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[StirCrazy]

I think everyone is missing the point, it doesn't take a higher nutrient level in the water to grow softies, I have grown them at high rates of growth in very nutrient lacking water, it takes high light, good water quality, and food, just like any other coral.

Now there are two ways to get the food, 1 have a high level of nutrients in your water and fight with algae unless you can find the perfect level of nutrients that the softies can have just enuf but it isn't enuf for algae.

Or you can set up a nutrient free system with higher flow and aggressive skimming. Now this is the part where most people get confused, just having a skimmer doesn't cut this set up, you need to be able to severally over skim. the idea behind this one is that you feed your corals a lot and your skimmer can remove the un eaten food before it breaks down and turns into algae fuel. another part of this is water flow, you have to have enuf so that you have now dead spots in the tank, and that it will keep all the junk suspended so the skimmer can remove it, unfortunately this usually means having to have a bare bottom tank.

Almost all of us operate somewhere between these two ideals, therefor we have algae and other problems. I have been moving to-wards the latter set up for about two years now, increasing tank flow, removing the sand bed, increasing flow again, and finally building my new skimmer which should be able to handle a tank 10X bigger than whats it is going to be used on.

so in my mind anyone who says you need nutrient rich water for softies, or that they do better under lower lighting, either honestly doesn't know any better or doesn't want to spend the money to upgrade lighting/equipment

Steve

[TheReefGeek]

I still think a higher nutrient tank will grow softies faster. Yes you can get them to grow well by feeding lots, and skimming lots, but I think they would grow faster if you fed lots, and skimmed less.

I feed a LOT, but because of my refugium and really heavy skimming, the softies don't get a chance to feed all the time like they did when my tank crashed an there was lots of nutrients available.

[Reefer Rob]

Is it just my tank or doesn't high nutrient + low light = brown corals. My softies look much better under high light with nitrates near 0 than they did at 20 ppm. IMO softies grow like weeds anyway.

Rob

[TheReefGeek]

Where did low light come from?

Under high lighting, the look of my corals didn't change between having high or low nutrients, just the growth was stunted once the nutrients were gone.

When I had high nutrients, my xenia went nuts, and my kenya tree dropped limbs to propagate almost every day. Now, the kenya tree has stopped dropping limbs, and the xenia are not spreading anymore.

[danny zubot]

I think we need to consider the benifits of having softies even is SPS dominated systems. They act as nutrient sponges much like the various common macros we used for nutrient export. I have no macros in my tank, but enough softies to export enough nutrients to leave my tank algae free. IMO it is a symbiotic relationship between vastly different corals, they work well together.

[Reefer Rob]

I thought that in a high nutreint environment the corals can reach a point where they are unable regulate their zooxanthellae populations due to nitrates being so high they defuse into the coral. This causes an over population of zooxanthellae, which acually stesses the animal slowing down it's growth. I thought I read this somewhere, I could be wrong

Rob

[TheReefGeek]

Could be, but that would be a lot higher than the levesl we are talking about then.

[Dale]

I thought nutrients were food?

There is this generalization that everything grown in our tanks is light Dependant - thus making waterborne nutrients unnecessary. Obviously, with certain soft corals and filter feeders this is not the case (how much light do my chili coral and tube worms need to thrive?). I think many reefers kill off or emaciate certain organisms by running "too" clean a system. Why intentionally starve a nutrient absorbing/filter feeding reef? Again, it is a case of distinguishing the specific needs of the livestock we keep.

I actually operate my tank somewhat as stircrazy suggests but there are limits (chosen/unchosen) to the amount of skimming/export possible IMHO.
One problem is that it is impractical to dose a tank to the nutrient density needed for some general filter feeding species if one is going to decrease the density to zero once again each time (I'm assuming large systems here). My vividreef live phytoplankton costs $20 a bottle and doesn't go far when dosing approx. 75G.'s of water. Some might add a little, thinking it's enough, but once diluted and only allowed to circulate for a short period the effects on the livestock is minimal.
It is also assumed that all the species in the tank will be feeding when one doses the tank. In my tank I find the livestock open and close on their own schedule.
I also don't know if it's very easy to go from nutrient dense to pristine like a yo yo unless one sets up a skeletonized reef ala SPS dominated displays (I'm going for the lush jungle look). I think it is a good idea to skim heavily but, other "passive" forms of mopping up nutrients/nitrates is a good idea too. I'm aiming for that balance stircrazy suggests.
FWIW, My routine is to dose the tank 2 - 3 times a week. I tee off my return line so that the flow feeds back into the sump like a closed loop. I allow my tank to sit for several hours and then return flow to the display. Display water movement is maintained by a closed loop circ. system.
I am slowly going B.B. (siphoning substrate out with each P.W.C.) mainly because my recirc sys. kicks up too much substrate when the blenny skates over it. I chickened out of B.B. initially because I wanted the substrate to cover my PVC piping but now I am confident that the coraline algae will look OK. One problem with going B.B. is that you lose the natural buffer that the crushed coral affords (I planned ahead for this by adding C.C. to my R.D.S.B.) Of course you can also counter this by using additives or a reactor. I also think one loses some sand borne scavengers that may aid in waste control (also not a problem if rock work access is planned for regular siphoning).

Whew!!! What a lot of work. May be those F.O.W.L.R. keepers know something I don't
________
herbalaire vaporizer

[StirCrazy]

Originally Posted by Dale

One problem with going B.B. is that you lose the natural buffer that the crushed coral affords (I planned ahead for this by adding C.C. to my R.D.S.B.)

Don't worry so much about losing this buffer, there was a test done years ago with a BB a crushed coral and a DSB tank left to crash. the BB crashed first but it was only two weeks later when the DSB tank crashed. If I remember right the time frame was over a couple months.

even if it did help though, with the PH your water would have to drop to to release any significant amount of Ca you are going to have bigger problems than low Ca. Also if it did release Ca you have to think of all the other stuff bound in that sand, Phosphates, ect.

Steve