Noteworthy, glad to hear your tank is doing better. Kudos on the large waterchange, glad to read it worked so well for you. Sometimes they are a chore to do, but if you adjust the levels properly they are great for the system. I have a friend who is a commercial breeder who uses 100% waterchanges every week. Of course he just pumps it in straight from the ocean so a little easier for him then the rest of us.
IMO I would try adding the refugium with the macro algaes and seeing how far your nitrate levels drop before investing in more equipment. IME refugiums alone can not only stablalize a tank and keep nitrates low, but are also very beneficial in other areas as they produce so much good stuff for our tanks.
I have a friend Len who owns Window to the Sea, he had his Ecosystem style tank featured in Coral Magaine last year. His tank is incredible, not only to look at, but also because in the last three years the only thing he has ever added to the tank was calcuim and mysis. no other addatives at all. no protein skimmer. Just very heavy feeding, calcuim supplements, and a nice size refugium. I didn't even believe the guy at first, thought his tank was going to crash soon, but it keeps chugging along. Proof there are several ways to keep a sucsessful tank.
Don, have you ever cracked open a piece of dead rock that has been in a system for years? It looks significantly different from a piece of traditional liverock, and even more different then a piece of rock that was imported with a coral attached. JME
While the anaerobic bacteria can colonize sandbeds in a couple of months, IME it takes far longer for it to accumulate in a piece of rock. JME, could be unique or differ from others. I've run this test a few different times and always had the same results. I even tried burying pieces of dead rock in an 8 inch sandbed for 6 months, keeping temperatures relativley high to encourage growth and maintaining a constant level of nitrates and did not notice any anaerobic growth in the interior of the rock.
Like I said, I'm not a scientist and the experiements I have conducted are very limited and do not stand up to the scrutiny of scientific methods as they lack repitition. I do know of a few professionals currently conducting similiar experiments, which is why I was inspired to conduct my own, but they are yet to be published. When I first heard about others findings I was skeptical so I went home and cracked open a rock, the rest kind of went from there.
Also, have you ever used a remote DSB yourself? I have found them to be quite effective at continued nitrate reduction. I feed heavily, my nitrates are 0. I do also use macro algaes. Just curious as to why you think they are not worth the hassle.
Damsel, I don't think a cannister filter would make an effective remote DSB IMO due to it's lack of size. Also the way the cannister filters I have used work it would be closer to a fluidized sandbed which can grow toxic very quickly if there is a disruption in flow or power. JMO, I have never tried it myself, but those are the problems I forsee, I could be wrong
JMO
HTH
