Filer questions

[NaH2O]

NaH2O: I have N. snails which remove everything that drops on my ¼ - ½’’ crushed coral. In addition, I have shrimps&crabs who anxiously wait for stuff to drop down.
My system is essentially BB, I added sand for aesthetics and because I have so much of it from my 55 g which I am breaking down currently.

Nassarius snails, shrimps and crabs have waste products, too.

You are right. There is no maintenance free system just yet although that is and should be the ultimate goal. However, I significantly decreased my maintenance work. I have to skimmer to take care of, no siphoning of the sand, and due to high flow, at least half of my live rocks do not need attention/cleaning anymore. And harvesting macro algae, that takes 10 seconds, tear it and throw it away once in about two weeks. About the mud, the manufacturer recommends replacing half of it every two years.

According to Leng Sy, a portion of the MM should be replaced every 18-24 months. Sue Truett (her tank was in the book Ultimate Reef Aquariums), had some issues with her MM. You can read about what she learned from Mike Paletta and Leng Sy in this thread: Scroll down to post #71 Let's Talk About ~Filtration Concepts~. The length of time the mud is viable is going to depend on bioload. I suspect using a skimmer with the ecosystem filtration will allow the bed to be viable for longer. The changing out of the mud, I feel, will also help keep it "fresh". I have a problem with the make-up of the mud....really high aluminum and iron (Miracle Mud Analysis).

Krish: You are right in that two systems are never alike. However, do not forget that I do not use a skimmer and I need my gunk to be removed from water. My (bio) balls seems to just aid doing just that. The lower half of the balls column are submerged in water which has not much flow (I have a 6’’ T – piece pipe). I drilled a few small holes in the pipe at the bottom, but I did that to prevent completely still water. I suppose these lower balls are in a rather anaerobic environment, thus aiding nitrate removal. I do monitor my nitrates twice a week, and I do 3% water changes every week. I had 5 ppm nitrates after I added the bioballs for 2 weeks, and then it went back to 0.
karl

I don't know why you all dismiss the possibility of my chaeto absorbing a good portion of my nitrates.

I think your mud is doing more for the nitrates than the chaeto. With the MM set-up, bioballs are put prior to the mud. This allows the nitrate water to go to the mud for denitrification. The fine particle size of the mud is great for this. Then, by using macro algaes, you get the export. Here is a quote on growth rates of different macros from another thread (Caulerpa Toxicity in Perspective):

Collin you are calculating under the premise of taxifolia being 80x more toxic in regards to cyn. When in the wild with out competition it is closer to 25x. Also if their is no competition it can increase its cyn output by 42% This will change the numbers a tad. You are also comparing a freak aquarium version of Taxifolia to a native racemosa, Can it be assumed that the racemosa has not morphed in our aquariums exactly like the taxifolia has??Also we can assume that in a refugium its going to be non competitive and perfect light and heat conditions, Prime for the production of CYN.
Regardless Collin, IMHO if a person wants to run a refugium and they are choosing a macro algae to use in it. When choosing you have to take a number of things into consideration, including secondary chemicals, possibility of sexual, growth rates and so on. Here is a table of the growth rates of a few algaes
Halimeda: ~4% / day (20-40 mg/g/d)
Dictyota: ~ 10% (50-100 mg/g/d)
Padina: ~ 10% (75-100 mg/g/d)
Caulerpa: ~ 10% (50-100 mg/g/d)
Thalassia: ~1.5% (10-15 mg/g/d)
Palmaria: ~25% (tripled in 1 week)
Enteromorpha: 20% (7 fold increase in 1 month)
Gracilaria: 10% / day
Cheleto: 15% (5 fold increase in 1 month)
cyanobactor: 35% (300-400 mg/g/d)

Now when you look at these and say eliminate the most toxic (caulerpa, dictyota and Padina), then eliminate cyano because it is gross and tough to harvest, you are left with several great exporters, that are easy to grow and harvest, have a low sexual rate and you dont have a problem with toxins. Now if you still wish to use caulerpa, by all means


Mike

 

[charlyclown]

Wave98: It’s clownguy who has the nitrate problems, I have ~0 nitrates and I would turn on the skimmer and do more frequent water changes if I had >10 nitrates, for sure.

I get mechanical filtration because I stacked my (bio)balls together in the upper layers of my bioballs in the overflow. That gives me the following benefits: 1. it practically completely eliminates the water flowing sounds 2. keeps my smaller fish out of the overflow and last, it traps larger detritus. The disadvantage is that I have to clean the stuff every month or so. This of course depends on how and what you feed. I use a feeding station, which work really great. I used a material mesh before, but they clogged to fast and required almost daily cleaning.



Clayton: People used to never ask the Earth was flat. I did check for myself the Earth is not flat; it’s a quite simple experiment.
I also never claimed Chaeto removes nitrates completely. And I think we are moving in a circle here. My system works and I know other people w/o skimmers who have beautiful tanks. There are several ways that lead to Rome. I know also people w/ skimmers who have problems with their tanks, too. Probably, both pathways are radical. One removes nothing and the other removes bad but also good stuff. You may also argue the heavy metals buildup and so forth in my system. However, it all boils down to good husbandry.
If you do scientific experiments, you do need to keep as many parameters constant as possible. Temperature is some of them. That makes the difference between scientific and non-scientific experiment design. I will also not switch things around in the same tank. Instead, after one experiment I will remove all water, disinfect the tank and start all over again with cycling and so on. Otherwise, the experiments are not reproducible and thus not really objective. I am also not in a hurry and would like to concentrate on one tank at a time.



Nikki: thanks for the warning regarding bioload. Regarding MiracleMud, high iron and aluminum do not mean that they are readily dissolved in water. Also, spectroscopy used does not say anything about the chemical (actual molecules) and physical state (crystal structure, stability of that structure, ability to dissolve in sea water and so forth). Also iron and particularly aluminum are not particularly toxic substances and as of aluminum, it’s the most abundant metal in the earth’s crust.

Karl