Micro Bubbles?

[Zenoah1439]

Probably a questions i should already know the answer to, but i did a few searches with the search tool and could't find anything. Also looked through a few different locations on the forum and could't find anything. What exactly are "micro bubbles"?

It appears that they can be common in an improperly setup sump, but don't know if they are caused by other things. Only reason I ask is that i have one of my power heads mounted near my HOB filter. Occasionally the intake of the head will draw a bubble from the incoming HOB waterfall. In general, it just blows to the surface and is gone. Would this be classified as a micro bubble and if so, I'm guessing I need to add a little distance between the head and HOB? Why are micro bubbles so bad? Sounds like at least clams will react poorly to them, but are there other reasons to avoid them?

If there's already another post that describes these in detail, please point me in the right direction and I'm more than happy to read what may already be there.

 

[crazyfish253]

Micro bubbles are very very small and don't just float to the top of the tank. They mostly come out of hob Skimmers or Skimmers in general hints baffle in sump's. I guess there bad cuz they stick to rock and glass anywhere in the tank.

 

[steven11]

Most people avoid micro bubbles from a looks perspective. The tank won't look as nice with a bunch of bubbles floating around or attaching to rocks and such. I don't know that there are any negatives as far as the health goes for tank inhabitants. That is unless your tank constantly looks like the inside of a skimmer.

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[Zenoah1439]

Hey Steven11,

Thanks for the clarification. Makes sense to me. PS, I beleive that's a Lionfish on your post avatar? I always like the way those fish look, awesome pic!

Jim

 

[pandora32]

From my understanding, micro bubbles are a bad thing besides not looking "pretty" in your display. I was told a little while back that corals and the like that are sensitive to the air, could possibly die where the bubble lands. It makes sense to me anyways. Coral in the air or a coral under a bubble, same in my eyes. Also, I was told that a fish could develop a "bubble eye". Thats where the fish can get air behind the eye and the eye pushes outward. I dont know if thats true or not.
I would just prefer to keep the bubbles out.
Hope this helps.
pandora

 

[steven11]

Pandora- micro bubbles are not a cause of popeye. I also don't think that the micro bubbles will cause a healthy coral to die. Maybe speed up the death of an already dieing coral. Let me give you an example, I would frequently run my sump low to the point my return pump would suck air. It would put so many micro bubbles in the tank that I couldn't see my rock work. I would add water, tank would clear of bubbles, and believe it or not, the corals were feeding. Some would have their slime nets out, others their feeding tenticles. I guess they were feeding on all the crap the bubbles were suspending in the water column. Long story short, I didn't loose anything out of that tank because of the bubbles. I kept sps, lps softies, fish and clams. These bubbles were being injected into the tank for up to a couple hours at a time.

In fact, I remember seeing on here that somebody designed a system that would inject air into the return pumps multiple times a day. I think it was a half circle tank. Maybe Mojo or Krish can dig it up. Was a very cool idea to get rid of detritus. Not sure how well it worked though.

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[pandora32]

Thanks for the clarificatin. Like I said, its just something somebody told me a while back. If that thread about the bubble injection could be found, I would be real interesed in reading it.