How long can your tank go without it being fed/maintained??

[Mark]

It seems like some of the tanks Ive read about are so demanding that they practically need reef sitters if they go away for the weekend. How true is this?

In your opinion how long could your tank survive without any nutrition/feeding/supplimenting??

Thanks!

[mojoreef]

Now heres a question.

No tank will last very long with out nutrition/feeding/supplimenting. I think what all of us reefers strive for is to make the tank self suficient, so every tank out thier is in different stage of this, so everytank will be different in the requirements for leaving it alone.


Personally my tank can go a month with out any human care as it is setup with all kind of automation and the only reason its only a month is that is the ammount my feeder will go with out running out of food for the FIsh


see ya
mike

[Drew]

Hmmm, interesting question. Well, for me, not very long. As I don't have an auto top-off and I can't go more than a couple days before my salinity is out of whack. However as soon as I get an auto top off I would say honestly my tank could go a good while without care. Maybe 1-2 weeks before things start going wrong. Fish can actually go a long time without food. But that doesn't mean I won't go on vacation without getting one of my friends (who have fish) to come over and feed and observe.

Drew

[Mark]

the main reason I asked that question is I tend to go away for 3-4 day weekends occasionally and Id hate to have everything die in that timeframe.

Would evaporation be my biggest concern or would it probably be something else?

[FishDaddy]

Hi Mark,
The main danger of leaving a tank unattended is power/pump failure. Lack of circulation/oxygenation has been know to crash a tank in a day. That is the best reason I know to have someone check your tank daily if you can. If your equipment is in good order, everything should be fine but, of course, you can't always depend on the power company!!
Salinity drop due to evaporation could become a problem in a week's time. This drop will be gradual and as long as S.G. doesn't get too high, everything should be OK for 3-4 days. One caution: if it does rise appreciably due to evap., avoid the temptation to fill it up with top-off water all at once. Bring it back up slowly over 2-3 days.
I certainly agree that feeding is not an issue....they will be fine for a week or more.
HTH,
Dick

[MontanaRocknReefer]

Very good question! I would say the smaller the tank the more problems will definately arise if not attended too daily. My tank is an 80 gallon reef and I have left on a Saturday morning and came back Sunday afternoon and everything was fine.
The only problem I found was thinking about all the things that could have gone wrong while I was gone!!!!! If you have a very large tank the odds are definately even better but anyone who has a reef tank knows the problems that can arise at any moment. All I can say is if you feel confident with your system then go for it. Johnny

[gregt]

I just did a 4 day trip and other than Ca being low, I couldn't tell I had been gone. If you do things right and the tank is healthy you can leave it for quite awhile. (I also believe in a lightly stocked tank, which makes a difference here)

I wrote an article on this subject a few months ago that Brooke was going to post here..... what's up with that Brooke?

For now, you can find the article here:

http://saltyzoo.com/OutOfTown.html

[JennM]

I just came back from 4 days away. I had somebody come to feed my cats, dog and SEAHORSES....I had their frozen food portioned out into little baggies with the day of the week marked on them and thawing instructions. Had 232 babies today!

My reef and other tanks were well topped up, well fed before I went and other than my neighbour checking to make sure the water was acutually CIRCULATING, he didn't have to touch them.

I absolutely concur about power/equipment failure being the #1 worry. I read a story last year on a board about a local man here who went away for a week, and he'd just swapped out all his Rio pumps but one of the NEW pumps shorted out, tripped the GFCI outlet and all circulation STOPPED. That was on about day 2 of his vacation. His neighbour who was looking after things, didn't realize the problem til about day 4 when it started getting ripe, but of course it was too late. The man came home to a DEVASTATING smell, not to mention animals he'd had for YEARS (clown 7 1/2 years etc.) all gone.

We ALL felt his pain.

Machines always wait until nobody's looking to fail. Have somebody check on your tank. If at all possible, if they aren't fish-savvy, make it as simple and low-maintenance as possible, AND if you know of an LFS who does house calls or maintenance service that's reliable, make contact with them, that way if there is an emergency and you're hundreds of miles away, your caretaker can call somebody who CAN fix the problem. IMO I'd rather shell out $75 or so for an emergency service call to a "real" aquarium technician (or better yet to a fellow hobbyist if you know somebody in your area), than have no one to fall back on if a neighbour gets in over his head.

Jenn

[cwa46]

It depends on how you design your system. FishDaddy is right that power problems are the biggest problem. My system will last about 7 hours without power. (I have tested it and fish began to really suffer by then.) When I started this hobby, I was determined not to be tied down by it. I have a calcium reactor, auto-top off, refugium with macro algae, an ATS and auto feeders. I have spent quite a bit of time working on a dry feed that will satisfy all my inhabitants.
I leave my system quite regularly for 3-5 days at a time. On August 22nd of this year my wife and I left on vacation and did not return until October 9th. During that time, my son filled the feeder twice. I had a lot of cleanup, macro algae pruning and screen scraping to do, but everything was fine.
One thing I can't have because of this is animals that require special or spot feeding. I don't have many fish, but have soft, SPS and LPS corals. Other than that I have been free to leave it when I want.

[mojoreef]

I agree with most power is the most scarest, but what do you do if your area has a power failure. Unless u have a generator all yoiu can do it watch ( well I geuss thier are a few things u could do) but the bottom line is if the power company has a power failure your at thier mercy. If you blow a fuse and it creates a failure, now that you can get around by not having all your esencials on one circiut. I ran three seperate 30 amp breakers to my tank area. I run my return pumps on 2 of the three (same as the lights) that way if one pops for some reason you still have a pump working.


mike

[JennM]

A UPS that you would use on a computer will work your circulation for a while, your critters can do without light more than they can do without flow. Cheaper than a generator too (although I have NO UPS...I should.)

For small setups, a battery powered air pump will help (I do have one of these!)

I've had a couple of blackouts, one lasted about 4 hours, nothing was the worse for wear. In a pinch I'd manually stir the water just to get a bit of gas exchange.

I tend to under-stock too, and that probably helps matters when there's no power.

Jenn

[dwyatt]

I definately agree with the UPS. A 600VA UPS should be able to power a single powerhead for quite some time. Aimed slightly toward the surface for max gas exchange, this should provide some circulation and minimize your concerns. CYA!

[asmith]

I believe that I can leave my tank alone for about 5 days without any intervention. That is about how long my top off system can run without being refilled. My biggest fear is that dreaded power outage.

Andrew

[blaneperun]

I have a large system, consisting of a display and several grow tanks. I have no more than four to six fish and two hundred or more pieces of coral. Leathers, SPS, LPS, Zooanthus the whole gamut. I don't feed at all, in fact I don't even add iodine. The tank has been running for 6 years now, and many of the inhabitants had come from a previous system that had been running for years. Occasionally a star fish or a snail dies, and I'm sure that is a food source for a short time, but I don't ad food whatsoever.

For those of you in disbelief here is a photo of a Blastomussa Welsi that I have been propagating for around a year now.

blane