refugium Builds need help advicd

[Typhon]

What you mean make the chaeto spin? I put some chaeto in last time and it slowly died our after about a week which makes no sense to cause my phosphates are .85 so it should of fed off that

Normally in low flow fuge only one side of the cheato is lite and grows. If you have ball of cheato and enough flow. It will spin and have new growth on all sides.

If your last ball of chaeto died, then I would look at your light and water parm.

I add "Chaeto Grow" from Brightwell and get great growth. Chaeto actually will strip out keep elements from your water as grows. Not just phospate and Nitrate. That your corals need too.

 

[Typhon]

The light for your fuge has to as strong or close to your display. So the chaeto can out compete the algae in your main tank.

 

[nightmarepl]

Agree. Though don’t think the spin is necessary so I wouldn’t get hung up on that. A strong light is important as well.

ACKE LED Grow Lights Full Spectrum,Plant Lights，Growing Lamps 12W for Indoor Plants,Hydropoincs https://a.co/d/f57biWS

 

[nightmarepl]

The light for your fuge has to as strong or close to your display. So the chaeto can out compete the algae in your main tank.

Oh boy i didn’t know the light had to be that strong people said even a basic plant light will do wonders…

 

[TokenReefer]

I'll admit I don't get the concept of Chaeto Grow; but that's not a first lol. Almost bought some once but thought...."am I trying to grow chaeto?" and passed. My chaeto doesn't grow off the charts but it doesn't die either. I look at it as a buffer for excess nutrients at this point in time

 

[Typhon]

Oh boy i didn’t know the light had to be that strong people said even a basic plant light will do wonders…

Yeah.. I didn't know either until, I watch an series on fuges on BRSTV.

 

[Typhon]

I am using the Kessil H160 Tuna Flora. Works great for me.

 

[Typhon]

I'll admit I don't get the concept of Chaeto Grow; but that's not a first lol. Almost bought some once but thought...."am I trying to grow chaeto?" and passed. My chaeto doesn't grow off the charts but it doesn't die either. I look at it as a buffer for excess nutrients at this point in time

I use be to that way too, until I tried it. Not just the chaeto, but my corals have seen better growth and coloration too.

 

[TokenReefer]

I use be to that way too, until I tried it. Not just the chaeto, but my corals have seen better growth and coloration too.

Not doubting your success but on paper it didn't add up for me is all. I wanted the chaeto to handle excess nutrients; if I dosed nutrients for the chaeto to grow, that would defeat the purpose and negate it's effect on the pulling from the rest of the system. Now getting the chaeto to a mass that can effectively have an impact is a concept I get so for that purpose...maybe

 

[RedoubtReef]

Food for thought. Here's a similar thread with some good info on refugium setup that was going on this week also:

A Pod Fuge

Over the last 2 years, I have struggled to keep nitrates and phosphates over 0. Even with heavy feeding and reducing skimming, I struggle to keep both nutrients at proper levels. So much so that I just had a really bad cyano outbreak. Got it fixed with chemiclean and am dosing nitrates and...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Eagle_Steve]

Not doubting your success but on paper it didn't add up for me is all. I wanted the chaeto to handle excess nutrients; if I dosed nutrients for the chaeto to grow, that would defeat the purpose and negate it's effect on the pulling from the rest of the system. Now getting the chaeto to a mass that can effectively have an impact is a concept I get so for that purpose...maybe

Cheatogrow is not nutrients. It is trace elements that the cheato consumes when it grows. Iron is one for example.

I use it on my macro tanks, as without it, they will die. Unless I was to dose the specific elements needed singularly, this is my best option out there to replenish those used by the macros. I have also used it with cheato,and with great success. In some tanks, it is not needed and people grow cheato like a weed. But for others, they may be iron limited or some other trace element limited and it does help those individuals that are trace limited. I know by ICP tests, that I was limited on quite a few elements and the cheatogrow provides them, so I use it.

But if one can grow cheato without it, awesome.

 

[TokenReefer]

Cheatogrow is not nutrients. It is trace elements that the cheato consumes when it grows. Iron is one for example.

I use it on my macro tanks, as without it, they will die. Unless I was to dose the specific elements needed singularly, this is my best option out there to replenish those used by the macros. I have also used it with cheato,and with great success. In some tanks, it is not needed and people grow cheato like a weed. But for others, they may be iron limited or some other trace element limited and it does help those individuals that are trace limited. I know by ICP tests, that I was limited on quite a few elements and the cheatogrow provides them, so I use it.

But if one can grow cheato without it, awesome.

ok. To be fair I never really looked into the ingredients and funny you say that because I think iron is my limiter at this point; been thinking about getting some fergon to dose just haven't gotten around to it. Simply to see if it helps but honestly if my chaeto takes off I'd be afraid it'd strip too much; already running thin. I've got the lighting period down to 8 hours as it is. Thanks for the info

 

[RedoubtReef]

Since normally flow thru a fuge is slow, the sand becomes a nutrient sink. And slow leaks back into main tank.

I've always run it low turnover but, use power heads for higher 'flow' within the fuge. Keeps detritus in suspension and moving out of the fuge.

 

[hikebikebrew]

Fwiw, I use PhosBan to help regulate phosphates. It comes in little pellets that I put in a nylon bag and place in my sumps where they get good flow.

I have that in addition to my fuge, and my macro is growing very well still. My phosphates stay <0.2 ppm.