Wet Foam vs. Dry Foam

[Brucey]

Mike, thats fantasitic information, thanks for taking the time to put it all down on paper, well on your keyboard anyway. Yes, my clam is a baby .... Only about 1.5 inches at the moment so I guess he still needs the phyto. Point taken though, and I will cut back. I was falsely under the impression the the SPS and LPS were capturing the phyto as well, which as you indcated they are not. I think I'll concentrate more on the Rotifer production then as I have setup a seperate tank just for them. My Phosphates were dreeping a bit recently and I started to get red slime algae growing but I have recently (Last 3 weeks) setup a external cannister filter running ROWAPhos and the slime algae and Phosphates levels have all but gone.

Once again, really appreciate your input. It's not often you get to learn so much in one. PS, I just love your picture of your clams, do you have to supplement them Nitrate as I understood clams enjoy quite a bit of it and you just have Sooooo many, their amazing. There are a few $ lined up along the front of that tank.

Brucey

Oh one more Q .... How about the anenomes ..... They filter feed right !!!! But again would they be better on Rotifers rather than Phyto

[mojoreef]

Brucey I also run a phosphate remover but it will not touch organic phosphates, it only binds inorganic forms. On your phosphates my friend this is how you me and everyone must look at them. If you get a reading off your hobby test kit it is only telling you what the inorganic content is (as that is all they measure). If you show a level of inorganic phosphate then you know that you organic phosphates are completely saturated. Example, inorganic form is the food, organic is the binder. if thier is inorganic phosphate in your tank that means that the orgainc forms are full and cannot take anymore (kinda like the food is left on the plate and the guests are stuffed, lol. This is where the heavy wet skimming comes back into play, with this type of skimming you are removing large ammounts of inorganic and organic types, and thus doing some actual exporting. So its back to real simple my friend, serve dinner of the things you know they like to eat and then clean the plates off for the next meal, keeps the dinning room real clean.


Mike

[Scooterman]

I had to take a second glance of the topic, LOL!
When I add a little Phyto I never noticed much difference in any of the corals I have, unless I'd go weeks without adding anything, then it would seem to perk them up momentary. I seldom add anything on a regular basis & I do skim as much as I can, heavy & wet. Some people who use the Eco Mud system don't skim, but that can be discussed later. I always see a need to do more than just skim, every so often I use a 50 Micron sock overnight, & regular WC etc. If I lag on any of it, the first thing I see is algae popping up everywhere. To me adding that much Phyto would cause major algae blooms & cyno, heck my cat doesn't eat that much Burp!

[VINA DEL MAR]

Now going back to skimmers!I also noticed like myself many reefers are going back to the old skimmers using wood air diffusers and air pumps.I do see the quality of the air bubbles in terms of size and numbers.
Perhaps the small bubbles in big ammounts is having more time to contac proteins.A big effect with my tank water
quality took place after the switch.I also know forcing air to the skimmer is better than the sucking effect that the venturi style has.What do you guys think about this topic?VINA

[Scooterman]

Humm, I wonder If I added a small air pump to mine, wonder if it would work better, that is a good idea!
Curts, get in line bud.

[Brucey]

I always thought needle wheel skimmers were better ... or perhaps it is just that the wooden airstones needed replacing quite often ???

Sorry I digressed off the subject thread (Just a little ??? LOL)

brucey

[Brucey]

Just giving this thread a BUMP as there was a lot of discussion on skimming and overskimming written here. I've been ready reefkeeping.com and Eric "God" Bourneman has some interesting theories on the matter, which i think makes pretty sound reading.
Brucey
http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-01/eb/index.htm

[Scooterman]

I went through that article last week, he makes good sense for beginners, not sure about the skimming part.

[mojoreef]

You know I have tried avoiding commenting on that article, as Eric is a friend. But man if you really read it, there are some things to shake your head at.
Looking at the skimming part for example.

Yes, you can. Far too many works have dealt with various aspects of protein skimming. I still feel there is too little information on exactly what, how much, and how effectively foam fractionation affects various components of the water column of reef aquaria.

In one breathe he says that you can skim to much, and in the same breathe says he doesnt know enough about it and that it is an unkown????
Then

For the most part, protein skimmers are employed as water quality control devices to maintain low levels of organic and some inorganic materials, notably compounds containing nitrogen and phosphorous commonly linked to degraded water quality not conducive to the growth of many reef species such as corals

Ok works for me but then

My point is that once nutrient levels are low and conducive to a healthy aquarium, and until other secondarily important aspects of protein skimming are experimentally validated and quantified, any skimming over that required to maintain low levels of organic and inorganic pollutants is overskimming. Why? Because if the water is cleared of those things that are detrimental, it is also likely to be equally cleared of things that are beneficial

I hate this stuff. What are the acceptable levels he is refering to????? He states that secondary aspects should not be looked at until scientific study is done, but throws a blanket staement out like "it is also LIKELY". for me you live with the sword you die by it. If you're scientific for one then lets see the scientific for the other.

There is no advantage to a constantly stripped water column in all but a very few specialized situations.

well I have alot of equipment on my reef, and the likelyhood that I could even come close to totally low nutrient levels as the reefs in the wild are is a snow balls chance in hell, so how can anyone achieve stripped water. Oh and if you have figured it out let me know I would love to give that a go.
And the last statement when he offers his solution he states

(I think this likely, especially if activated carbon is employed).

So ditch the skimmer and use carbon in its place. Thats not even ...well I wont say that.
If you carefully read all of the articles you will see that they are designed to stay in line with the overall concepts of his stuff, and are written in such a manner that allows a lot of excape holes if he is caught or wants to change direction. Not much else to really say about the article beyond "I guess he couldnt just write an article that says use a large skimmer and be done with it"

Anyway my two cents, for what thier worth.


Mike

[tankgirl]

Ditto what Scott said!

Brucey, take a look at this thread;
http://www.thereeftank.com/forums/sh...threadid=29329

[Curtswearing]

I found the articles very interesting and I haven't posted much about them. I absolutely LOVE the title of the series. I'm not sure I agree with everything that was stated in the series and I have a problem with some things but I'm not going there. Regardless, I still learn something new every day.

When I first started reefing, I trusted implicitly what one person at a particular LFS told me. I would go see him every Saturday morning, ask questions, and buy more stuff. It turned out that he didn't even work for the LFS. He ran a tank maintenance business. They let him hang around because he brought them sales but they weren't listening to what he was telling their customers. I never even made the connection when he would gather up what I was purchasing and give it to someone else to ring out. (I guess I'm a little too trusting). This guy was purposely creating problems in my tank and hitting me up for maintenance services each week. BTW----I do believe that if he showed his face in a single LFS in St. Louis, the local news would have a story about a customer who accidentally died by ingesting a rare poisonous toxin.

Then I found internet reefing boards. My trusting nature made me believe hook line and sinker, everything that experts said. I then proceeded to tell everyone that XYZ said this so it must be true. (Sorry guys).

I'm not commenting on this post other than the Title of the Series. However, I'm throwing my earlier mistakes out there to just warn you to think things through, ask questions, and make sure you understand the answer before moving on. Make sure it makes sense to you.

A couple of years ago, you were edit--made to feel like a complete idiot if you didn't buy shares of XYZ.com. The magazines said so, the talk radio said so, the internet said so, your friends said so. It might have been sound advice or it might have been poor advice. The mere fact that a lot of people repeated it didn't make it true.

edit---I really find it difficult to accept that we have the technology to overskim our tanks at this point unless you put a HUGE skimmer on a 29g tank. I would rather take out all organics and then control what goes into my tank rather than leave some organics in my tank that are not under my control.

[tankgirl]

Good post, Curts!!! I think most of us had similar experiences. Glad they're behind us (hopefully).

[VINA DEL MAR]

CURTS I'm sorry that you had a very bad experience with that guy that hang around in a local fish store somewhere in ST. LOUIS.
I'm sure you took your losses as a learning lessons.But is this site(RS)there is many people that knows a lot more that you can't imagine.
I respect every advise,opinions and comments that every member has in mind.You mentioned that you are not sure to agree with everything stated in the series and have problems with something and you don't want to go there.I always like to hear these people thoughts it gets very interesting because at the end they seems to agree with everybody else.
When I began to read your post I thought I was an a different thread.
I know many of us shift gear and go to different topics.I still like to see what you think about "Dry foam or Wet foam" and give us your opinions.
I did not buy any shares of XYZ.COM so according to you that make me an idiot!
And yes I do believe in magazines,talks shows,books,internet as long as their are educational to me.
You also mentioned that you dont want to comment on this post other than The Titles of the Series.I really dont know what you meant by that?Are you sure is about this site or another one?
I'm glad this site is the home of very good people,smart and understanding and are always here to help anyone that needs help!LOL and peace to all.
VINA

[Brucey]

Curt .... exactly. When you first get into this thing, we all trust one person, a LFS, a friend who already has a reef etc ..... but the most valuable thing about these boards is you can throw a question out there, get 20 replies and then make a judgement yourself on whats right and whats wrong. We're all still in the early days of this hobby and I'm sure that in 20 years time, things that we think are gospel now will be blown out of the water.
Brucey

[Scooterman]

I guess this thread has gotten off course, I'll continue to stay off track by making this statement. I had over $1,000 into my 30g tank before finding web forums, like Curts, I was trusting the LFS guys, someone I don't know, also I never spent much time on forums before so I didn't know I could ever trust anything I've seen or read in these live web pages so to speak. My point is eventually I found out that I was real mad at my LFS, I was spending tons of cash and getting nowhere but then it hit me, if it wasn't for the almighty LFS, I would of never gotten here. I do go and probe questions, look around etc... it is nice to get out and see what they are selling. I actually find a few guys that help, know some things and are nice, also it is our community, so LFS is good and bad in ways but we need them. I read, I interpret, I read, I interpret, & then I read some more, this lesson was costly but has paid off lately. This guy made some very good points about cycling tanks & I would suggest beginners reading these certain parts but Not the whole thing LOL! As a community, we here, help each other every day, that is why when I read this, I started posting it, wanted your opinions, information etc.. It has helped!