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Unread 01/25/2015, 10:51 AM   #678
dartier
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Join Date: Aug 2012
Location: Brampton, ON, Canada
Posts: 958
Quote:
Originally Posted by Montireef View Post
Not only bacteria but many other microorganisms like nematodes and ciliates. Skimmate is mainly water plus a Ca and Mg insoluble carbonates. It has no nitrate and little phosphate but can have SH2.

Snails keep pooping black crap for almost a week, that's the main drawback. Lol
Quote:
Originally Posted by Montireef View Post
The next day I watched cristal clear water, higher redox and many black poop from my turbo snails (they love it). Corals extended awesome polyps two days after pouring it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Budman422 View Post
Do you think with adding the aged skimmate you are adding something to prey on and eat dinos. Maybe there is something to it. It kind of works like a culture
I would expect that is exactly what it does (works like a culture). The common observation is that water changes fuel dinos. Allowing the skimmate to culture limits the dinos access to added trace elements, and the dinos are food for the mystery microbes.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Lavoisier View Post
Wow, this approach makes no sense to me. If you are right then skimmers are a detriment to water quality. I know there are a number of successful skimmerless systems but anecdotally there appear to be more systems that use skimmers successfully. We know the research confirms high quality skimmers take out about 30% of organic contaminants in our water columns. Why would you think returning those contaminants would be a good thing?
In this case where some unidentified microbe and dinos were both present in the tank, the skimmer acted as a sort of a condenser, allowing a high density sample of predator and prey to be segregated. I do the same thing when I culture pods (except I use a pipette ).

Quote:
Originally Posted by Montireef View Post
Most contaminants taken out by skimmers are bad indeed, no doubt about that.

I have run a 125 gal skimmerless acropora system for more than two years with no issues at all, every coral was thriving despite I held three big angelfish (annularis, imperator and xanthometopon), a big japonicus, one flavescens and many small fishes. The only drawback was very unstable and every change should be done very slowly, specially changes in their diet.

The point here is not what the skimmer is taking out, but the microorganisms that compete and grow in the skimmate. Do you know what happens if you let the skimmate sit in the skimmer cup warm in a humid environment that prevent rapid evaporation? I'll tell you: the skimmate turns turbid clear, just like the water you could find in a pond.

The skimmate holds the most efficient bacteria and microorganisms you could imagine: nematodes, rotifers, cocos, spiros...and ciliates, many ciliates (with use to be omnivore creatures). This is what we just want: efficient selected microorganisms able to prey on dinoflagellates which are on the first trophic step.

Just place some GAC on your filter/mesh to remove the bad stuff and release the stinky waters back to the tank, I'm sure you will be surprised.
If the unknown microbe could be identified, it would go along way to help confirm the process that occurred in your tank.

It may be that tanks that get overrun with dinos have none of these types of predators, or that they are too specialized so they die off in some tanks. The suggestion that dinos seem to appear hand in hand with ULNS conditions, may also be related. The low nutrients may be taking out the predators that keep dinos in check, but unlike the predators, the dinos can encyst and wait for the predators extinction, and then grow to plague proportions without any biological controls.

This is a great observation Montireef.

Dennis


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