Fish Only Setup

If you don't have live rock, or any other method of exporting nitrates, you absolutely need to do water changes.

 

+1 on blackraven

Russ - what are you going to have in the tank in the form of decor? hiding places for the fish etc?


Steve

 

I figured that the use of the protein skimmer, canister filter along with compounds and additives like purigen would keep the nitrate level down?

I would use the standard decor that would be used in a freshwater setup. Like fake plants and gravel, the standard aquarium fixtures that are found in stores like petco and petsmart.

 

The canister won't do anything for nitrates, except for maybe raise them, if you don't clean it enough.

The protein skimmer will help keep them from skyrocketing, but it won't keep them down on its own. It just removes a good portion of organics before they break down.

Purigen isn't a long-term solution; it does exactly the same job as a protein skimmer - remove things before they break down. It doesn't chemically remove nitrates the way a refugium, denitrator, or live rock will. What you'll be doing with purigen is bleaching it constantly, and putting it back in the tank, praying that you got every last drop of bleach out of the stuff.

As for "standard freshwater decor", it makes a tank look cheesy, like a 5 year old decorated it, and leaves your fish in a state where they're stressed to the max because it's not remotely a naturalistic environment and they have none of the nooks and/or crannies to hide in that they would in the wild.

By forgoing live rock, you eliminated the option to grow an environment similar in process to the wild, in exchange for an artificially-created physical space; doing that alone goes against what most people who are serious about keeping saltwater tanks believe, let alone not allowing for the natural biological processes. Then not wanting to do water changes, when there's quite a few other problems (the need to "keep fish alive" rather than "keep fish happy") with the plan, really isn't beneficial to your side.

 

Thanks for your advice and input. Based on what you're saying, it sounds like it's extremely hard to keep saltwater fish without live rock. I've seen it done though, so that's why I was interested in more info about that particular type of setup. I thought maybe folks have come up with a way to have a fish only setup that's as efficient as a fish only with live rock.

Freshwater setups may look cheesy to you, but to other families out there, it's a way to make a tank a little more unique and special rather than just having rocks.

Thanks again for your time and input.

 

Hey Russ4h

Its your tank and your choice on the way its decorated
as long as you do have hiding places then the fish have an escape if they get stressed / scared etc
you will have to research the type of fish- for example if you dont have a sand bed , then many species of wrasse would not be happy
but yellow tailed blue damsels would be happy to swim in and around a dead finger coral skeleton for example.

so one or 2 pieces of rock would be ideal anyway IMO as it will give a natural feeling and retreat for fish that require that .

in this scenario - you will have to place your biological filtration needs in a cannister
but as stated before, you do need to clean it regular using old tank water to prevent escalating Nitrates

media such as ceramic rings or sintered glass rings provide massive surface area so enough real estate to easily deal with the waste of a sensible bio load ( dont take tank stocking to the max )
keep them clean by using a sponge or floss above them and rinsing this weekly and changing / replacing often

Purigen, my experience over 12 months now has been very good with this product to be honest, I purchased twice as much as I need so that I always have a spare bleached and rinsed and soaked cleand and then left outside ( for weeks at a time in all honesty on my balcony) and IME in my 5ft with 4 fish, no sump, no fuge system I maintain 0 - 2.5 Nitrates and have done so since introducing this media to my cannister - I use Red Sea, Hippo and Tetra Nitrate test kits ( and do use all 3 to verify, check my results) the amount I use is double the amount suggested as the min required for volume of water and when my nitrate starts showing, thats when I swap out the 2 x pouches and put them in bleach and put in the pouches that I bleached previously and Im getting at least 3 months between the need to do this
but as stated I have 4 fish only in a 5ft x 20 x 18 inch tank ( 2 x YTB damsels, a yellow tang and a radient wrasse) I dont feed excessively and perform 5% water changes each week


Steve

 

you could use base rock with just a couple small peices of liverock to seed it.If your trying to keep your cost down,this is a very cheap way to go.I run a 20 gallon with 5 small fish,inverts and several corals with a hang on back typical filter and a protein skimmer.I run near 0 nitrates,but i do 10% water changes about every 2 weeks.My nitrates however don't climb,but i still do water changes just to keep them in check.

 

Most people who have open water tanks with open water fish have live rock in the sump, so they still have the benefits of filtration it provides.

You seem to miss that the rocks aren't "just rocks" in the tank; they're covered in life once you get started. Coralline algae covers most of it after a few months, but depending on whether you get dead or still-alive rock, you might have nearly any kinds of organisms. Mine has mussels, barnacles, crabs, tiny pistol shrimp, spaghetti worms, sponges, tunicates, snails, bristleworms, pods (very important; lots of fish eat them), and a whole bunch of stuff I'm likely forgetting.

I've had my tank up for about 4 months, and I just discovered the mussels a couple weeks ago - they're elusive. The rock (at least the rock I got) are almost as interesting to look at as the rest of the tank. It adds a level of detail completely unattainable with plastic decorations, and makes the tank much more unique in terms of both diversity and things to see, learn and know than you can even hope to achieve without live rock.

Although I trust your judgment, I would point out that it's very possible to keep nitrates between 0-2.5 without the use of purigen, even when not using a fuge/sump.

 

Agreed 100%,you should really consider rock in your tank,not only for the nessesary bacteria,but like blackraven said, it's facinating to watch,i started with about half live and half dead,now it is all becoming coming covered in life,I have a mussell i found about 2 months ago,baby brittle starfish,just found a asterina star last week and i could go on and on about different things in there,you literally can go in a trance looking at it.You should consider it.