Bi-Weekly Discussion of the Week: Maintenance Regime!!

[Geoff]

what do you all do to keep your tanks up and running? everyday week, month, and year. this includes additives, vaccuming, and cleaning.

come lets see how often you all really get your elbows and floor wet!

G~

[tkjeffrey]

In my 55 I feed ESV spray dried phyto every day (the shady spots of my live rock are totally covered with turnicates and fan worms).

I drip Kalk continuously daily (coralline fonally starting to cover everything). I mix 2 gallons of Kalk with RO/DI water about every 3 to 4 days for top off in my tank.

I change 5 gallons of water with RO/DI salt water every Sunday, when I do this I syphon out the 5 gallons and vacuum out all my live rock trying to get as much detritus as I can.

Every couple weeks I clean out the funnel in my skimmer.

Every month I change out 2 bags of chemi pure that are in my HOB filter (thats all I have in that filter).

I clean side and front glass with magnets every other day.

I clean the lens on my light about every month or whenever its starts getting salt spray building up on it.

I add no additives at all EXCEPT 2 drops of Lugols Solution every Sunday

Thats it, thats all I do

[Pirate]

It's funny that this one has come up, because I just changed mine in the last week or so. Although all looked healthy and I have not lost anything in months (almost a year) I felt like I could try a few things to get better polyp extension, more color and so on. So anyway all that I normally used was kalk drip 2x's weekly and aragamilk in between for top off, and weekly I would add a few drops of lugols, along with a 15 gal water change, and a dose of DT's on sunday. Now it is generally the same, however I have begun to try some kent products, Coral accel, Chromaplex, and Coralvite. The vite is 1x weekly the others are two. And I now do 20 gals every monday. Glass daily, skimmer weekly, clean bulbs and reflectors monthly. All water is ro/di, and I forgot the most important part. I do supervision on the tank at least 3 hours daily, hey someone has to supervise, might as well be me !

[RWD]

I do two small waterchanges a week (sunday and wednesday) that work out to be around 20% a month. I test calcium and alk once a month unless somethings out of wack and I have to add buffer and/or calcium chloride (Kent Turbo calcium). I do a good cleaning that includes the glass, aptasia patrol, and overflow teeth cleaning once a week. I may vaccum a part of the sand bed every few weeks.
I normally run a calcium reactor but I'm experimenting without one for now. That's where the Kent calcium comes in now. When the reactor is set up I clean it out and refill it every 3 months or so.
The skimmers get cleaned the same time as the water changes and the sumps may get cleaned out every 5-6 months. I also change out a few cups of carbon every 2 months.

Bob

[tdwyatt]

skimmers once a week, kalk contuous, Ca reactor continuous, auto top off replenishments once a week (I don't want any screwups with the auto top off to dilute the tanks more than what is in the reservoirs) make about 100 gal of topp off ro/di once a week, another 100 gal for water changes with IO salt mix. Target feed the lps, anemones and the clams once or twice a week. Scrape the glass once a week or two weeks (depends on if it needs it or not). Trim the Halimeda once a week.

No trace element additives. None.

I use iodine for cuts, occasionally for a dip for critters coming into the tank or new softie cuts/props.

Powerhead the rock for detritus and use sponges to catch the stuff, skim out the rest after scraping the glass (to take whatever the algae will export, nitrates, phosphates, etc)

General cleaning once a week, testing water params (usually only Ca and Alk on a weekly basis, Mg once a month, phosphates occasionally, but in all honesty, maybe once every 2 or 3 months unless there seems to be a problem, and low level nitrates once every few weeks, althouh of late it has been once a week to determine if low level nitrates account for some of the specimens browning while others seem to color up quite well... hmmm...)

clean pH probe once a month and check with borax every few weeks, salinity once a week with refractometer, daily with swing arm, Ca reactors once every 2 or 3 months, although the new one has yet to really need it. PAR and quantum meters once a month, bulb changes if PAR drops for 3 consecutive days below the 90% mark.

continuous temp monitoring with electronic warning digitemp thermometer (alarms when out of range)

General cleaning and wiping and spot projects are ongoing, but usually are part of the Sunday ritual. Head counts once every few days. Usually do the coral trimming and repositioning once a week if needed

[jimcfar]

You guys are probably gonna run down here and kick me.... but I do very little. I change about 10% water between 1 and 2 months. Clean glass about every 3 days. Clean protein slimmer once a week. Everything is doing great... so I use the old adage.. if it ain't broke.. don't fix it. But I do have some questions please..... Exactly how do you folks clean your lights and reflectors? How do you clean your sand and how do you clean your sump?

Thank You

[Geoff]

i clean my lights and reflectors with FW. making sure they are cool first. i also make sure they are completely dry and free of spots before turning the lights on.

as for the sump i clean it when i see that it needs it. i usually will use about half of my water change siphon on the the sump. it takes about 5g of siphon to clean out all of the detritus in my sump.

G~

[jimcfar]

So basically you just siphon the water from the sump to clean it? Or do you actually wipe it? And what about the dsb? I thought the clean up crew was supposed to take care of cleaning that?

[Geoff]

i actually siphon out the detritus that has built up in the refugium. i have a bare bottom refugium so this is really easy. since my refugium is completely hidden i do not care at all about the sides. i have several stomatella snails that keep the micro algae to a minimum.

those critters are not able to make the detritus completely disappear. those critters have to poop also. this is just another form of detritus that needs to be removed. depending on the flow in the refugium it may also be acting like a settling tank for the detritus from the main display. which could be a good thing if you were to siphon it out several times a year.

G~

[jimcfar]

Well that answers a lot of questions for me. Thank You.

[tims]

well i do not keep a super tight schedule on the maint. but, clean the glass every 2 -3 days. water change 10% evry 2 -3 weeks.
check lights evry 2 months or so, change filter media ( depending on what is being used ) either monthly a or every 10 days ( carbon or phosgen). empty skimmer when it needs it or looks like it needs to be cleaned. levels are checked once a week. still learning about what every one's needs are in the tank. so fasr so good.
now trying to figure out where to put a 125g and a refuge. that is my new year project.

[tdwyatt]

once a year I volunteer to polish and wax the yugo, but Bob has it now...

[Awestralian]

I change 40-50% of the water once a week and quickly wipe across the plastic light cover every other week.
I never need to clean the glass.
I spot feed my three anenomes every couple of weeks, and the other corals take care of themselves.

Simple!

Edit--> of course i also feed the fish twice a day...

[RWD]

Originally posted by tdwyatt
once a year I volunteer to polish and wax the yugo, but Bob has it now..

She sure is purtty

[Geoff]

Originally posted by RWD
She sure is purtty

i never could figure out what the toilet paper roll on the dash is for, if you figure it out let us know.

G~