Is there a pump in your sump?

[reacclimating 2 the hobby]

For you SPS dominant guru's... are you running a powerhead in your sump to keep detritus suspended? I'm not currently, but notice a large amount gets past the filter socks in the reefer sumps. My fuge seems to like it as the chaeto is growing mad. Just seeing what others do. My nutrients aren't out of control, but seems it could be a good conversation.

 

[KrisReef]

I have liverock in my sump and so I will get some settling in the sump.

Some people clean their sumps even draining them and wiping them down and using a shop vac to remove the collected stuff but I don’t and I don’t see a problem with it. Sometimes during a big water change I pour buckets into the sump and it snows in the DT. The corals get busy to catch what they can.

 

[reacclimating 2 the hobby]

I have shop vac'd mine out a few times, but now that the chaeto has taken over it will be much more work. I also have live rock and some smaller marine pure blocks. My tank is also fallow right now so i'm keeping all the nutrients I can.

 

[jda]

Sump is a great place for detritus to settle since it is easy to remove from there. It is benign anyway, so having it in your tank is no big deal. If you keep it suspended, most of it will just end back up in the tank - very little in the skimmer although this is where people that all of it goes.

Let me say this again - detritus is benign... the bacteria and critters have already scavenged any possible nutrients from it before it settles down there. Get it out, but there is no huge hurry.

 

[TX_Punisher]

Let me say this again - detritus is benign... the bacteria and critters have already scavenged any possible nutrients from it before it settles down there. Get it out, but there is no huge hurry.

Kind of how I feel. Nothing changes for
Me with it or without it.

 

[SeaDweller]

I thought about it but letting it settle there makes it easier for me to siphon MOST of it out. I leave a little in there as I know pods scavenge through it. I don’t even need to shop vac it, simple siphon gets whatever is there out, and that’s once a month.

I don’t bother with filter socks anymore unless I really need to remove something from the DT.

 

[Sidius]

For those that dose 2-part, do you run a small powerhead where the additives are dosed or do you just let the sump flow/return pump handle that? I noticed in the BRS videos, they've mentioned that as a solution to prevent precipitation. I'm currently working on designing a sump for my tank upgrade and I'm curious what others are doing.

 

[reacclimating 2 the hobby]

For those that dose 2-part, do you run a small powerhead where the additives are dosed or do you just let the sump flow/return pump handle that? I noticed in the BRS videos, they've mentioned that as a solution to prevent precipitation. I'm currently working on designing a sump for my tank upgrade and I'm curious what others are doing.

When I dosed 2 part in a previous tank I just had them going into separate areas of the sump.

 

[Waynerock]

Little tiny powerhead in the sump with some liverock just to keep the top of the water moving and not getting scummy. Plus having a Aussie ( dog not torch, although we got that too) dog hair likes to float around my skimmer body. Another plus is you can take a baster and blow the water around and the skimmer picks up almost everything floating around

 

[reacclimating 2 the hobby]

Bump

 

[MnFish1]

Sump is a great place for detritus to settle since it is easy to remove from there. It is benign anyway, so having it in your tank is no big deal. If you keep it suspended, most of it will just end back up in the tank - very little in the skimmer although this is where people that all of it goes.

Let me say this again - detritus is benign... the bacteria and critters have already scavenged any possible nutrients from it before it settles down there. Get it out, but there is no huge hurry.

I tend to agree with you - but - How do you know that all of the nutrients, etc are gone from it. What is detritus then? Plastic? Otherwise there should be 'something' that will break it down. My guess is that to some degree its beneficial - but like anything else - too much is not.

 

[jda]

A few decades of posts and research from Dr Holmes-Farley and Dr. Ron. You might have to go to RC to read most of them, but the supposition always was that fish/macro fauna gets to it first, then micro and then bacteria and single cell stuff. In the end, there is nothing left to scavenge, or else it would have been scavenged and that what accumulates is benign. Dr. Holmes-Farley used to post that he had more than an inch of detritus built up in his sump and had no inclination to get it out. Somebody tested some and there was no carbon or nitrogen left in it. Phosphorous is nearly all excreted in urine either through a bladder, skin, gills, eyes, etc. Why would bacteria leave anything behind for the next guy?

I do not agree with Dr. Ron to just leave it alone. I want to get it out. I do think that after a while that even a benign substance in the sand and sump can gum up the works and keep the microfauna, bacteria and single cell organisms from being able to do their jobs. This is why I vacuum out my sump a few times a year and I also vacuum my sand about every 4 years (slowly in small chunks with months inbetween). This vacuum does mix up the oxic and anoxic regions and does cause some die off and a need for these areas to reestablish, so that is why I do it slow.

 

[MnFish1]

A few decades of posts and research from Dr Holmes-Farley and Dr. Ron. You might have to go to RC to read most of them, but the supposition always was that fish/macro fauna gets to it first, then micro and then bacteria and single cell stuff. In the end, there is nothing left to scavenge, or else it would have been scavenged and that what accumulates is benign. Dr. Holmes-Farley used to post that he had more than an inch of detritus built up in his sump and had no inclination to get it out. Somebody tested some and there was no carbon or nitrogen left in it. Phosphorous is nearly all excreted in urine either through a bladder, skin, gills, eyes, etc. Why would bacteria leave anything behind for the next guy?

I do not agree with Dr. Ron to just leave it alone. I want to get it out. I do think that after a while that even a benign substance in the sand and sump can gum up the works and keep the microfauna, bacteria and single cell organisms from being able to do their jobs. This is why I vacuum out my sump a few times a year and I also vacuum my sand about every 4 years (slowly in small chunks with months inbetween). This vacuum does mix up the oxic and anoxic regions and does cause some die off and a need for these areas to reestablish, so that is why I do it slow.

thanks - this makes sense - on another site it mentioned that detritus contained a huge amount of bacteria etc. - I would just be curious as to what is 'in it'. In my discus tank - in the sump every 2 weeks in one section - is about 1/4 inch of 'stuff' that seems innocuous - but I just siphon it off.

 

[homer1475]

I do not run socks and let the detritus just accumulate. I have lots of LR in one section of my sump, and thats where it all tends to settle. I clean it out about once a year. I never notice any difference between cleaning it out, and leaving it be.

As far as the other question about a PH and 2 part. I have my dosing line directly fed into the first bubble trap before my return. There is plenty of flow in that area to get mixed before having to worry about precip. I also dose 1/2 hour apart. ALK at the top of the hour, and CAL at the 1/2 hour mark.

 

[LilElroyJetson]

I’ve got a Hydor Koralia nano in my first chamber beneath the filter socks to keep the detritus suspended and it works well. Recently noticed a lot of detritus settling in my middle/skimmer chamber so considering adding another in that section.

 

[MnFish1]

The main point being - if there is nothing beneficial in detritus - why not get rid of it periodically @jda

 

[rkpetersen]

For those that dose 2-part, do you run a small powerhead where the additives are dosed or do you just let the sump flow/return pump handle that? I noticed in the BRS videos, they've mentioned that as a solution to prevent precipitation. I'm currently working on designing a sump for my tank upgrade and I'm curious what others are doing.

I have not had to use a powerhead to avoid precipitation in the sump, because I am scrupulous about making sure that cal and alk aren't dosed within 5 minutes of each other.
However, this may have to change soon due to a hardware change, and so the idea of adding a small powerhead to the sump sounds good, and not something I had considered before.
And the smallest powerhead you could buy would do the job just fine.

 

[MnFish1]

I have not had to use a powerhead to avoid precipitation in the sump, because I am scrupulous about making sure that cal and alk aren't dosed within 5 minutes of each other.
However, this may have to change soon due to a hardware change, and so the idea of adding a small powerhead to the sump sounds good, and not something I had considered before.
And the smallest powerhead you could buy would do the job just fine.

Have you tried separating the output tubes? - I used to have all of my outputs next to each other - since changing - haven't had a problem... PS no Pump in sump occasionally - when moving stuff around - my skimmer becomes disconnected - which takes care of mixing things up lol

 

[JDowns]

I’ll mostly do water changes out of the sump and just vacuum it out at the same time. Only takes a few minutes and sump always stays vlean

 

[hart24601]

I don't have a powerhead but I do have a T off my main pump to circulate the sump. If I didn't do that then I would have a powerhead. I don't have a high turnover from the tank and my sump is much larger than my tank so it helps mix 2 part, circulate the chaeto, and keep the heater in circulated water.