chaeto requirements

tellycoleman · 09-05-2007, 11:48 PM

will chaeto die in a hi nitrite or amonia environment??
and do they require hi flow??
my chaeto isnt doing so welll
danggg i killed a WEED
now i feel bad

superwizbang · 09-06-2007, 12:04 AM

You should mention the current parameters and environment which you provide for it. Flow is not a consideration for chaeto. Proper lighting and trace elements like Iodine help growth.

-Ken

seasalt dreams · 09-06-2007, 12:06 AM

Mine is growing very well in my sump, with no flow directed at it, and a simple philips screw in spiral type 10,000k bulb ($7 at HD). I have no ammonia or nitrates though.

Hop · 09-06-2007, 01:32 AM

Aquatic plants generally thrive on nitrates and amonia.

To give an example in the panted tank world, you actually dose to keep nitrate, po4 and other things elevated. Amonia is generally consumed very quickly in the planted tank.

Having cheato not grow well is sometimes a good thing

Orient Master · 09-06-2007, 01:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hop

Aquatic plants generally thrive on nitrates and amonia.

To give an example in the panted tank world, you actually dose to keep nitrate, po4 and other things elevated. Amonia is generally consumed very quickly in the planted tank.

Having cheato not grow well is sometimes a good thing

So in other words your saying us keeping our tanks at 0 nitrates, 0 nitrites, 0 amonia would pretty much starve the cheato?

Hop · 09-06-2007, 02:05 AM

If you could truely keep it at zero then yes. But in reality, there is always some. This is why you hear some people have to dose iron at times to keep the chaeto going. I've been out of the high-tech/hi-light planted tank world for about five years, so I have forgotted much in regards to aquatic plants

I find that if I keep my cheato smaller than a football, all is good. When I let it get bigger, due to it's mass the entire clump will begin to die out as there is not enough nutrients for the volume of plant mass

Orient Master · 09-06-2007, 02:44 AM

so where would i go to get some cheato? I have my tank right now 20 gal long and i have been looking at getting either cheato or some type of calurpa, or even i have heard of using halamida (sorry for spelling). Looking at thowing these into my sump. Dont know if all can live friendly together or if that is a bad idea.

tellycoleman · 09-06-2007, 07:39 AM

oh ok my sump is a 40g. cheato is in there in 3 large clumps about softball size each.
but i guess i dont have much nutrient in the water. since it is cycling. i do have algae growth so i guess i have phosphate.
How long do the lights stay on.

Geoff · 09-06-2007, 09:23 AM

have algae not growing is a good thing. means your nutrient levels are low. why on earth would you want to grow algae in a system that you are trying to get algae out of?

this is why fuges are silly.

iodine will do nothing for the growth of Chaeto. iodine will do nothing for anything. it should only be used if you never do water changes, but no one would try that now would they.

G~

tellycoleman · 09-06-2007, 12:52 PM

i was under the impression that by having a controlable algae in the sump it will absorb nutrients and limit bad algae growth in the main tank. i have also heard that it might help with water polishing. but i maybe wrong.
i have heard of people getting rid of their skimmer and just have a algae rich refugium for filtration. Like i said its just what ive heard. I have never seen one in real life.

Geoff · 09-06-2007, 01:08 PM

ahh the misconceptions of a refugium.

algae will grow anywhere there is nutrients. the nutrients do not know that they the correct algae to feed is in the fuge and not in the display. the reason why fuges seem to work is that the flow in the fuge is so low that it facilitates the dropping out of detritus from the water column. the display tank will have a higher flow which helps to keep some of the detritus from depositing there. depositing detritus is the algaes heaven. in essence you are creating a cess pool/septic tank in your system. the algae in this septic tank can actually make your phosphate problems even worse. algae leaks any extra phosphates that it absorbs back into the water column. this means that some algaes can pull the phosphates out of the substrate then leak them back into the water column to be used by other algaes in the tank.

you can run a reef tank without a skimmer if you do major water changes every week and siphon out all detritus that has accumulated during that week.

there is a reason why you have never seen one in real life, they do not work. it will take very little time for these systems to crash due to phosphate levels.

conservation of matter is a B****.

if you are not removing as much detritus as you are feeding the tank you are heading towards a phosphate crash.

explain controllable algae.

if it is growing at a huge rate, how is that controllable? granted you can cull it, but by the time you cull it the algae has already leaked plenty of phosphates back into the system. no matter what you do if you do cull the algae, DO NOT feed it back to the fish. this is just putting the bound phosphates back into circulation and is not helping you export nutrients at all. the fish will just poo out the phosphates back into the water column.

G~

mediabox · 09-06-2007, 01:41 PM

Quote:

algae will grow anywhere there is nutrients. the nutrients do not know that they the correct algae to feed is in the fuge and not in the display.

By putting microalgae in the refugium wouln't that aid in nutrient export? I think if the microalgae we not there then the display tank's algae would be that much worse. In addition I keep my lights on the refugium 24x7 and that in itself would give a growing edge to the microalgae.

Geoff · 09-06-2007, 01:59 PM

it will only aid in nutrient export if you actually remove it. the problem is that as it grows it is releasing almost as much phosphates into the water column as it is uptaking. it would just be better to get rid of the algae all together in the fuge and siphon out the detritus. that way you are not allowing something to release it back into the water column. once it falls it will stay there.

the chances of you making it harder for algae to grow in the display than in the fuge is nearly impossible. if the display is a BB tank and you remove all detritus once a week you have a chance of this occuring. any place that is allowed to accumulate phosphates will grow algae.

running 24/7 can actually stunt the growth of algae. algae needs some down time to deoxygenate itself. one of the main reasons why people run their fuges 24/7 is to try and counteract the pH drop caused by all of the bacteria going anaerobic at night. the more sand you have in a tank the harder it is to keep the pH up. running 24/7 can keep the CO2 levels down, thus keeping the pH up. it was also found that if you were using Caleurpa, keeping the lights on 24/7 would keep Caleurpa from going holocarpy on you, thus possibly taking out your entire system.

fuges are just a way to make people feel all warm and fuzzy, without doing any real benefit for the tank.

G~

tellycoleman · 09-06-2007, 02:37 PM

Ok So What Do I Need To Do With My 40 Gallon Sump?
Since My Cheato Is Dying Anyway.
I Got A Skimmer And A Heater. Took Out All My Bioballs. So I Just Got Water And Rock Rubble.
I Guess I Could Turn It Into A Copeopod Sanctuary And Get A Manderine In About A Year.
I Have Also Heard That Many People Quarintine Thier Fish In The Sump And Get Them Use To Eating The Food You Are Using Without Competition

Geoff · 09-06-2007, 04:05 PM

why does everyone feel like they have to have something in their sump.

i only have a heater and a skimmer in my sump. well not entirely true i have one 2 lb chunk of LR in that has about 4 different species of sponges on it. i am trying to get it to seed my LR in the main tank.

the less stuff you have in the sump the easier it is to siphon out once a week.

G~