temporary home for sps

Fly Guy · 08-22-2006, 11:34 AM

I just broke down my sps display and will be setting up a new tank in its place.......for a temporary thing, i have all of sps corals sitting on the floor of an old 80 gallon no sand, just glass, there are no rocks to speak of except for the rubble and a couple rocks that they are attached to.

70% of the water is from the tank they came out of and the floor of the tank is packed as tight as it could be without any of them touching each other.

My question is this:

How long can i let them sit there with no rock filtration, before it may pose a risk to thier health?? Ive got flow and aeration dealt with and there are no fish in the tank and it has the same lighting over it that they had before, although they are of course deeper........

thanks

Leverage Lad · 08-22-2006, 06:02 PM

I don't know an answer. I still get freaked out when one of my mushrooms doesn't look right. But I figured a bump wouldn't hurt.

Little Luey · 08-22-2006, 07:31 PM

I had my SPS in QT for about 3 weeks with no rock and only PC lights, I did a weekly WC but it was all. At the end of the 3 weeks they were all brown. I think this had to do with the PC fixture.
IMO if you do WC they should be ok for a while.

Wiskey · 08-22-2006, 09:53 PM

I did it for about a week with no problems, it is certanally not ideal, but how do they look? Good PE? Look healthy? If so no worries I say.

Whiskey

Fly Guy · 08-22-2006, 10:11 PM

Im planning on doing it for 3-4 weeks....i should probably throw some rock in the sump at least...........There arent any fish though.....

PE is perfect, they didnt even notice the move and the signifigant water change...........
But its only been one day.........
thanks for the input though wiskey.....makes sense, i guess they will let me know if it ISNT ok........

Wiskey · 08-23-2006, 12:14 PM

No prob, for that much time I would definitally keep an eye on CA/ALK make sure especially ALK dosen't drop too low.

Past that, like you said, I think the corals will tell you.

Whiskey

Twitterbait · 08-23-2006, 02:03 PM

just keep the water moving.

Fly Guy · 08-23-2006, 08:11 PM

And as far as water changes????

Im thinking that im not going to change the water at all. Dont want to dilute the bacteria. Im just going to monitor and keep alk, ph and calcium where they need to be.

Is that reasonable thinking??

Wiskey · 08-23-2006, 10:40 PM

Personally I would do water changes, but small ones often (maybe 1G per day while syphoning any detritus that collects on the bottom). You don't have any other means of export right now (Skimmer, carbon, etc). There is plenty of space for bacteria on the glass of your tank to support corals, they aren't big waste producers.

Whiskey

Fly Guy · 08-23-2006, 11:06 PM

I am running a skimmer, but its not grabbiong a whole lot, i could very easily hook up my phosban reactor to run some carbon as well.......i will change a gallon a day as well.......

thanx

Wiskey · 08-23-2006, 11:19 PM

Eh, I wouldn't push it too clean either. I wouldn't use phosban, that stuff has been known to cause problems for some people, and with the corals already under a bit of stress,......

There won't be much to skim (no fish, no sand, no rock), but it will add O2 and take out slime from the acros.

I think you are good with the skimmer, I would probably change a couple of gallons a week too, nothing serious, just a couple to siphon detritus.

I was concerned you could not remove coral slime, that stuff can really build up, because one coral sliming can cause others to, then they start throwing it at each other

. If it sits around in the system like that it could cause RTN events, but with the skimmer removing it you should be good.

Whiskey

Fly Guy · 08-23-2006, 11:35 PM

i use a phosban reactor for carbon

, i wasnt thinking of running phosban