Nutrients For a Fishless SPS tank

[Teemingtank]

I’m in the process of setting up a “fishless” sps tank. I was wondering how I can keep nutrients up and algae down. The tank itself is a drilled evo 13.5 with 25 gallon sump. The flow is pretty high, the tank is rather small, and from what I’ve read, controlling algae on the DT can be hard without fish to consume them. There isn’t a tang small enough to keep in the system without getting a life sentence from the tang police.

Currently, I have a mature frag tank(roughly 7-8 months).

Would I be able to cross water change, from one tank to another, to add nutrients? Or would I be better off with having inhabitants in the sump of the evo?

I’ve got some time left in the cycle to get a game plan together. Any suggestions?

 

[Timfish]

Keep in mind fish are probably the best source of nutrients for corals. As far as dealing with nuisance algae I'm quite fond of sally light foot crabs and thin strip hermits. Unfortunaletly your tank is likely too small for a tuxedo urchin unless you can find a tiny one.

 

[garbled]

Anything you feed will produce nutrients. So if you have some cleaner shrimp in there and feed them a little bit, or a sandbed with lots of little pods and worms and you feed them a tiny bit of pellet, or maybe some small crabs? Even snails produce waste.

 

[Teemingtank]

Anything you feed will produce nutrients. So if you have some cleaner shrimp in there and feed them a little bit, or a sandbed with lots of little pods and worms and you feed them a tiny bit of pellet, or maybe some small crabs? Even snails produce waste.

I have a scp- 90 crossflow wavemaker in the tank, otherwise I would have a couple fish in there! I wasn’t sure if the snails/ cuc would produce enough waste, but now that I know I’ll get a couple cool cuc members to keep in there. Thank you!

 

[Tired]

There are fish that would be suitable. If you have any lower-flow spots, there are some small gobies that would do just fine. Trimma gobies are little, and they perch all day, so they don't need much space. Really, my concern with a fishless tank isn't just nutrients, it's amphipods. They multiply a lot in a tank without predators, and can seriously annoy or even start to eat corals. A trimma will scarf them up. A shrimpgoby that lives under the rocks could also work, since it would be out of the flow.

 

[Teemingtank]

There are fish that would be suitable. If you have any lower-flow spots, there are some small gobies that would do just fine. Trimma gobies are little, and they perch all day, so they don't need much space. Really, my concern with a fishless tank isn't just nutrients, it's amphipods. They multiply a lot in a tank without predators, and can seriously annoy or even start to eat corals. A trimma will scarf them up. A shrimpgoby that lives under the rocks could also work, since it would be out of the flow.

That’s a good idea! The flow isn’t necessarily super strong and overpowering, there’s just constant movement everywhere. I was also considering a chocolate chip star in the sump. Bad idea?

 

[Tired]

Chocolate chip stars get quite large, I'd expect that to be a decent chunk of bio-load. I don't see why it's not possible, but I'm not sure it's ideal. You'd have to feed it heavily.

Perching gobies can handle some amount of flow. You would want to ensure that it has spots it can sit without being pushed around at all, but they don't exactly need large spots. Just DO NOT put a sally lightfoot crab with them- sallies are opportunists, tiny gobies are opportunities.

Snails are good for nuisance algae. What's better is live rock, so the algae doesn't have any free real estate to swarm over.

If it comes down to it, you can straight-up dose nutrients. I'd be inclined to try heavily feeding a couple of gobies, and also your corals, to get nutrients in there.

 

[Fishfinder]

That’s a good idea! The flow isn’t necessarily super strong and overpowering, there’s just constant movement everywhere. I was also considering a chocolate chip star in the sump. Bad idea?

It’s much less flow than they have in the ocean