Eric didn't say go skimmerless. He just says that corals use DOM.

reef_raf, how often do you feed your corals? Do you target feed or tank feed?

Re: BOB_I please respond
 

No, it is not. I will qualify my statement. When I say I don't have algae problems I am not saying there is no algae in my tanks. I have a bit of brown algae on the sandbed in my 50, but don't consider it a problem. I have just moved that tank so a algae was expected, but I can live with it. Also my Rainford's Goby seems to like it. :rolleyes:

I have tried some skimmers,but found nothing I liked. I had a Prizm, but it did nothing so I sold it. My tank is sumpless, so if I got a skimmer it would have to be a HOB. Frankly the way things go, I feel I can really do without. The Chemipure costs me about $25.00 a year, so in 10 years I will have spent enough to have bought a skimmer. I probably won't have a tank in 10 years. My goal now is to live that long. :biggrin:

how much and how often are you using the chempure Bob?

Steve

I feed the tank some GP or baby brine when I think of it. Unfortunately I don't think about it much. I have fed the tank probably 4 times this year. In fact, I just fed today and the corals were gobbling up the food.
If you look back thru the reefkeeping.com site, you'll see Eric has a 4 part series on coral feeding. DOM was only a small part of what they eat. I also know of some really awesome tanks hat have never fed the corals anything but light. IMO, a skimmer is something essential to keeping a reef. Some will disagree, and that's fine. I dump about 3 litres of sludge out of my collection container every 2 weeks. I would hate to be a fish swimming around in that sewage. You can save a lot of money not buying a skimmer, but I believe it's false economy to do so.

I am respectfully going to decline answering this question. I think you will probably take the opportunity to attempt to correct my methodology, and I have really had enough correction for now. I feel I have answered the original question adequately. :rolleyes:

I haven't gotten all the through the book yet. One thing that keeps coming to mind is the fact that corals are desinged to feed. I personally think that feeding is more important than light. When I look at pictures of peoples tanks with the MH lighting the corals are doing fine but are long and thin. I believe that with good lighting ( not 400watt MH) and target feeding the corals would do better. I think that the corals under high MH lighting are doing well is because of the zooantellae are growing more than they should be trying to get as much energy from the light as possible because thats all they get. With proper nutrition I think the corals would be heathier and live alot longer than ones that are placed under MH lighting only or with little food. You just have to look at all those polyps on the corals and think that they are a food machine more that light assorbing. If they only needed light, there would be far fewer polyps and more surface area to collect light not food. JMO

Marty, a couple of points. I assume you are talking SPS by your description, right? Long thin growth is due to lack of strong current, not nutrition. The higher the flow, the thicker the branches.
Yes, corals are eating machines and I agree that they should be fed. Please look up the articles I mentioned for the full story, your book doesn't go into that detail.
Light provides the carbs for the coral thru photosynthesis. Plankton supplies protien. There is oftern sufficient detritus to feed corals in an established reef, along with naturally occuring plankton. Supplemental feeding is still needed, IMO.
The more light, the greater the growth. You can certainly keep SPS with 175w, I did for a long time. However, the color and growth I get with 400w is many times more than what I experienced with 175s. The amount of light a coral is actually exposed to in nature is so far beyond what we could provide in a reef that you can't even comapre it here. 400w is in no way anywhere near too much light.
Further to this, if you look at Jamie Cross' tank in the TOM on RC, you'll see how little zooxanthalae are actually present by the bright white branches and colorful pigments. Zoox are brown, not blue and white. Jamie uses 250DE bulbs, known to be as bright or brighter than 400w bulbs. He feeds if and when he gets around to it also and his corals grow like weeds. They get food from somewhere. Jamie also runs a large beckett skimmer and does frequent water changes. (Jamie, hope you don't mind me using you like this :razz: )
Marty, you can't make blanket statments by reading part of a book. You need to read a lot more, and keep this critters for awhile. And I have to emphasize, read that 4 part article by Eric on feeding, you'll be glad you did. :lol:

yes I have only read alittle of the book, but I am not making a blank statement this is just what i have been noticing in my tank. The more I feed the better they are doing. I still have alot to learn as does everyone else.(Me more so that most :smile: ) But the first people who kept reefs didn't have MH or anything even close to what we have now and they managed to get this wonderful hobby going. Had of they not had success we wouldn't be enjoy the fruits of their labour. I have never used MH lights so I am trying different things to see how well I can get stuff to grow with PC's. Erics book is good but he is not God. Mother nature only knows what is best, I just try to to keep my tank happy. If I find something that works for me, i would like to pass it on to everyone for comments. And I'm not saying turn out the lights and pour the food in, it is a balance of both. I was just asking BOB_I how his tank was doing with no skimmer. Some day if I get the chance to try MH, I'm there. I will keep using my skimmer for now.