So technically the things that can be achieved in a refugium can also occur in your aquarium? Because most refugiums contain live rock and sometimes even small animals? So pretty much you're just recreating a smaller aquarium under your tank that's full of algae and looks kinda ugly...? I might have got this totally wrong...but is this the reason that it's not a very necessary thing unless you have delicate animals that need to live below your tank? Although it does seem like you would want to just start a small aquarium so that you could enjoy the animals you are shoving under your aquarium...
so is it possible to get pods and things along those lines in you aquarium without the refugium?
Sorry if this is totally off ...I'm trying to make sense of it all now that I've been reading more about them... :arg:
Ok to address your questions concerning refugiums:
So technically the things that can be achieved in a refugium can also occur in your aquarium?
A refugium is typically incorporated to help control and manage phosphates, as well as produce a safe environment for pods and live food to grow and reproduce without being "over eaten" by your live stock that feed on them.
The macro aglae (chaetomorpha/calerpa/ ect) are fast and slow growing macro algaes that feed on phosphates, also act as a natural filter floww to trap large particles of detrius and feed of them. Also the refugium being run on an opposite time schedule of your DT lights typically run your DT 10hrs a day you would run your fuge lights to come on an hour before your DT turns off and run until and hour after your DT lights come on. THis also helps level and balance PH to stop from swings at night.
Because most refugiums contain live rock and sometimes even small animals? So pretty much you're just recreating a smaller aquarium under your tank that's full of algae and looks kinda ugly...?
This is a general way to look at it. You are not replicating a display tank with a refugium. WHen you setup your refugium, the livestock you would stock it with are more likely clean up crew animals, I persoanlly have a lawnmower blenny in mine to pick at HA. You can have LR in your fuge, but its best put in the sump before the return to fine filter the water running back to your DT.
THe filter side of a tank wont look "ugly" its just a different environment. The fuge and sump are to keep the filter side of your tank to do its job, to stop from HA and unwanted algaes from showing up in your Display tank while managing the water params concernign nitrate/phosphate by establishing an environment where the macro algaes can grow at a rate to keep up and deplete your readings of Phos and Nitrate. (if setup properly and your techniques are not adding mroe po4 and no2 into your system as a whole)
I might have got this totally wrong...but is this the reason that it's not a very necessary thing unless you have delicate animals that need to live below your tank? Although it does seem like you would want to just start a small aquarium so that you could enjoy the animals you are shoving under your aquarium...
so is it possible to get pods and things along those lines in you aquarium without the refugium?
A refugium is NOT a necessity, you would not want to keep delicate fish in your fuge, you would want your fuge to FEED your fish dependant on live foods ie: Mandarin gobys, 6 line wrasse ect... anything that feeds byt grazing on live rock. It is possible to keep pods in your DT, typically you will start a tank and get a beautiful mandarin (not your situation maybe) well a week before you got that fish it will look liek your tank is swarming with bugs and pods and myssi shripm, and you will still see them for some time, but that mandarin will deplete a pod colony in a 90 gal in 8 months. YOu will end up having to buy live pods and feed tha tank and they will never take the tank over due to the demand of the mandarin. The refugium allows you to house those organisim in a save environment to be a constant feed to the tank so that is does not deplete.
Now to address the live stock in the fuge, you will typically want a a clean up creww taht feeds on algae, the pods and mysis and otehr organism in the fuge will help by feeding off the macro. which will help keep it in check to a certain extent, you will still have to trim the cheato or macro from time to time as it grows out. THe lighting for a fuge should be between 6000k and 6500k , nothign special, actually you can use a vho light to grow macro, they have very limited requirements when talking lighting, they do however need a source of po4 to feed, also when you trim your macro you are exporting nutrients that have been stored in the macro and that algae has fed off of.
A protien skimmer is only as good as the skimmer is built. YOur skimmer is (as noted below by another memebr) your number one filtration device, it is responsible to pull as much disolved organics as it can given its structure and functionality. But you can have the #1 skimmer in the world, and if it is not tuned right ... a sea clone fine tuned can pull more skimmate and produce better resutls. So keep that in mind. You cant drop a skimmer in a sump plug it in and walk away...
I am just trying to point out the +'s of the fuge and the benefits it can provide.
Not only does it provide the above mentioned, it also add's to your totla water volume as well as more sand volume to your system allowiing more aneroic bacteria to conlonize and work for your system allowing more environment and area to produce bacteria to help stabilize your environment and protect against swings and changes in the system.
alright...I guess I'll see what happens when I set my sump up... and maybe later on if it seems necessary to what I'm trying to accomplish.
