Day flow vs. Night Flow

[moortim]

Someone needs to come up with a system that monitors an actual reef and then we can have the lighting and flow in our tanks copy it.
Is GPS that good yet? lol.

 

[RockyHeap]

Don't mean to tangent the thread because its a good one regarding fish sleeping, sliming, and feeding patterns of corals.

To copy nature, first study it.......many aqua-culture sites out there growing the reef of tomorrow, and "saving the reef" sites too.....like

http://www.coralreefalliance.org/

Somebody in a past post mentioned coral sliming, yes it happens both in nature and reef tanks, I've also seen red cyano sliming during break down of a small section of real reef. It's a big world and system out there as others have said.


Emulate nature, keep your tanks simple folks.........

scuba diving rocks, the worlds biggest reef tank. (no water changes either)

I'll have to post some pictures of fiji diving at Walt Smiths aquaculture racks, thats how they grow 'em today, in constant good flow of water...

 

[marinelife]

For me I lower mine at night, my wavebox shuts off and the streams go down to 30%
To me the fish seem to like it when the current is lower so they can have a rest period. My research and understanding of the ocean is the current is always changing and I think we need to do the same in our tanks, I feel having the flow come at different speeds and from different directions helps the corals feed, plus it gives them better shapes. My Streams change during the day from 30-100% My fish seem to like to stop and let the wavebox move them back and forth. Having the current change seems to make the dirt flow and not settle, making it go to the sump to let the skimmer remove it.

 

[ethanriley]

In a lagoon system with fringing reef, the currents can easily approach 3-5-6 knots over a reef during incoming or outgoing tides, and no there's not a slack.

With regard to this comment in real life experience just like Krish I live in the Bahamas and we have a term between tides called "slack tide" it is particularly noticable in the Exuma Keys and around fringing reefs where natural channels that normal experience agressive flow during high and low tides experience a period of slack tide that can last up to an hour. When I am spearfishing we use this slack tide to spear large groupers that frequent the cuts. It is the only time you can actually "cut dive safely" without being driven out to sea or in on the rocks.

Until my timer broke I had my power head and closed loop set up on a reverse rotation with a lul in between of about ten minutes this seemed to benefit what I call active feeding where I could actually see the polyps taking particles out of the water column. Just my opinion but a short lull seems to benefit the polyps rather than a constant battering just my opinion.

 

[Krish]

With regard to this comment in real life experience just like Krish I live in the Bahamas and we have a term between tides called "slack tide" it is particularly noticable in the Exuma Keys and around fringing reefs where natural channels that normal experience agressive flow during high and low tides experience a period of slack tide that can last up to an hour. When I am spearfishing we use this slack tide to spear large groupers that frequent the cuts. It is the only time you can actually "cut dive safely" without being driven out to sea or in on the rocks

This is very true...I don't have the "balls" to swim in "cuts". Last summer, I was being pulled behind the boat looking for conchs on the Sounthern side of Rose Island. I saw a conch, went down and when I came up everyone was shouting at me to get back to the boat because of 2 sharks. I never saw the sharks and I didn't really care about the sharks, but it frightened me because I couldn't swim in the direction I wanted because I got too close to the cut and it was sucking me in! The boat had to pull up to me and then I had to be pulled in the boat, by which time I was exhausted from kicking so long. "Slack tide" as they call it is the only time you can successfully line or spearfish in a cut unless you have a motor strapped to your back. I'm not sure what species of marine life thrives down there because I don't have the guts to go and look or wait on slack tide, but it would be interesting to know...

 

[Jessbo]

The main reason for the seas to be a bit calmer at night is mostly due to wind. The sun powers the wind, which blows across the water, creating its waves and its own current. This is why at night, the surface water seems to be calmer due to less wind. But beneath the waves, the worlds currents usually stay the same.

From my time diving in Hawaii, the current is quite strong compared to what I have reproduced in my little environment. The whole water column moves as a whole, rather than the streams created by power heads or closed loops. As some have mentioned, creating random currents is the key.

Live rock in your tank should provide the necessary cover for your fish to take a break. But if you wanted to replicate nature a little better, slow your flow over the surface of the water. It will also slow the currents lower in your tank just a little but, but not too much to need to worry about detrious settling.

And remember, different corals thrive in different locations(surf, lagoons, deep water, etc.). These areas usually provide the same type of environment day after day. So coral selection along with flow of your tank, lighting, etc., are very important in order to mimic their natural settings.

Ocean life was created in order to keep things in balance, not to look nice. So putting two colonies in your tank, that normally are in different aquatic environments, will allow one to thrive while the other hardly does well at all. Even though they both would look great in your tank, they aren't meant to both be there together. So much consideration needs to be taken with the type of coral you can keep with the flow your tank provides.