reef jacob
Active Member
I was thinking of setting up a display refugium to plumb into my 135 gallon reef. What should I add to it and what size of tank?
Refugium display tank
- Thread starter reef jacob
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luxauterna
A softy who loves softies
Hello and welcome to R2R! You should start a tank thread so we can follow along in there. I love the idea of having a display fuge. I tried a similar thing using a 125 gal tank. It is up to how much space you have and whatever size you want I guess! I would go with something like a 40 breeder at least. I think that would be pretty sweet. I saw a 55 display fuge that was plumbed into a reef that had some tube anemones, different kinds of beautiful macros and a Peacock Mantis Shrimp. He used it to display some things that wouldn't be reef safe. I always wanted to do one that I could put some different kinds of crabs and starfish that I wouldn't have in the DT. Here is the vid I was talking about:
redfishbluefish
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I'm not quite sure what you mean by display refugium....but I left the panel off one of the doors exposing the refugium on my sump. Not the greatest picture, but I think you get the idea. FYI, five foot 90 gallon DT with a 40B sump/refugium. The little kids that come over get a kick out of the "lower tank," where I also house a pair of clowns. It's at their height.
SeahorseKeeper
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Moved to the current forum so that you could get more input. 
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reef jacob
Active Member
thanks for the video and so I do have the space for a 120 but I don't wont the huminity of it because I would put it in the same room as a 135 gallon reef.
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reef jacob
Active Member
well I found a 30 gallon is that big enough?
AlexG
Valuable Member
Here are a couple of pics of my last 65gallon display refugium tank. Macro algae and one big mantis had a nice home. One change I will be making next time is it will be bare bottom and higher flow as it caused algae issues right before I had to tear down. I could not house a cleanup crew in that tank due to the mantis and I also had issues with detritus buildup due to limited flow. Next refugium I am planning will be even bigger.https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/macro-algae-refuge-tank.129205/#post-1511502
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reef jacob
Active Member
just wondering so why do I have to do a big refugium tank?
luxauterna
A softy who loves softies
You definitely do not have to do a big refugium tank at all. I originally was just talking about my original plan. A 30 gal tank would be great to house plenty of macros and whatever type of little critters you want to display
luxauterna
A softy who loves softies
Any additional water you are adding to your total water volume is going to help with stabilization of the water chemistry. Also the addition of some macros will help with nitrates and phosphates.
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reef jacob
Active Member
Well I bought a 54 gallon corner tank.
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reef jacob
Active Member
Yeah im just going to drill it and put a overflow box on it and plumb it to go were the original fuge was and put a return pump in the fuge too. Then just run the two pipes to the 54.
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reef jacob
Active Member
Well im probably going to add every macro that I can find and put some pipe fish, mandarins, file fish, seahorses, sponges and gorgonais and some xeinya.
luxauterna
A softy who loves softies
sounds like an amazing fuge. With those types of fish, you may need to supplement with copepods since they will all be eating them. Also seahorses are definitely a whole different animal. Krista (seahorsekeeper) has a lot of knowledge on this.
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reef jacob
Active Member
ok ill ask her for some knowledge.
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reef jacob
Active Member
Can led grow macro very good or is t5 better for that sorta thing
This is exactly what I do.
I use the Mars Aqua led 165 w. Works great and is like $80
