Water Changes Needed or Not. Please Vote!

My system went online 05/17/2010 & I have NEVER done a water change.. So, that is well over a year now. I loose 3gal of water a day from evaporation, that my ATO system takes care of. If that is the case, 21gal of fresh RODI water goes into my system every week. That is 84gal a month of new water going into my system. The salt never leaves the system. My clowns, blue-green chromis, & bi-colored angel are over 5 years old & even on my old 29gal I have never done a water change.

It also helps that all my skimmers have been over sized.

IMO water changes can lead to unwanted swings in Salinity, CA, MG, ALK, etc... Granted if there is a major problem & a water change is needed, it is what it is. But if your system is fine, why mess with it. IBM's golden rule "If it's not broken, don't fix it!"

 

I think this is definitely debatable. Last year, I would have yes it is for sure, needed.

But with a larger skimmer (which I have as well)...when you wet skim, you take out quite a bit of water along with your nutrients which are being exported. Then that water is replenished when you top-off (for the most part). So when you wet skim, opposed to getting a thicker, darker skimmate, you are routinely changing out more water.

I will be doing 1/4 a gallon automated water changes on my 29g reef...using 2 timers. Is it necessary? No. but I think I feel better If I know my water is being cycled more often...I suppose.

 

^ With that said, for the past 6 months my tank has been set up..I have done maybe 2 water changes? I have 10ppm nitrates and running a skimmer but that is it.

 

Oh, I know this is going to be debated.. Caution on wet skimming, you are removing salt with it as well.. Thus, dropping your salility.. Make sure you are testing your salinity level.

 

That is an interesting concept. I never thought about doing no water changes. I do it maybe every other week or every three weeks if I'm lazy.

When you wet skim, or skim in general, aren't you also taking out salt in the water as well as waste? Then add the ATO and you are slowly lowering salinity. Not sure if that is the case or not, but if it is then you would need to do a water change or something to get salinity back up

 

Yes, that's why I said "for the most part". That makes it a bit more confusing. I would need to calculate the amount of salt being lost and add that to the days ATO water(maybe?).

 

Yes, you are correct. I get barely any skimmate right now (even wet skimming) because I only have 2 hermit crabs for livestock. lol. but I still need to figure that part out (varying salinity).

 

You are still removing some salt, but not to the extent of wet skimming.. When I notice my salinity drop a little, I'll do what I call a hot mix. I'll add about a gal or two of saltwater at 1.030-1.050 or so to my return.. Depending of how low the salt is. I do this about once every 6-8 months maybe.. Keep in mind, my 90gal setup has about 130gal of water.

 

That sounds a lot better than trying to keep up with water changes. May have to try it when I get my 40 Breeder up and running. Can't do it with a 10 gallon tank, no skimmer. Haha

 

I've done the "very few/no water change" route a few times. Long term I've never been able to keep a tank that way and achieve the same level of coral health I get from doing regular water changes. If you can make it work, more power to you!