Three pages back at
#268, I posted a description of my rotifer tower that is a tube 6 inches in diameter and 6 feet tall. It is designed to be fed 2 gallons of total water from the main tank, spread out throughout the day automatically. That same amount of rotifer laden water returns to the display tank via gravity. Along with it comes the waste that my main tank has no problem processing so the 7 gallon plankton tower has relatively clean water cycling through it all the time.
I have been feeding it dead phyto and it works well. Lately, I got some live phyto from a local grower/dealer at a very reasonable price so I used it instead for a while. Of course live phyto makes for a cleaner running system.
Looking at my nice green tower, I thought:
1. What if I added lighting to the clear plastic tube and a little phyto fertilizer?
My algae scrubber loved its addition when I ran the light too much and over scrubbed. If I didn't add so much that I fowl the 7 gallon tower, my display tank should be just fine. I could just turn up the lights.Perhaps the live phyto and the rotifers would live together. Now we come to phyto crashes.
2. Would it still crash if the phyto density is lower and the bacteria filled main tank water is cycled through it?
If so, would it fowl the water in the tower and kill the rotifers too? If not, that addition of a lesser daily feeding of live phyto would seed the tower every day.
3. Would the bacteria from one crash hang around and continue to kill?