To change or not to change water

[mling]

I have not done any significant water changes in about 2 months. The last 20% change was little over a month ago. I have purchase a RO system over a month ago and have not even taken it out of the box! The readings from my weekly water test have shown Ammonia, Ni & Na reading to be zero. Someone advised me that maybe my tank is doing great and I shouldn’t do anything to it. This is one of the reasons why I have not used my brand new RO system. fficeffice" />>>

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Do you need to do water changes when everything seems great ?

[yardboy]

99% of long term aquarists will tell you that regular water changes are the best thing you can do to your tank. Organics and such you can't even test for build up to bad levels in a tank and slowly cause deterioration of the inhabitants.

I'll challenge you this way. Take a good long look at everything in your tank, how they're behaving, polyp extension on the corals, the general appearance. Now do a 15% water change with water of the same salinity and temperature. Wait a few hours and look at your tank again then you decide if regular water changes are good for your tank.

[Doug1]

Agreed on buildup of stuff you don't test for. Using your RO setup will give you better water going into water changes, so over time you will remove a lot of stuff that was in the tap water, as well as replentish trace elements from fresh salt mix.
Water change with good RO/DI and calcium/buffer supplement should keep your reef well and happy

[Awestralian]

I third that motion, regular water changes are important for a healthy tank.

Would you like to breath the same room of air over and over for 2 months?

[SPC]

Originally Posted by mling

Do you need to do water changes when everything seems great ?

Yes. Think of it this way, our reef animals come from an environment that receives constant water changes.
Steve

[Fatboy]

mling,

Because of work reasons, I do quite a lot of traveling. This means that sometimes I haven’t been home enough time in order to do the monthly 25% water change that I usually do……. A couple of months ago, my aquarium went without a water change for almost three months, and I must say that even that I had no algae problems and most of my corals were looking alright, as soon as I did a 30% water change, I could really see an improvement in most of them.

Some of my zoanthus were closed and they started opening again. I also could notice better polyp extension in some other corals. In general I could say, that even that I saw that in case of emergency the aquarium could be without a water change for three months, I wouldn’t do it on purpose. I’m pretty sure heavy skimming helped my tank, but I wouldn’t take the risk in normal circumstances. I live in a country were getting corals is “extremely” difficult and “expensive”, so why risking them ? After those thee months, I have been doing water changes every two and three weeks and really my corals are looking better than ever.>>

[mling]

Did my 20% water change as you've all suggested. I am sure my tank will be better off.

Now I have to get my house pumbling in place for my RO system.

Thanks for all the advise !