Carbon and Zoas

[RCS82]

Hello,

My 90 is now 4 months old and all is well. Fish, lps, softies all doing great. Have 5 types of zoas, all are open and seem fine but obviously would like to see more growth, patience I know haha.

Question is about carbon. I've been running a couple bags of chemipure elite in the sump for the 4 months. Does running or not running carbon impact zoas at all?

Thank you

[mitch91175]

I am no zoanthid expert, but as hobbyist we all likely have run carbon in our system with no affect on our corals. I am currently running carbon in my system and haven't lost any zoanthids, etc that I feel was because I am running carbon. Carbon mainly helps polish your water to make it crystal clear. No if you are running really cheap carbon that is leaking a black cloud into your system that may be a different story all together.

[organism]

It depends, why are you running chemipure?

[RCS82]

Chemipure I knew from the 90s as a real good carbon so I thought I would go with that.
Definitely keeps the tank pristine, but have been meaning to look into other types of carbon.
Thanks for the replies.

[organism]

Yeah but why? Necessary trace elements are inevitably removed as well, so what in your tank led you to the decision to run carbon, and have you tried just not using it? Back in the day we used to run carbon because wet/dry filters were nitrate factories, those days are long gone though.

[RCS82]

I run carbon for water clarity, not for nitrate removal. Since I was 8 years old 30 years ago I understood mechanical, biological and chemical filtration and the differences between the three. Haven't kept saltwater since the 90s and just got really into lps and some zoas. Carbon just seemed natural to use but it got me thinking if I was stripping anything beneficial from the water. Though I'm sure many hobbyists run carbon on their tanks, im guessing haha.

Cheers