Thoughts on over skimming

[sphelps]

Originally Posted by mr.wilson

I haven't tried vitamin C dosing, other than a bit in the food for lateral line disease, but this thread is pretty thorough. http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1602494

I'm surprised your nitrate and phosphate is zero and your calcium is 400 and alk 8, considering you have so many stony corals and you don't use carbon, phosphate remover, algae or coral harvesting, much in the way of a sand bed, ozone or UV sterilization. You also seem to have modest feeding practices (no phyto, baby brine, or rotifers). Usually coraline algae is a probiotic way of outcompeting nuisance algae, but you have stated that you discourage its growth.

Your old tank looked like it had the works, and the new one is pretty minimalist. What do you attribute your success to?

Thanks for the link.

I could try different test kits, mine are fairly old (Salifert Nitrate and Elos Phosphate) but they're not expired so I assume they're accurate. I'm always wondering what my clams are doing for me, perhaps I should look more into it.

Yeah my old tank went through about every kind of equipment available and it did get overly complicated in the end even when I tried to simplify things. I contribute my success to stability more than anything and just sticking to the basics. I believe most of what I was doing in the past was not necessarily needed and the goal with my new tank is determine the bare basics and keep things as simple as they need to be. If you have any suggestions I would love to hear them in my build thread, the tank is still a work in progress.

[hillegom]

From the tunze 9010 skimmer manual, I copied the following text.

"For operation in surroundings which tolerate a
very low noise level only (living room, bedrooms,
et cetera), the Comline DOC skimmer can be
connected up to a time switch (7). The unit may be
put out of action for eight hours a day, for example.
The missed protein skimming action is caught up
almost after the unit has been switched on again.
The Comline DOC skimmer has the advantageous
property of not changing its setting when switched
off. In this mode of operation, the skimmer should
not be run at the lower limit of the recommended
output for the aquarium."

Might just be propaganda, but it seems to say if you shut the skimmer off for a while (8hrs) then whatever skimming was missed, will be caught up.

[sphelps]

Originally Posted by hillegom

From the tunze 9010 skimmer manual, I copied the following text.

"For operation in surroundings which tolerate a
very low noise level only (living room, bedrooms,
et cetera), the Comline DOC skimmer can be
connected up to a time switch (7). The unit may be
put out of action for eight hours a day, for example.
The missed protein skimming action is caught up
almost after the unit has been switched on again.
The Comline DOC skimmer has the advantageous
property of not changing its setting when switched
off. In this mode of operation, the skimmer should
not be run at the lower limit of the recommended
output for the aquarium."

Might just be propaganda, but it seems to say if you shut the skimmer off for a while (8hrs) then whatever skimming was missed, will be caught up.

Thanks for the info, kinda what I figured.

[fishytime]

Just a thought but, I noticed in your pic that you have a relatively large leather mixed in there....I noticed quite an improvement will all my remaining corals after I removed all my leathers (xenia and toadstool) and started running a carbon reactor....I wouldnt think of doing a mixed reef without running carbon to help absorb any toxins that may be being released. Im not positive if the improvement was due to an increase in available nutrients or a decrease in "chemical warfare"

[sphelps]

Originally Posted by fishytime

Just a thought but, I noticed in your pic that you have a relatively large leather mixed in there....I noticed quite an improvement will all my remaining corals after I removed all my leathers (xenia and toadstool) and started running a carbon reactor....I wouldnt think of doing a mixed reef without running carbon to help absorb any toxins that may be being released. Im not positive if the improvement was due to an increase in available nutrients or a decrease in "chemical warfare"

The pic in this thread is a previous setup, I just used it as an example to show healthy LPS in high nutrients. I don't currently have any leather corals or much for soft corals at all. I'm going to start thinking about building a sump soon so I can filter the water properly including carbon.

[fishytime]

Oops.....ok never mind then....I'll shut up now

[sphelps]

Originally Posted by fishytime

Oops.....ok never mind then....I'll shut up now

Haha come one, it's all about the gum ball effect, every bit of insight helps and is appreciated.