Considering changing my system to support non-photosynth stock--- share your success

[Newreeflady]

Can someone point me to a website where the building of such a system is outlined? Also, I'd love to hear your success story; specifically which corals you began with and what your system consists of.

Main reasons for wanting change:

Never done it before
Sick of electric bill
Prefer a lower-lit system (I think I'd like a more mellow mode in the room.)

Equipment I have now:

36g tank w/ 15g sump
Euroreef skimmer
LED actinic and LED moonlight + 250w halide (halide will go.)
CL setup with rotating flow from Eheim 1262
Chiller (which I could finally ditch!)
B-ionic dosing system

Current inhabitants:
Ocellaris pair
Blue-sided fairy wrasse
Tuxedo Urchin

All of my coral/clams/nem are photosynthetic, so I would sell them or trade them.

Thoughts/comments/stories/suggestions?
:)
thx!
-A

[Kreeger1]

The food bill to support non photo Is much higher then the electric bill.
I've been keeping non phot creatures alive for the past year. The money involve in keeping them isn't worth the cost to me.
Erik

[dendro982]

Consider all following factors:
1. Electric bill (watts used, not service charges) is a minor nuisance, comparing to:
- cost of salt for water changes (and cost of its delivery),
- cost of specialized food,
- regular trips to LFS to buy it (or mail order),
- cost of continuous food dosing device.

2. Time. After starting culture of super-small rotifers for sea apples and crinoids, and trying to reproduce berghia nudibranches to fight aiptasia, which gorges on such amount of food, all my time is tied, a little was left for the tanks.

3. Interest. Sooner or later comes time, when one can no longer continue obtaining new specimens for collection, even if physical space in tank is still available.

I wasn't able to find opinions of others on the topic, but after finding next really interesting non-photosynthetic invertebrate, I'm facing the necessity to adapt tank to its needs: change aquascaping and pattern flow, what affects all previous inhabitants, so one has to find the balance and compromise for all organisms (until next purchase :D ). And not balanced situation may lead to increase of undesired organisms, like aiptasia, bristle worms, red slime, dinoflagesllates, flat worms.

Without feeding interest, all becomes a burden, not a hobby.

On the positive side, non-photosynthetic corals and fine filter feeders are very unusual, interesting and well worth of keeping (keeping in mind what was said above).

What I would suggest:
Mind, please, that I'm only 2.5 yrs in the hobby, low tech and budget end, my tanks looks unpresentable, but I'm keeping almost all available groups of non-photosyntheric corals and fine filter feeders - Christmas tree worms, LPS (sun coral and its cousins), soft corals (gorgonians, chili, scleronephthya, dendronephthya, filter feeding sea cucumbers, feather stars, and barely related, but amazing tube anemone). Sun coral reproduces regularly, other sun regrew tissue on skeleton, red finger gorgonian reproduced once, yellow morph and fine blue sea whip grow new branches (what is unusual), sclero opened from half-molten state, stopped necrosis of swiftia gorgonian, Christmas tree rock recovered from snow white bleaching during toxic tank crash, and worms actually grow.

1. Your tank setup is good, if the skimmer is much larger, then recommended for this size of tank and skims really well.
You may consider later adding UV and ozone, but this may affect larvae survival. You can see more information at this forum, thread FTS of the non-photosynthetic tank, and at Ultimate Reef (UK) Azoo forum, thread Primary means of filtration. At sponsors forum here should be Fauna Marin post, Gorgonian system.

2. Choose, what kinds of NPS are more interesting to you:
a) gorgonians, scleros, dendros, crinoids, cucumbers, which all require high flow and continuous dosing of food (automatic device will be required, peristaltic or syringe pump). I'm doing this manually so far, but this is not optimal and is a burden, after several months of initial splash interest.
b) sun corals and other dendrophyllids. Lower flow, and will require manual feeding twice a week or more, if you will want faster growth or recovery. With several large colonies use of mysis and Ocean Plankton from LFS will be necessary, the homemade seafood blend in required quantity pollutes water too much. This tanks will be less in variety, then the tank (a), but with tolerable water quality they are reliable and very bright in the tank, visual impact is impressive.
c) high light tank with Christmas tree worms is out of question, as I understand. Without them, you can keep long-nosed fish to fight aiptasia and bristle worms.

It's all. Take a look around at existing NPS tanks (most of them are big), see what other are using from hardware and food for particular group of organisms.
HTH. Good luck!

[Newreeflady]

Hmm... well, I was thinking I'd be able to grow my own food; you know, like those people who have separate systems for phyto. I thought it'd be a cool lab project.

I have a peristaltic pump, but it is used for b-ionic currently. I wonder if I wouldn't need to dose calcium anymore. Maybe I could do only soft coral.

I would prefer the tank to be somewhat presentable.

Hmm... I really wanted to do something else for once. Maybe that something else could be just going down to softies and lower light -- thereby reducing the need for as much light, the chiller, and the calcium and thus simplifying the system. I haven't kept soft coral in years.

I'm opened to ideas... but I'm really attached to my clowns so they stay! :)
-A

[Kreeger1]

The phyto you grow at home will add unwanted algae to the tank. The amount of food from a home brew is not enough to feed Dendros or scerlo's. You need a Instant Algae consintrate to feed the demands.

[slcw]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13340647#post13340647 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Newreeflady
Can someone point me to a website where the building of such a system is outlined? Also, I'd love to hear your success story; specifically which corals you began with and what your system consists of.

Main reasons for wanting change:

Never done it before
Sick of electric bill
Prefer a lower-lit system (I think I'd like a more mellow mode in the room.)

Equipment I have now:

36g tank w/ 15g sump
Euroreef skimmer
LED actinic and LED moonlight + 250w halide (halide will go.)
CL setup with rotating flow from Eheim 1262
Chiller (which I could finally ditch!)
B-ionic dosing system

Current inhabitants:
Ocellaris pair
Blue-sided fairy wrasse
Tuxedo Urchin

All of my coral/clams/nem are photosynthetic, so I would sell them or trade them.

Thoughts/comments/stories/suggestions?
:)
thx!
-A

i have recently decided to move to sun coral biotope. I sold all my photosynthetic corals and anemone and retain my 3 balanophyllia, 1 tubastrea. Recently added rhinzo.

I also remove my MH.

I also make my own blended food

[dendro982]

slcw: can you post link to your tank description and photo? Thanks.

[Newreeflady]

See, that's cool. I am fine with not keeping dendros. I am totally fine with keeping the easiest of non-photosynth organisms. Can someone name what those would be? I have kept sun coral successfully in the past, for instance, and I love them!

thx!
-A

[slcw]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13350047#post13350047 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by dendro982
slcw: can you post link to your tank description and photo? Thanks.

Well, the aquarium is undergoing a change due to decision to move into a biotope, therefore the setup & aquascape isnt final yet. So is my website.

Have a look >>> www.slowreef.com

[dendro982]

If you plan to rely on own food, produced in the tank and/or refugium, hard to say, because all: soft corals, gorgonians and LPS are usually abundantly fed. You may take a look at the old Chili coral thread at Ultimate Reef (at Azoo forum), some keepers have them in systems without additional feedings. But IMHE, it's not a reliable coral, as sun coral is. Chili lives in some systems and not - in the others. I still trying to figure out what it needs.

Big number of the sun corals (different kinds may make a nice collection, including other Dednrophyliidae) may influence water quality, unless they will be fed by washed whole organisms (mysis, brine, Ocean Plankton), not by grocery seafood blend, with which I'm fighting now. But Daniela Stettler has tons of sun corals in sps tank with very clean water (link (http://www.recif-france.com/Articles/Portraits/Stettler/bacDaniela.php)).

In the thread FTS of NPS tank you can see a lot of gorgonians there, Menella is frequently described as the most reliable. But with regular feedings.

If you will have some time, you may try to track natural systems, that allow to keep corals without additional feedings. Sorry that can't help, I'm more concentrated on improving filtration and making NPS systems more affordable.

Best of luck!

slcw: thanks!