My skimmerless goal

definitely interested in seeing how this goes. Unfortunately, i don't see me ever being disciplined enough to decrease my bio-load to where i can make it without a skimmer.

 

I should mention... I have absolutely no intention of running a light bio-load. Or being easy on feeding. I plan to feed 3 cubes and a half sheet of nori every day and coral foods once a week.

My plan is extremely aggressive Algae Scrubbing and use of remote DSBs as a back up if needed. I'm really not nearly as opposed to the skimmer as I am gfo, pellets and additives.

I think Water changes, algae and sand are pretty darn natural ways of filtration. Foam fractionization isn't a far step either, beaches do use this form and you can see foam build up on shores in my area. I just felt as though it removed foods to aggressively and didn't serve much other purpose.


Reading that article dingo provided here is a breakdown of what the skimmer in the experiment exported:

8% inorganic ions
26 % of CaCO3
7% of MgCO3
21% of biogenic opal (SiO2)
38% of organic material
1.5% of phosphate
1.3 % of ferric oxide


I don't want removal of the following: (but, all are easily replaced)
26 % of CaCO3
7% of MgCO3
38% of organic material


But, the 8% inorganic ions and the 21% biogenic opal (SiO2) scare me the most about removing my skimmer. I'm not sure on export of either of these out side the water change schedule...

 

Never tried the intermittent skimming and honestly I don't know if I would be interested in trying it?
But anyways, the Si will lead directly to extra diatom growth, which then leads to them dying and turning everything brown. Then as the dead diatoms decay it leads to cyano. I have found that eliminating silicates leads to the difference between a nice tank and and exceptionally clean one. This is why I prefer over skimming.
Also, you mentioned that you feed a lot... The frozen and the nori have high levels of phosphate and silicate binders in them :-/

 

Yeah, the silicates are the only part that scare me... Phosphate is readily removed by algae scrubbers... Silicate on the other hand isn't.

Hmm.. definitely will be taking this one step at a time and won't be selling my skimmer.

 

I ran my 75g for the first 4-5 months I think with just a ATS. I just find natural filtration more interesting to me. Now granted were talking a new tank & a light bioload, but at the same time were were talking new guy that fed the hell out of it. Feed till the food fell past the fish to the bottom. Yes I have fixed that since then. Anyways I ran the ATS & all worked well, stable near perfect params consistently, so algae outbursts, cyano, everything was fine. I think picked up a brand psk-75 skimmer from the local want adds for so cheap it was nearly just what shipping costs would be online. Didnt think I needed it, but for the price the resale value alone I could break even. Anyways I added it to the tank & the only benefit I seen was the water just looked clearer. I have fish, inverts, LPS, softies, and even a few pieces of SPS and had growth out of all of them. I think the skimmer just helped remove some of the trace whatevers that were in the water. So I am a fan of both ATS & skimmer, but I dont think a need all, be all solution of just one or the other is the answer. Like reef-a-holic said the answer is finding what works for you and your system and for me the answer is a little bit of both.

 

Didn't you read Randy's article? Disagree? I add 1.5ml of sodium silica a week. Does a lot of good IMO and I haven't seen any negatives.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2003/1/aafeature1

As long as you keep the silicates under 2ppm or so, there shouldn't be any visible diatoms. There are a lot of organisms that use silica though, in an established reef that is pretty easy. Also, GFO will tend to remove silica, if phosphate is low. So, that can help...

 

I am curious about this too--I even thought about 2 days on, two days off, or something of that nature.

 

Are there any tests available to find the lvl of silicate in my system?

As far as diatoms, just because there is silicate doesn't mean they will grow, you can still strip the water of phosphate and that will become the limiting factor of growth (something algae scrubbers do exceptionally well)

 

Wanted to comment on running a skimmer at intervals. Depending on your system and timers available to you, i would think that you will want to run your skimmer at an interval that will not dry out the sides and/or slime bacteria coat on inside of it. As long as the internals of it stay wet, i would imagine no issues firing it back to up peak performance immediately.

I would start by running it in 5 minute intervals 4 times an hour (depending on timer) or once for 15 minutes an hour. If the inside doesn't dry, I can't see there being a re-break in period.

 

yes, that's the thing, a new tank doesn't interest me. I want to see how things are skimmerless 2 years from now. i rarely tested any nitrates (never over 5) until my tank was more than 1.5 years old.