Bi-Weekly Discussion Thread - Skimmers

[OneDummHikk]

Do you run a skimmer or are you skimmerless? And, what lead to your decision to make that choice?

[aquawolf]

I run a skimmer. I decided to do it based on the recommendation of others that it was needed to remove organic waste from the system. I may not have believed them at first; however, once I saw the nasty gunk that the skimmer pulls out of the system I became a believer. The only other way I can think of to remove waste like that from the system is major weekly water changes, and that might not even keep up with it.

[dobejazz]

I run my 24g nano cube skimmerless - the tank is not designed to have a decent skimmer so I keep my bio-load low

My 95 was skimmerless for quite a while - I had a large increase in bio-load (added 4 more fish) and added a skimmer at that time to help maintain water quality

[Hop]

Yes... Why force my tank to process what I can remove

[dobejazz]

Originally Posted by Hop

Yes... Why force my tank to process what I can remove

Why not make the tank work for it's keep? (I still need to empty the skimmer cup on the 95 too)



I am soooo lazy

[Caball362]

I run a Sklilter 250 on my 20l nano and it pulls out a lot of gunk !

the skilter is a skimmer/power filter.




Then again i have 5 fish in there

[tdwyatt]

Skimmers, high eff skimmers. One on a DSB tank, the other is BB

[Loverotties]

Yes I do!To take out the waste and have cleaner water for all!

[scoop]

I do both. I have a big skimmer in my 75 and no skimmer in my 5, but I do weekly water changes. I do them in the 75, too, but only 5 gl, whcih I don't think would be enough if I went skimmerless. I think you woulod need to do at least 20 - 25% weekly water changes if you went skimmerless. I've heards this is a new trend, though. I'm hoping someone who's skimerless (in a big tank) will chime in and let us know how it's going.

[Fat Tony]

yes, i have a skimmer on both of my display tanks. and just a couple HO filters on my QT tank. On my 75 i have the NW200 Octopus and on my 29 i have the Remora Nano, that tank only has one fish. But my wife is insisting that the 29 with the one fish looks sad, she thinks the Clarkii needs a friend..LOL

[skey44]

more "friends" leads to bigger more expensive skimmers

I run a large needlewheel skimmer- I go by the fish poop=coral food thinking and the skimmer is to remove any of the waste that does not get processed by the corals in a hurry to prevent the biological filtration from being overloaded.

I am playing with the "vodka" method right now and have seen an incredible increase in coral polyp extension (feeding I assume) and protein skimmer production. Only time will tell if it helps coral growth and color, but I already believe it halts algae growth more effectively than any other method I have tried(including GFO, skimming, and major water changes).

[skey44]

I am not actually using ethanol or vodka, I am trying the new Brightwell Aquatics product called Reef Biofuel that is a carbon source replacing the flammable, alcoholic looking hidden under the tank vodka.

[reefermike1]

i run a skimmer and always will as long as i keep sps corals. the bigger and more overrated the better imo.

[tims]

SKimmers on mine. gota get the P out!

[OneDummHikk]

Tim, if you gotta get the P out, what about putting O in?

reefermike, you can actually get too big a skimmer for a system. You can get to a point where the skimmer just doesn't have enough poop to process and it becomes inefficient. Stepping one or two steps up isn't a big issue but if you too far up, it becomes wasteful.

scoop, that is something people are trying (skimmerless) on large systems because nobody can tell you what the skimmer is pulling out in the skimmate cup. Using
"natural" export methods instead of a mechanical export method.