Slow dosing food for sps

[Mandragen]

I was wondering if anyone could inform me of a way to dose sps food all day in intervals. I'm assuming that you would dose a liquid through a dosing pump hooked up to a controler, is this correct? I was wondering if this is common some people could inform me of how they do it and what they feed. If it isn't common, why not?

Thanks

[dublo8]

The problem I would see is that food will settle to the bottom of the holding tank/jug whatever your using. I guess you could use a kalk stirrer to keep the food suspended than tie a powerhead or aqualifter of some type to the stirrer and have it ran on a timer or a controller.

[Mandragen]

not if your doser drew from the botton, say use a BRS style doser and pull from the bottom? I think it will work, just gotta figure out what to use.

[preef]

I would think the food would rot while in the container and tubing

[jc-reef]

I found this site that has a reefer who built a 'mini-refrigerator doser' to dose live foods....pretty cool. Its on reef addicts . com (minus the spaces)

here are a few pics

http://i833.photobucket.com/albums/zz254/jc-reef/Dosing%20Refridgerator/fridgedoser1.jpg

http://i833.photobucket.com/albums/zz254/jc-reef/Dosing%20Refridgerator/fridgedoser2.jpg

.............

[dudley moray]

wow i thought i was lazy !!
i just get my fish to feed mine

[Mandragen]

that's really cool. I would be interested to see if this has helped in anyway with the health and growth of the coral.

[stormrider27]

I found this site that has a reefer who built a 'mini-refrigerator doser' to dose live foods....pretty cool. Its on reef addicts . com (minus the spaces)

here are a few pics

http://i833.photobucket.com/albums/zz254/jc-reef/Dosing%20Refridgerator/fridgedoser1.jpg

http://i833.photobucket.com/albums/zz254/jc-reef/Dosing%20Refridgerator/fridgedoser2.jpg

.............

That system was setup for a NPS tank.

[allsps40]

I will stick to hand feeding. I feel that when I dose planktonic coral foods daily that it degrades my water quality and causes algae blooms. Cool idea though.

[Mandragen]

Well I understand that there are some for NPS tanks, and even if this is one of them, it's exactly what I am looking for. I think that even tanks other than NPS tanks, would greatly benefit from slow feeding all day. In fact, I don't really know of any organism that wouldn't.

[Mandragen]

I will stick to hand feeding. I feel that when I dose planktonic coral foods daily that it degrades my water quality and causes algae blooms. Cool idea though.

I can see this to be the case, but the reasoning to me would be that there is extra in the water that is not being consumed or filtered out, which in turn needs to be handled by algae. I'm not talking about feeding any more than I already do manualy, just not all at one time. I think that if it were spread out the consumption rate/efficiency would be better for all organisms in the tank. This may lead to the ability to increase amount slightly but not necessarily the reasoning.

[stormrider27]

Well I understand that there are some for NPS tanks, and even if this is one of them, it's exactly what I am looking for. I think that even tanks other than NPS tanks, would greatly benefit from slow feeding all day. In fact, I don't really know of any organism that wouldn't.

I agree. Finding that perfect balance will take time. Most, if not all, owners of NPS tanks do HUGE weekly water changes to keep their parameters in line (that is the main reason they use smaller tanks). However, several NPS reefers are having success using bio pellets to reduce water change frequencies while keeping their parameters in check but a track record of success hasn't been established yet; you can read their posts in the NPS section. I am fascinated with NPS tanks and I am trying to decide if I have the dedication, not to mention finances, it requires to keep one running successfully over the long haul.

[ousnakebyte]

If I were to do this, I would set it up so that I was dosing primarily at night, a few hours after lights out. And, I don't think you need a real expensive setup. You could slow drip your newly-hatched brine shrimp into the tank over night.

Cheers
Mike