of frozen cyclopeze plus a cube of chopped brine shrimp and use this to spot feed the corals. Do not know for sure if this is an overfeeding scenario?
Reverse lighting cycle on refugium?
- Thread starter JoeESSA
- Start date
Forgot to mention that the PBT gets a 2" wide strip of seaweed every day as well on top of the feedings mentioned in the previous post. To me this seems like a lot of biomass going into the tank, but would be interesting to get some feedback on this and how often and what others feed...
For the size tank and the number of fish, it dosn't seem like a lot of food to me.
I feed 2 cubes of frozen mysis daily as well as a pinch of freeze dried ce and a pinch of golden pearls. The ce and the gp are for the pods and other tiny critters in the tank. I have 3 horses and one bangai feeding on the mysis (and my bristle worm cleanup crew.
How long have you had this tank set up for? The reason I ask this is that ime it takes a while for your tank to build up the capacity to absorb all the food you put in and the resultant waste in the form of juices, fish poop etc.
It has taken almost two years for my fuge to become really productive. My measure of productivity is somewhat subjective, but, I think, valid. A year ago, the fuge was able to support a stray serhorse fry for 3 months before it died from a lack of food. This year, its has been able to support two fry for 5+ months; one being in the fuge, one in the main tank. To me that is a huge ramp up.
It has also taken that long for the fuge to really fill up with algae ( 1/2 chaeto, 1/2 caulerpa). I suspect having enough algae as a substrait for amphipods is part of the reason it has taken so long.
I am also wondering if your fuge is large enough. I am at the other extreme having a 40g fuge for a 40g tank.
Fred
I feed 2 cubes of frozen mysis daily as well as a pinch of freeze dried ce and a pinch of golden pearls. The ce and the gp are for the pods and other tiny critters in the tank. I have 3 horses and one bangai feeding on the mysis (and my bristle worm cleanup crew.
How long have you had this tank set up for? The reason I ask this is that ime it takes a while for your tank to build up the capacity to absorb all the food you put in and the resultant waste in the form of juices, fish poop etc.
It has taken almost two years for my fuge to become really productive. My measure of productivity is somewhat subjective, but, I think, valid. A year ago, the fuge was able to support a stray serhorse fry for 3 months before it died from a lack of food. This year, its has been able to support two fry for 5+ months; one being in the fuge, one in the main tank. To me that is a huge ramp up.
It has also taken that long for the fuge to really fill up with algae ( 1/2 chaeto, 1/2 caulerpa). I suspect having enough algae as a substrait for amphipods is part of the reason it has taken so long.
I am also wondering if your fuge is large enough. I am at the other extreme having a 40g fuge for a 40g tank.
Fred
Fredfish, the 140g has been setup since March this year, however, the contents of an established 70g (started in March 2005) were transferred to this tank. The 70g had 100lbs+ of live rock in it. This, the sand and livestock were transferred to the 140g. I used 100lbs of porous baserock to supplement the rockwork. The baserock purpled up in a matter of a couple of months. I also added an additional 60 to 80lbs of fresh live sand. The possible "immaturity" of my tank has also crossed my mind and I may be expecting things to mature faster than they do in practice. E.g. the baserock I added may have purpled up fast, but may take longer to become truely functional live rock. My fuge is quite small, it's only 17 to 20g capacity, I regret that purchase and have spent quite a bit of time staring enviously at larger fuges in the LFS's. I also use 1/2 chaeto and half caulerpa. The fuge was jammed full of algae (mainly caulerpa) a month or so ago, so I trimmed the Caulerpa back, perhaps too much. I have a 2" sandbed in the fuge, so it will not be providing a DSB effect.
Well, it sounds like the tank is still cycling. Unless there is something in the tank that is not looking too good, I would not worry too much about 20ppm of nitrate, its not that high.
Its a funny thing about tanks and cycles. I have asked two well known aquarists, Julian Sprung and Eric Borneman about how long it takes for a tank to cycle and I got exactly the same answer from both of them: it depends. Some tanks cycle in a matter of months, others take a lot longer. Every time we disturb things or move stuff around we cause changes and little cycles.
The other thing about cycling is that it really never stops. There is no such thing as equilibrium, either in our tanks or nature. In nature, there are always storms and surges to stir things up and make room for new stuff to appear. In my tanks, I always seem to get an eb and flow of critters. Last year, I had no limpits that I knew of. In the last month I have had a real explosion and they are appearing everywhere. My grape caulerpa comes and goes as well and so does cyanobacteria.
These little changes are not really a bad thing. In fact, Eric B. thinks we should be changing things around a little in our tanks from time to time to help prevent 'old tank syndrom'.
OK, enough rambling.
Fred
Its a funny thing about tanks and cycles. I have asked two well known aquarists, Julian Sprung and Eric Borneman about how long it takes for a tank to cycle and I got exactly the same answer from both of them: it depends. Some tanks cycle in a matter of months, others take a lot longer. Every time we disturb things or move stuff around we cause changes and little cycles.
The other thing about cycling is that it really never stops. There is no such thing as equilibrium, either in our tanks or nature. In nature, there are always storms and surges to stir things up and make room for new stuff to appear. In my tanks, I always seem to get an eb and flow of critters. Last year, I had no limpits that I knew of. In the last month I have had a real explosion and they are appearing everywhere. My grape caulerpa comes and goes as well and so does cyanobacteria.
These little changes are not really a bad thing. In fact, Eric B. thinks we should be changing things around a little in our tanks from time to time to help prevent 'old tank syndrom'.
OK, enough rambling.
Fred
reefworldaq
New member
I read about the photosynth coral that need of CO2 for that cycle.
that's why we must use refug in reverse daylight to support the CO2 in daylight tank.
the 24/7 light is just for all caulerpa to not spawning.
I think for all macroalgae best in reverse daylight for all coral reef tank.
Fandy Sutanto
that's why we must use refug in reverse daylight to support the CO2 in daylight tank.
the 24/7 light is just for all caulerpa to not spawning.
I think for all macroalgae best in reverse daylight for all coral reef tank.
Fandy Sutanto
I have also been told from a couple of people at LFS's that 20ppm of nitrate is nothing to get uptight about provided that everything looks healthy. My tank appeared to go through a mini-cycle a couple of weeks after being initially set up. I.e. the appearance of some brown algae on the sandbed that I associate with the completion of cycling. Interestingly I had a stronger brown algae bloom together with green cyano outbreak in August. This was what spurred me to check my nitrates and started all this off. After syphoning the cyano and doing a series of 10g water changes for ten days in a row the brown algae dissapeared. It may have corrected itself without the water changes. I'm prepared to accept that the tank may still be cycling in some fashion - albeit not the commonly referred to initial, ammonia-nitrite - nitrate cycle since the former two are consistently unmeasurable. This may be more a secondary process where the tank is attempting to establish equilibrium - I don't know enough to speculate further than that...
Back to the original subject matter of this thread... Seems like experimenting with a reverse lighting cycle on the refugium would be worthwhile - albeit that I will have to keep an eye on the Caulerpa in my fuge and be prepared to step in if it starts going asexual.
Thanks everyone for the inputs...
Back to the original subject matter of this thread... Seems like experimenting with a reverse lighting cycle on the refugium would be worthwhile - albeit that I will have to keep an eye on the Caulerpa in my fuge and be prepared to step in if it starts going asexual.
Thanks everyone for the inputs...
