Shut that Skimmer Down! Over skimming your tank.

[twilliard]

Besides water a skimmer removes CaCO3, MgCO3, biogenic opal, organic material, ALK, CAL, MAG, potassium, iron, phosphate and a few more elements.
Phosphate is only between the 5 and 10% what is found in skimmers.

The trick is to catch po4 before it even begins.. organic state

 

[brandon429]

It's silica nice call Diesel! I thought you were making a chem joke I shouldn't have ditched chem to shoot pool all the time apparently.

 

[MOPAR]

I may be wrong but wouldn't shutting off the skimmer just postpone it pulling out organics? Instead of consistently pulling it would have a peak and trough effect. Even though it is off for x amount of hours once it is turned back on it would immediately start pulling the stuff it had missed while off until it caught up. I remember when I ran my ATB 840 on my 65 (way to big) it would only pull so much until it didn't have enough organics left to create a proper foam head. It would pull some nasty skim, but it would fluctuate.

 

[hart24601]

An off cycle allows the catch up of no3 and po4 (depending on foods introduced)

But it's not needed. Seems like an imprecise way of regulating no3 and po4 that as you also playing with removal of DOC, small particulate matter, bacteria and gas exchange and have no idea of the removal rate or ratio.

Clearly it's not hard to run a tank too clean now. yes coral need to have some nitrate and a wee bit of phosphate but there are much better ways of doing it Imo, and which I believe has been made very clear by the vast number of tanks that have huge coral and greet color that run a skimmer 24/7.

If it makes a person happy than run the skimmer part time - I'm sure it will work fine as there are great skimmerless systems out there. But is it better??? If you can produce a tank better looking than all the TOTM that run a skimmer 24/7 than maybe.

 

[twilliard]

Define organics

 

[Diesel]

Lol. Here's a scenario. A reefer is having a bit of a "Cyanobacteria" issue. Wanting to go the natural route, and not wanting to use an antibiotic treatment, the reefer goes with a Product made up of a bacterial strain that out competes the Cyano. The reefer shoots the well known company ( not mentioning any names) an e-mail and ask's them if they should discontinue the use of carbon/GFO/skimmer while treating. The reefer gets a reply back from the company to shut off the skimmer a few hours a day while treating to give the bacteria time to procreate in the tank or the skimmer will just remove the bacteria added. It's was also suggested by the company that a skimmer should be shut off a few hours a day for the above stated reasons. So one question is...... Can a skimmer have the means of removing bacteria floating in a water column?

Now my question is.............. why do manufactures from biopellets, ZEOreactors, and GFO reactors and what not recommend that the return is as close as possible at the inlet of the skimmer pump? We all know that they release bacteria into the watercolom

 

[twilliard]

Not much has been said about co2 exchange

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

... hmmmm.. does any one know how many strains of bacteria there can be in a reef tank? Hint.....It's just not one.

If you know the exact answer, you certainly know more than anyone else.

 

[twilliard]

If you know the exact answer, you certainly know more than anyone else.

Wohoo Randy!!

 

[melev]

Lol. Here's a scenario. A reefer is having a bit of a "Cyanobacteria" issue. Wanting to go the natural route, and not wanting to use an antibiotic treatment, the reefer goes with a Product made up of a bacterial strain that out competes the Cyano. The reefer shoots the well known company ( not mentioning any names) an e-mail and ask's them if they should discontinue the use of carbon/GFO/skimmer while treating. The reefer gets a reply back from the company to shut off the skimmer a few hours a day while treating to give the bacteria time to procreate in the tank or the skimmer will just remove the bacteria added. It's was also suggested by the company that a skimmer should be shut off a few hours a day for the above stated reasons. So one question is...... Can a skimmer have the means of removing bacteria floating in a water column?

Yes, the skimmer can be shut off in that scenario -- it usually needs to be off for 72 hours or longer. Then you have to perform a 25% or greater water change before the skimmer is turned back on. You just siphoned out a lot of waste in that water during the water change. The skimmer will then remove more DOCs; so much so that you may have to keep emptying the collection cup that day until the skimmer settles down.

It's n0t about removing bacteria. There is plenty of that in our tanks, everywhere.

 

[Diesel]

The trick is to catch po4 before it even begins.. organic state

I can say that we call that the TOC or Total Organic Carbon.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

So one question is...... Can a skimmer have the means of removing bacteria floating in a water column?

Skimmers can remove some types of bacteria, yes, along with lots of other things.

That is obviously why skimming is recommended when organic carbon dosing.

 

[melev]

Now my question is.............. why do manufactures from biopellets, ZEOreactors, and GFO reactors and what not recommend that the return is as close as possible at the inlet of the skimmer pump? We all know that they release bacteria into the watercolom

I don't agree. The bacteria within those reactors is populates and consumes the bioplastics. The effluent likely exports decay and dead bacteria, which our skimmers can then export quickly and efficiently. Had I not set mine up that way a year ago, my reef would have crashed when I accidentally overdosed bacteria. The skimmate resembled pudding, which was more than likely mostly the biopellets. Fortunately most of the corals recovered.

 

[Lenny_S]

I may not know all the science behind foam fractionation, but I do know that if I run my skimmer 24x7 and nothing else, I see the following... Nitrate and phosphate will steadily rise, so whatever the skimmer may remove of those from the tank, it isn't as much as is produced. Mg, Ca, and ALK don't budge, I ran the skimmer full tilt during the cycle of a sterile tank with dry rock and this tested virtually the same at the start and again after 6 weeks. I will admit that it didn't pull much skimmate during that time, but I think it's notable. Finally, my observation is that everything in my tank is very happy and growing.
Every system, even if 2 different people use the same equipment will behave differently. And each of our systems will flourish when we have found that equilibrium of the many different factors that creates a balanced environment. For some I can imagine that turning off the skimmer for some period of time is part of their systems equilibrium. Just as others use or don't use various life support equipment, additives, or media.
My $0.02 [emoji6]

 

[Diesel]

If you know the exact answer, you certainly know more than anyone else.

Believe me every day I try to count them but lose track when I come around the corner of the third rock starting at the right side.

 

[Diesel]

I don't agree. The bacteria within those reactors is populates and consumes the bioplastics. The effluent likely exports decay and dead bacteria, which our skimmers can then export quickly and efficiently. Had I not set mine up that way a year ago, my reef would have crashed when I accidentally overdosed bacteria. The skimmate resembled pudding, which was more than likely mostly the biopellets. Fortunately most of the corals recovered.

That makes sense.
Does that also counts for the ZEO reactors as we don't talking bio plastics here.

 

[Anthony kolodziej]

while I don't completely disagree with not running a skimmer 24/7. I don't think a reef tank can be without one. I also believe most people over filtrate their tanks . heres why I think this . I had some issues with my tank and started a massive campaign to reduce nitrates and phosphates from my system since all my SPS were turning brown .as I approached 0 color had started to come back and so I held it there . Then I saw the colors turning more pale . still colorfull I thought well... this must be how it works . I recently began to re-introduce ( allow to form ) nitrates and phosphates. growth is better color is better pod count has gone up . over all much better. I am not talking crazy numbers here just about 5-10 trates and under 0.1 phosphates thereabouts . How does skimming affect this ? It allows you to keep a slow build up instead of a spike . By removing waste before they become broken down . Any skimmer no matter how much you pay for it or how it is rated only removes about 30-40 % of organic waste . but it also can remove disolved metals from the water . IE trace elements . so skimming , water changes , good husbandry all need to be done together . In short create a balance .starting at the bottom with Bacteria , micro organisims and so on .Now, do I get a star lol

 

[gcrawford]

I have a 5 ft tall skimmer in my closet that I can't wait to integrate into my system......my dream is to connect it to a huge iwaki pump (also in my closet) and skim 24/7. Would be a great experiment to support or argue against this thread! I just need the closet in my son's room which is behind the tank on a shared wall. Come on college!

 

[Snotdoc]

This seems like the kind of claim that should be backed up with some data.

 

[xmas_one]

Got rid of my skimmer two months ago, I'm running chaeto in the fuge on a reverse cycle, weekly water changes, and dosing no3 as needed, tank is doing great.