FW Refugium

[SeaHorse_Fanatic]

Originally Posted by ElGuappo

i have heard of people using skimmers on sumped fw systems. i have never tried or seen it tho...

On a very dirty tank like for koi, a protein skimmer sort of works, but otherwise no. At that point, you are much better off doing a simple water change. (my friend tried it as an experiment on his brother's koi tank).

What you are talking about for a refugium on a fw tank is what I like to call a "planted fw tank"

With my heavily stocked, over-filtered last planted tank, the plants did a very good job sucking up excess nutrients, to the point where I had to add Metricide as a carbon source and plants grew very well, water stayed good, and fish were healthy.