[no_bs]

Originally Posted by DiverDude

There certainly is a lot of variance in the advice that one can get. That was an interesting read and underscores just how much 'fluff' floats around forums. Although, even among the academics, you realize that not everyone had hard, experimental proof backing their recommendations.

People tend to recommend what has worked for them in the past and while that's fine, we need to realize that no 2 tanks are the same (volume, flow rate, bio load, livestock mix, lighting type, lighting intensity, etc. etc.) so to suggest to someone that they should do what you have done, isn't necessarily good advice.

So from all of this, I take that a) I need VERY little carbon for my 29 Gal tank b) I should run it perhaps for 1 day a week or maybe even only when I suspect something is up in the tank. c) putting it in my sump (pretty much my only option) isn't the ideal place for it because it's seeing ~300gph

Valid point, but we try and use this info as a starting point and experiment with this.