Need advice on setting up a new refugium

[spieszak]

I only say how I did/do it or would do it.....doesn't make it the only way I no longer tell hobbiest how to do something flat out like the old days because you would miss the journey of research(most important part of the hobby to me). Think of your DT and refugium as one in the same just different cross sections of a marine environment you are researching, planning, and building. Once finished may they both be breath.....taking to look at") `

Cool, just to be clear, I wasn't questioning the advice, just trying to understand the thinking behind it. There are, and always will be people with not only more experience than me, but those that are much more well versed in their understanding of the why, not just the what. The WHY to me is incredibly more important than the what.
I take it from the "think of your DT and fuge as one in the same" comment that you disagree with the idea that managing detritus or the down sides of a DSB in a "satellite" tank is no easier than managing it in the DT?

 

[halmus]

So you advise rooting mangroves? I've seen lots of tanks where the mangroves are suspended, allowing their root system to develop in the water only, no substrate, and my understanding of that was that they are much better at exporting nutrients that way. I have almost rules out mangroves in that from my reading, you need to spray the leaves down at least daily, with some advising more than one... and I try to avoid daily maintenance tasks when possible. Its would be nice to hear from someone with real experience with them, as a lot of what I've read is one time posters, or "book knowledge"

I can't pretend to have any scientific basis for planting mangroves in a DSB. However, the DSB seems to provide nutrients that the mangroves love. So I suppose, in that application, you're actually creating nutrients in the DSB that the mangroves consume and therefore aren't removing from the general water column. Like I said, I like them because they're pretty but I can't say that I think they're particularly helpful in removing nutrients. Just leaving the roots exposed to water might do that more effectively. You're right about spraying them with water to wash off the salt that leaches out of the leaves. However, in my application, I built an acrylic enclosure entirely around the mangroves. That kept the humidity at 100%. I never once sprayed them down over years and they did fine. But, everyone's experience is different.

I want to reiterate, I'm not advocating for mangroves for any other reason than that I like them. There are too many people on forums that are convinced that their particular approach to the hobby is the gospel. There are certain parameters that have to be met, but ultimately, there are a million different gimmicks that work perfectly well for some and are a horrible failure to others. Good luck!

 

[halmus]

Hey guys, my "refugium" is just a small section in the center of my sump. As far as corals I'd like to have a little bit of everything. I'd like the fuge to be a place for natural filtration and a safe place for breeding pods. Halmus do you have any advice for me on planting and keeping a black mangrove sprout?

Like Spinner said, "I only say how I did/do it or would do it.....doesn't make it the only way"

My experience is:

I added an additional tank ~20g off of my sump. That acrylic enclosure had a 6" DSB. I planted mangroves in there and had 3 of the ~7K curly cheepo bulbs from Home D lighting the tank. I also had red ornamental algae in there along with some sponges. The entire time I had that up, I always claimed that I had no idea if it was helping or hurting the overall system. Was it creating more nutrients than it was exporting? I have no idea. I had a separate in-sump refugium just to grow out and remove cheato. The extra sump with mangroves was just there because I liked to look at it. I made an acrylic enclosure that trapped all the moisture in and never sprayed them. The mangroves loved it.

I had to take the tank down for a move. My next system will have a large tank with cheato, mangroves, and maybe some species specific fish like pipefish as a display fuge. They will inevitably eat some of the pods but some will also make it back into the display. I will have a sprinkler system incorporated running from my RO/DI reservoir to give them a shower daily. Maybe it will work, maybe it won't. Either way, like Spinner said, half the fun is the research as long as I'm not risking the health of the tank's inhabitants.

 

[spieszak]

You're right about spraying them with water to wash off the salt that leaches out of the leaves. However, in my application, I built an acrylic enclosure entirely around the mangroves. That kept the humidity at 100%. I never once sprayed them down over years and they did fine. But, everyone's experience is different.

I want to reiterate, I'm not advocating for mangroves for any other reason than that I like them. There are too many people on forums that are convinced that their particular approach to the hobby is the gospel. There are certain parameters that have to be met, but ultimately, there are a million different gimmicks that work perfectly well for some and are a horrible failure to others. Good luck!

How did you keep the enclosure free of salt creep? Gotta say I like that idea, just wondering if it what it did was shift maintenance from spraying the leaves, to cleaning the enclosure?
I agree on the "my way or the highway" approach a lot of forum users take. It saddens me that people don't see how much flexibility there is in the hobby, especially considering the wide range of systems we set out to accomplish now, as compared to years ago when you were looking to just keep animals alive in captivity. We'd still be there if folks smarter than me hadn't tried this, that or the other to provide a better quality of life for what they are trying to keep. Keep in mind that I think there are a few things that shouldn't be done, but those things tend to be where there is a fairly obvious result that is in detriment to the animals. Other than that, new approaches or calculated risks, when they are backed up by an understanding of what the downsides can be, are what advances the hobby.

 

[halmus]

This was taken before the mangroves really started to fill in. They seemed to do better as the DSB matured and their roots became more established. The root system was extensive when it came time to remove them.

The water line was far below the removable lid. I never cleaned or touched this fuge unless I was pruning algea for people that wanted some of the red stuff. I ended up having to extend the lid to make room for the mangrove's growth. In the future, I will leave plenty of room for them to grow out.

 

[spieszak]

That is awesome. It doesn't look like it would work well for the display fuge I'm planning, but it definitely looks like a great way to handle the requirement. Now you have me thinking about mangroves in the sump rather than the fuge.

 

[Spinner]

Cool, just to be clear, I wasn't questioning the advice, just trying to understand the thinking behind it. There are, and always will be people with not only more experience than me, but those that are much more well versed in their understanding of the why, not just the what. The WHY to me is incredibly more important than the what.
I take it from the "think of your DT and fuge as one in the same" comment that you disagree with the idea that managing detritus or the down sides of a DSB in a "satellite" tank is no easier than managing it in the DT?

I am a fan of sand and have had NNR beds, no bed, RDSB, and 3" DT sand bed. They all do different things and have different requirements for upkeep. If A system is having a detritus build up problem it may not be set up right there are to many way's to deal with detritus in the water column for it to be a real problem above normal tank maintenance.
There is a lot of reefer's that have a lot of this down and there is way more that don't. Time in the hobby and forum post count don't always equal correct information ask your questions get many answers then research......when an answer matches research from more than one view/place then you have truth The trick and fun is to find it......

 

[spieszak]

There is a lot of reefer's that have a lot of this down and there is way more that don't. Time in the hobby and forum post count don't always equal correct information ask your questions get many answers then research......when an answer matches research from more than one view/place then you have truth The trick and fun is to find it......

I agree, post count and time don't equate to correct information... but I try not to discount or trust anyone's opinion based on anything other than the information provided. Post count and time do sometimes correlate with how well someone explains something though. Folks who have taken the time to explain a theory more than once usually have worked out how to make it make sense to the most people.
I had to do a search on NNR. Quick results say NNR is DSB, and DSB sure seems to be more wrought with conflict that a lot of other topics. Are you equating the two, or are there differences I should spend more time looking at?

 

[Spinner]

No just different way's to have or not have sand. I had good luck with running a NNR bed for 3.5 yrs. some didn't? I wasn't growing SPS so not sure how that would work.

 

[xxkenny90xx]

What a discussion, I'm also not sure that the mangroves will be extremely beneficial, but I have a sprout so might as well see if I can grow it. I have read that suspending it half in and half out of the water simulates being hit with waves on the shore and encourages faster growth.

 

[Stkef9]

I just setup my sump as well im using some miracle mud i got from a friend and a bit of live sand I had left over with one piece of LR just for somewhere for pods to hangout. Idk maybe thats not right but just one more spot for bio filter

 

[xxkenny90xx]

I've never really read anything on the mud, is it just another type of substrate like live sand?

 

[Stkef9]

I honestly don't really know how much it actually benefits but it's 80% ocean mud and 20% nutrients and trace elements. I only used it because I had it laying around and wanted a substrate in my fuge. I thinl
of it as the plant substrate you can get for freshwater planted tanks. I've used it before and I've gone without and I still saw great plant growth. SEems like good stuff but who really knows

 

[spieszak]

i've never read anything bad on the mud either really, other than its overpriced for what it is, and can have the same 'bad' effects as a dsb if deep enough and not healthy

 

[Stkef9]

Yeah idk I tend to steer away from people saying one way is bad this is better because each way seems to have benefits/problems. I only have maybe a 1/2-1" bed in the fuge and like 1.5 in the display.

 

[spieszak]

Yeah, I wasn't trying to say it was bad... just noting it can have the same issues that can be noted with any deep substrate. The issues only exist when deep substrate isn't healthy as far as I know... so the mud isn't bad or good, and neither is a dsb. In either case though, you need to know what the problems 'could' be, so you know what to look for and how to maintain so as to avoid them.