Water Purification

[Bob I]

There is a serious flaw in the poll question. It matters not to me that skimmers exist because I don't use one, and most importantly I have no desire, or plan to get one. IMO skimmers are grossly overrated gadgets.

[TheReefGeek]

I would think you would have to try one in order to be able to say whether they are overrated or not. If you could say you ran without one, then ran with one, then ran without one again, and saw no benefit with the skimmer, then you could say they are overrated. But saying they are overrated without ever trying it, im not sure how you would justify your opinion.

[richtg]

I decided to make the poll based on the fact that the vast majority of reefers (IMO) would have chosen skimmers as their first choice. I wanted to know what people felt about other forms of filtration and open a general discussion about them.

Ozonators will have to fall into the "other" category, as most people have a budget that wouldn't allow one.

Great input so far,
Rich.

[TheReefGeek]

First would be live rock and sand for me, not a skimmer.

[Bob I]

I do want to mention that I am not totally devoid of filtration means. I have for years used Chemipure in a Fluval. I don't know if it does wonders as claimed. However, I have never had a problem with tank crashes etc., therefore I will continue using it even when later in the year I am forced to go FOWLR. And as a note to Brad, I have a few bits of SPS corals. Notably a smallish colony of Blue Tipped Staghorn that does great.

[danny zubot]

Bob, if you've never had one then how can you possibly decide if they are "grossly overated" Have you seen skimmate?

[Bob I]

It would of course be an exercise in futility to engage in an argument. I have stated an opinion, and that is as far as I will go. I have run a very successful reef tank for the last five years without resorting to a skimmer except a brief unsatisfying experience with one, and my decision is to leave the gadget to those who believe there is need for one.

[TheReefGeek]

Yes, it is possible to run a successfull reef without a skimmer, nobody will argue that.

But could that same reef be run easier, and possibly even healthier, with a skimmer?

Bob, what skimmer did you try, on what size tank? What made the experience unsatisfying?

[Beverly]

I'm with boB on this one.

A few years ago, we ran a Precision Marine HOT skimmer on our first two reefs for about 2-3 years. Produced great skimmate! But fiddling with it to remove micro bubbles, fiddling to get the skimmate not too wet or too dry, and coming home to at least two floods was just too much freaking work! Now that we live in a second storey condo, floods are a major no-no

I know we do exta work to compensate for the lack of skimmers on our three reefs, but we don't have any more floods and don't have to fiddle with extra machinery. IMO, our reefs look great.

Rory and countless others have seen our skimmerless reefs. Anyone care to comment on how our reefs are doing without skimmers?

[Psyire]

I think you can run a tank just fine without a skimmer. However once you get into the bigger tanks a skimmer is almost a necessity, due to the amount of time and money required to due major upkeep all the time. My total system volume nears 250 gallons and I would not like changing 10-20% of this every week. If I was retired and didn't have much on the go, well I could manage that, but I'm not. I perfer doing less waterchanges and pulling oodles of junk out with my skimmer. I also think that the balance in my tank is better due to the fact that I'm always pulling out waste that is theoretically introduced as food everyday. It dosen't accumulate until my next water change.

Bev gets away with not skimming, but she's also on a very strict maintenance schedule that some people would have a hard time adhereing to.