Whats the longest you have gone without doing anything to your tank? [Archive]

pledosophy

07/28/2008, 12:27 PM

18 hours. No deaths. It came back fairly quickly.

I do have a tank that I ran for a few months without feeding it, or doing any maintence besides filling the ATO unit once a week. Everything was fine, but the bioload was such it did not need to be fed. Corals were all happy as well.

I have other systems were a few days without food would mean certain death for the inhabitants. All tanks are different, many creatures are different.

JUNI0R

07/28/2008, 12:30 PM

2 weeks, while I was on vacation but I had everything automated including feeding, however my skimmer was turned off. Besides a little algae on the glass everything looked just the way I left it.

Ricke

07/28/2008, 12:37 PM

8 days with no food and anybody watching it! It´s been a 80G low-tech tank.

It where like i left it when i came back. Belive it or not!

masonicman

07/28/2008, 12:42 PM

7 Days, but I had automatic feeding and my PS was shut off. Water was low but nothing major.

crvz

07/28/2008, 12:45 PM

probably 7 days or so without touching anything. All that was really necessary was to scrape the glass. It did fine.

HumbleLobster

07/28/2008, 02:14 PM

About 5 days. I had unexpected family issues come up about 200 miles away from my tank and thus I couldn't even top it off. My SG spiked up to about 1.027 and my skimmer cup was full, along with having a nice film on my glass. Otherwise, it was all fine. Just fed a few small meals over the course of the next few days to get the fish readjusted and some top offs and I was gold.

TXAlbert

07/28/2008, 02:30 PM

41 minutes. Thank gawwddd everything was just fine when I returned from the grocery store!

sikpupy

07/28/2008, 02:33 PM

41 minutes??? Wow, that might get you husband of the year award, lol.

billdogg

07/28/2008, 02:44 PM

5-7 days

xtm

07/28/2008, 02:57 PM

3 days max.. usually during long weekends when we go to Vegas. So far so good.

areze

07/28/2008, 03:06 PM

I might get banned...

but Id say 6 months.

I did top it off every few days, cleaned the glass every 2 weeks. no water changes, sump pump was broken so no skimmer. only had 1 fish, frogspawn, xenia, and clam. nothing died... fish was an algea eater.

tank still doesnt look right from algea outbreak though, no snails or anything to eat it. manual removal isnt cutting it.

reefergeorge

07/28/2008, 03:20 PM

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13039540#post13039540 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by sikpupy
41 minutes??? Wow, that might get you husband of the year award, lol.
At least he goes grocery shopping.

3 days for me. Everything was fine except some film algae.

sikpupy

07/28/2008, 03:23 PM

Mmmmm areze, auto water top off is barely allowable, as less water makes a stronger solution. Thats cutting it close but the judges said they will accept the final answer. You slid by because you didnt have any feedings in there, lol.

You will have to talk to the mods about the banning part. :)

DamnPepShrimp

07/28/2008, 03:54 PM

A month. I have my tanks setup to where all they need is to be topped off. I've been living at the beach all summer and only see my tank once a month. Everytime I go back, the corals are bigger and better. If you leave your tank alone and everything is setup right/simple, your corals will thrive. I don't have any fish since I am not there to feed them, and a fuge as my only source of filtration and a couple powerheads and my tank thrives. It's amazing what grows if you leave your tank alone and fishless for a few months.

sikpupy

07/29/2008, 07:07 AM

I am wondering how long I can get away with a 75/90 gallon unit with a auto feeder and a 20 gallon top off from a bucket? Looks like I could get a 10 day stint out of that???

celano

07/29/2008, 07:45 AM

hooterhead

07/29/2008, 08:32 AM

Two years. No water change, no dosing, no feeding. All I did was top off. My acro's, clams, softies, and fish are still doing amazingand growing like weeds. I actually did about an 8 gallon water change saturday so I've broken the streak. Guess I'd better start the clock over.

Kannin

07/29/2008, 08:41 AM

I haven't left my tanks for more than 8 hours or so since i got in the hobby 18 months ago. My wife would like a vacation but, I can't find anyone I trust to take care of them.

Slakker

07/29/2008, 09:53 AM

My nano has been in my mother's care all summer...she hasn't called me panicked that anything has died yet, so I'll assume it's all fine. Haven't done a water change on it in several months though.

Probably doesn't count though...

sikpupy

07/29/2008, 10:30 AM

2 years??? Are you serious hooter head? Okay, I can see all the verts taking care of themselves, but, what kind of fish you have in there, plastic fish??

WinnipegDragon

07/29/2008, 11:11 AM

Yeah, two years with no feeding?!

jrwap

07/29/2008, 01:31 PM

I am in the same situation as hooterhead. I ahve gone a few years with almost no maintance at all. I do throw some food in for the fish once or twice a week, but they really dont need it. The corals (mostly soft) all look great. There is more macro alge then I would like and it does need a cleaning... but everything is alive and healthy.

Now, my problem!

I want to move the tank and really clean it up to look nice. I have built a new sump/fuge.... bought a new skimmer, pumps, controller, etc... and plan to do a complete cleaning for the next 3-4 days.

How will everything react to such changes and is there anything I should do to aclimate the corals, inverts, and fish?

Keep in mind I hardly ever emptied the old crappy skimmer, havent done a water change in probably 2+ years, etc etc.... and yes, I know I should have taken better care of everything!

-JRW

Diatome

07/29/2008, 01:48 PM

7 days, on vacation. Autofeeder jammed so no food either. Everything was fine, except my scopas tang went after my green torch, mostly to get back at me. He never bothered it again but it was cut down by two thirds.

dones20

07/29/2008, 02:11 PM

sadly enough close to 9 months with no water change filter pad change nothing and my skimmer was out for the last 4 months of the total 9 i had a 120 mainly lps and softies and alot of fish nothing died the agae was disgusting

sikpupy

07/29/2008, 02:30 PM

You guys are terrible :lol:

Oh, also include how long your tanks have been up and running. Curious to see if long term was from, and I am sure, a stable tank.

LOTUS50GOD

07/29/2008, 02:32 PM

4 days... but I have EVERYTHING except water changes automated through my AC III.
When I am on holiday the tank would sends me emails every 6 hours just to let me know it is okay...

I also had someone check on the tank daily to make sure my living room wasnt underwater.

Semper Fi 1959

07/29/2008, 02:50 PM

This is an interesting topic...

I had to leave my tank alone for about a month. Since I knew I would be leaving it, I turned the skimmer off so it didn't overflow and had someone feed the fish for me. The lights and Tunze's were on controllers and timers, so all was fine. The individual that fed the fish for me, would top off for me as well.

Needless to say one whole month later, the tank looked like CRAP. The glass was green and moving. lol But once I cleaned the glass and looked inside, my corals had never looked better. Honest to god. Makes me wonder why I run a skimmer at all...

bubbly

07/29/2008, 06:35 PM

All you guys that posted in this thread should write "how-to" posts on how you set up your maintenance-free tanks.

My dream is to have a maintenance-free tank so I can just enjoy it rather than working on it all the time!

It seems "tank work" is what I do most around the house.

Semper Fi 1959

07/29/2008, 06:40 PM

I actually wonder if my corals looked so good because my arm stayed out of the tank for a whole month. lol What effect does my arm being in the tank constantly have on the inhabitants anyways? Seems I'm always needing to glue a coral, pick up a coral, help a snail, scrape the glass, etc etc etc.

What do you guys and gals think?

vetdog

07/29/2008, 07:02 PM

I've noticed this as well. I wonder if it is from putting my arm in the tank less often. It may not have anything to do with the arm itself and may be related more so to actually handling and moving the corals less often.

dmack

07/29/2008, 07:42 PM

I went away for 1 month recently. No problems, but I also have my tank automated. My sps corals never looked better.

hooterhead

07/29/2008, 11:50 PM

Yes TWO years. And I also haven't run a skimmer on it in about a year. The one I had (ER RS-80) just completely stopped producing.
Not from lack of adjustment/maintenece, but because there was nothing to skim.

For those of you wondering...
I have a very large Gold Stripe maroon, green leopard wrasse, yasha hase shrimp goby and pistol, and a Citron clown goby. Oh and a large pictus angler living in my fuge (this guy I absulutely had to feed so maybe I told a slight story). Various sps, lps and soft corals. Three tridacnid clams. All with absolutly no supplimentation, and showed better growth and color than they ever did before.

My setup is about as simple as it can possibly get actually. I've got a 29 gal display, external overflow which flows into a 20L converted to my sump. First chamber is what used to be my skimmer section. This part of the tank is now a benthic zone. Filled with feather dusters, sponges, and sea squirts with a rubble rock floor. This then goes into about a 5 gallon refugium with sand bottom (1") and some chaeto. Then there's my return section.

All in all, about 40 lbs, of live rock in the system, 30 lbs live sand. There are a rediculous amount of mysid shrimp and copepods in this system. But the system is only about 2 1/2 years old.

flyyyguy

07/30/2008, 01:00 AM

45 minutes...maybe 50

BuddhaKiss

07/30/2008, 02:02 AM

My main tank, no more than 8 hours. Its the last thing I look at before going to bed and one of the first things I look at when I wake up. But I do have a 10 gallon that I don't do anything to. Its a tank I set up for pest hitchhikers. Aiptasia, pyramid snails, sundials, etc basically, I just toss them in there. All I do is top off and the occasional WC. I just think aiptasia are too cool looking to toss out....needless to say that 10 gallon is overrun with it....which actually looks kinda neat.

sikpupy

07/30/2008, 08:35 AM

Hmmm hooterhead, pulling a "areze" ehy? Well, judges will allow it as thats not the main tank and feeding the fish in the fuge, as long as he ate everything, will be allowable.

Carry on all :bum:

Michael

07/30/2008, 09:52 AM

3 days, and that worried me

frankipoo

07/30/2008, 10:04 AM

im ashamed to admit it, but about 18 months with only topping off.
no cleaning no feeding.(30x24x24 custom made)
its about 75 gallons with about 200lbs of live rock and a closed pump loop. LG 4mscqx whatever...
all my money and most of my non job working time and all my mental energy were in another project for the last two years.
when i first started to neglect the tank i decided to get rid of most of my corals. i left one coral i cant identify and star polyps.a couple of gobies a tang and an aurantias angel.
they all survived, except the pair of gobies became a single.
a couple of weeks ago i cleaned it up, diatomed did water changes changed the bulb and started to buy corals. im actuially on gonna head to absolutely fish and reef encounter to see what i can buy(im hoping for an awesome O R A Tort).its but alot of work.
ive had some sort of tank or fish for the past 30 years. so i love the hobby, not a fair weather hobbyist. its just this other project took alot out of me. but luckily finally gave back.

miwoodar

07/30/2008, 10:05 AM

I used to go a few weeks fairly regularly ignorring everything but the top off container. These days I feed a lot more and dose a carbon source on a daily basis. A 4 day weekend doesn't bother me though. Anything longer and I have somebody stop by to check on it from time to time.

If I'm home I check on it more than I should but I only stick my arm in maybe once every two or three weeks.

Xiaan42

07/30/2008, 11:15 AM

I just came back from vacation for 3 weeks just had someone come in and feed the fish every 3 days (I had everything else automated). the only thing bad that happened is one of my acro frags fell on my Cynarina and the Cynarina lost half of its tissue but it is coming back nicely (there was no damage to the acro).

Michael

07/30/2008, 11:27 AM

i will say that some threads make me wonder why some posters bother at times, ridicilous questions are asked and we lose interest quickly, however this thread is great well done silkpuppy, im really enjoying this, great answers that are eye opening, i hope all the reef central reefers input here, great stuff, well done again, cant wait for the next reply to be honest , really good thread silk puppy

tush

07/30/2008, 11:43 AM

thanks for starting this topic sikpuppy! i always felt horrible if i had to leave my tank for a week - some posts in here (not this thread) made me feel like it was a crime to not have a spotless tank 24/7 -
i went for 6 months with adding water and flakes 2x a week - and everyone is right... when i left it alone everything did beautifully - but the fish kept looking at me and made me feel guilty... lol

rustybucket145

07/30/2008, 11:53 AM

I have enough in my auto top off reservoir (35gal) to last 7-9 days depending on the season/temp. After that reservoir is depleted the tank will run an additional 5-9 days on the water in the sump. I have gone upwards of 15days before without feeding the tank. I have a pretty large fuge (55gal) and over 110gal of sump and other tanks that do not have fish, basically acting as refugiums as well. Because of the fuges and macro algae the tanks produce their own food at a pretty sustainable rate. I don't think I could go indefinitely without feeding, but I do not feel I would loose any fish if I went over a month without feeding.

So, long story short, I think 15 days is probably my max time for not touching the tank. I do go 7 days at a time pretty regularly without touching the tank.

Barring power outages and natural disasters the tank always looks good and the fish and corals are always happy! :D

gummi

07/30/2008, 12:10 PM

Only 2 days for me.... and I was a bit worried.

I don't have an Auto-Top-Off so I would say that it couldn't go more than 7 days with at least a top off.

I don't understand how a tank can go 2 years without even feeding. I mean algae growth is one thing but is it enough to keep all fish eating and healthy? I"m blown away...

I feel bad for feeding my fish once a day! Maybe I should do it every 2nd day.

sikpupy

07/30/2008, 12:49 PM

One should not feel bad about a tank looking ugly as long as the living are healthy. We all have things in life we want to do. Some of us are homebodys and can clean all day, some only have intrest in a tank and thats thier only hobbie and others want a tank but want to go play also (which I fall into). I think learning from the people who have left thier tanks alone can help others that want to break away for that 7 day cruise, know what to expect on return and not be shocked by it. Heck, I think everyone that has a tank should deliberitly leave it alone, except for the feeding of the fish and water top offs, and see what thier tanks will do, then, when they get a little growth, see how long it takes to recover from it. Of course you need to cheat a little and watch your parameters. No sence deliberatly killing live stock off. Some of you are gonna say "why let things grow when I work so hard to keep it clean"? I would say that if you have a clean tank now, it will get clean again, but, try at your own risk, I am not offering any gurantees. :cool:

rustybucket145

07/30/2008, 12:59 PM

Personally...... I think that if a tank cannot be left alone for ATLEAST 7 days you should take a good hard look at your setup and re-configure so that it allows you to take a break once in a while.

I've seen it happen to too many friends.... They get a tank, cut corners setting it up. Then they end up with a tank that won't let them relax. They end up getting burned out on the hobby, everything dies, they sell everything and loose a ton of money and also end up hating the hobby '.... b/c it's just too much work....' [said in whiney voice]

Realistically, it's not too much work, they just didn't do the right things to start with and THEY made it too much work.

I honestly enjoy the $hite out of my tanks, but I do NOT enjoy water changes, scraping glass, screwing with parameters, killing livestock.... the list goes on...

So.... I made my tanks cater to the things I DO enjoy. For every hour I save in maintenance is just another hour I can spend enjoying the tank and it's inhabitants.

jkdsr78

07/30/2008, 01:03 PM

My first post and a noob, had to leave out of town for the job unexpectantly for two weeks. Came back home and everything was fine thank God!

DNickell

07/30/2008, 01:42 PM

This is a bit beyond your original parameters, but I once had a 29 gallon tank set up to be as much of a self-sustaining biological system as I could make it.

I went for just over a year with daily topoff water additions and BIonic supplementation. Nothing else added, though I did empty the skimmer cup as needed. I didn't even feed the three small fish for over a year. Everything did fine.

Then, in about a two day period the whole system crashed and I lost everything in the tank except for a False Percula clown (still with me today!). That crash was followed by the most impressive algae explosion I have ever seen.

It took a LONG time to reclaim that tank. That 29 gallon tank is now the sump under my 120. That'll show it!

GreenWithEnvy

07/30/2008, 11:28 PM

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13038645#post13038645 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by sikpupy
I am talking about not feeding or even looking at it, nothing, absolutly nothing. When you finally got back to it, how long did it take for it to spring back to its normal self, before you left it? Did anything die?

If you are looking for a low maintence tank put only soft corals and a few fish. As told in other threads, we only changed the water every two years, basically when we moved. Its a 50gal tank, Compacts, at that time no skimmer, and no problems. We regularly left the tank alone as we commuted 5 days a week to Rochester, MN from Wisconsin for my husband's job. We came home Friday nights and fed the tank, then fed it again on Sunday just before we left. No problems - healthy fish, healthy soft corals. We did this weekly for about 3-4 months.

Moved to Chicagoland and added hard coral frags and the tank exploded in hair algae and the frags started dying. Now have a good skimmer and weekly water changes, tank is stablizing again. New halide lighting. All corals doing well and finally growing. Fish are happy. Only one who isn't happy is Dominar Rigel the 16th, our algae blenny, who has lost his lush fields of food. I can live with that.

onano

07/31/2008, 05:21 AM

If I don't count time sleeping or working I would say 30 minutes :) What can I say I'm devoted...Just kidding...well sort of I have only left it alone for long weekends anything other than that and it gets a tank sitter :)

sikpupy

07/31/2008, 06:09 AM

Thats okay onano, if thats your passion or baby then by all means, get a paoose cube and carry those things with you, honestly, nothing wrong with that, hobbies are ment to be enjoyed. I spend most my time in me living room, where my tank will be. The way I sit i will alwys be starring at the tank, its gonna be so cool!

Yea, thats all I want really is soft wavy things in my tank. When I saw my friends genepora in a nice floresent green swaying around, I was like ........... wow...........so calming, soothing and cool... I was hooked!

miwoodar

07/31/2008, 09:03 AM

colotl

07/31/2008, 09:15 AM

I haven't changed water or dosed for about 5 months. Everything is growing and colors are real vibrant. LPS some SPS, fish and anenomes.

sikpupy

07/31/2008, 09:24 AM

I might have to ask the judges to let up on the calcium dosing restrictions. I would think that biologicly, there would be no way to produce calcium fast enough, in the circle of life tank. I will let you all know when the decision is final :D .

On a side note, whats the by-product of the corals from using calcium? Oh, wait, thats another thread, sorry. :smokin: <-- more than likely not a cigarette :thumbdown

BigJay

07/31/2008, 11:17 AM

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13053852#post13053852 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by rustybucket145
Personally...... I think that if a tank cannot be left alone for ATLEAST 7 days you should take a good hard look at your setup and re-configure so that it allows you to take a break once in a while.

I've seen it happen to too many friends.... They get a tank, cut corners setting it up. Then they end up with a tank that won't let them relax. They end up getting burned out on the hobby, everything dies, they sell everything and loose a ton of money and also end up hating the hobby '.... b/c it's just too much work....' [said in whiney voice]

Realistically, it's not too much work, they just didn't do the right things to start with and THEY made it too much work.

I honestly enjoy the $hite out of my tanks, but I do NOT enjoy water changes, scraping glass, screwing with parameters, killing livestock.... the list goes on...

So.... I made my tanks cater to the things I DO enjoy. For every hour I save in maintenance is just another hour I can spend enjoying the tank and it's inhabitants.

This is exactly where I am now. I don't even have an ATO setup, so I have to dose and put in topoff water in every day. I'm looking at remedying that soon (Buying an ATO setup this month, and a good dosing pump next month).

What else can I do to eliminate some of the more tiresome chores? What else have you done to reduce maintenance?