What kind of equipment/filtration poses the highest risk for "over filtering" a tank?

Treehrtsme · May 5, 2024

For fun I've been messing around with adding an overflow box to a water box 25 gallon peninsula in order to have a sump in the stand. In doing so I found been using a nano refugium I can fit and automatic fleece roller a full size protein skimmer, an algae reactor, as well as media reactors.

Let's say an extreme cases, if I were to hook up perhaps a massive protein skimmer, or a pax bellum c-36, or an Overkill fleece roller, what aspect of filtration would be the biggest concern for completely stripping nutrients? I would guess the protein skimmer would be a concern if it's extremely overrated for the tank, but can excessive mechanical or biological filtration have a negative effect on a nano tank? Any opinions or experience? After seeing how much I could fit in the stand I figured, this is got to be way too much filtration for a 25 gallon tank, but what aspect of the filtration would be something that would need to be monitored or severely limited? A bit of a theoretical question.

Spare time · May 5, 2024

Its really the combination that is the concern unless you feed an insane amount of food or have tons of fish.

Treehrtsme · May 5, 2024

Spare time said:
Its really the combination that is the concern unless you feed an insane amount of food or have tons of fish.

That was a thought I had. I'm terms of absorbing trace elements calcium and such a fuge or algae reactor would compete with coral. Mechanical combined with protein skimmer could just strip the tank of any phosphate or nitrite/trate pretty easy.

I hear it commonly recommended to just do weekly water changes on nano tanks, but has anyone had success in the lazy method of just ato? I've had some success with just an algae reactor on 20 g tanks for nutrient export but found it a bit hard to maintain ph without intervening. I would guess that perhaps solid biological and mechanical filtering with good live rock might be doable but I've read a lot of different things about success with triton and success with just ato and dosing but on much larger tanks.

Spare time · May 5, 2024

Treehrtsme said:
That was a thought I had. I'm terms of absorbing trace elements calcium and such a fuge or algae reactor would compete with coral. Mechanical combined with protein skimmer could just strip the tank of any phosphate or nitrite/trate pretty easy.

I hear it commonly recommended to just do weekly water changes on nano tanks, but has anyone had success in the lazy method of just ato? I've had some success with just an algae reactor on 20 g tanks for nutrient export but found it a bit hard to maintain ph without intervening. I would guess that perhaps solid biological and mechanical filtering with good live rock might be doable but I've read a lot of different things about success with triton and success with just ato and dosing but on much larger tanks.

The competition for trace elements can easily be fixed with chaetogro.

A nano tank can be taken care of easily with water changes, but some, like mine, get little to no water changes since its constantly bottoming out nitrate and phosphate.

Treehrtsme · May 5, 2024

Spare time said:
The competition for trace elements can easily be fixed with chaetogro.

A nano tank can be taken care of easily with water changes, but some, like mine, get little to no water changes since its constantly bottoming out nitrate and phosphate.

Is that not a bad thing? Are we talking near undetectable levels of phosphate and nitrate? I suppose in an ultra low nutrient system that would at least balance out lost trace elements. Are you just running macroalgae for nutrient export? I feel like biolaod plays a factor in these situations but I've had algae reactors grow crazy in tanks with almost no live stock as well as the opposite.

darrick001 · May 5, 2024

In most systems bottoming out nitrate and phosphate is a bad idea. I have ran mine at undetectable levels for 7 years. I only use a refugium for nutriet export and triton to replace minerals. My coral get most of their nutrients from plankton. Without the skimmer the pod population has grown very large. When the pumps are off you can see them swimming.

Pod_01 · May 5, 2024

Treehrtsme said:
massive protein skimmer

Not going to work, skimmer needs to be sized to your fish load. If there is no fish byproduct to skim the skimmer will just bubble and collect water or nothing. Also there is misconception that coral add to the bio load, corals are another filtration method and very effective one.
When you oversize skimmer you end up with inconsistent skimming. Nutrients build up, skimmer works removes them and it sits again waiting for next build up.

Spare time · May 6, 2024

Treehrtsme said:
Is that not a bad thing? Are we talking near undetectable levels of phosphate and nitrate? I suppose in an ultra low nutrient system that would at least balance out lost trace elements. Are you just running macroalgae for nutrient export? I feel like biolaod plays a factor in these situations but I've had algae reactors grow crazy in tanks with almost no live stock as well as the opposite.

My soft corals consume a large amount of nitrate and phosphate. I have to feed the corals a lot each week.

homer1475 · May 6, 2024

The single biggest issue I have seen lately, fleece rollers.

Sure they work great at removing large particulate, but unlike a filtersock, the stuff gets taken away before it breaks down. In a sock, even if you change it out every couple days the waste still has time to break down some adding nitrates and phosphates.

I've read more issues recently with new reefers running fleece rollers, then when we used to just run socks.