Water Changes: Where do you stand on water changes for your reef tank?

[robbyg]

Check out Glenn Fong!

First of all I have no idea who Glen Fong is, so I apologize if I am stepping on the toes of a well known and respected Godfather of the reefing community.

I just did a quick search of his website and forum and his tank is impressive but it is not an easy thing for me to just accept all of what he is showing and suggesting when he actually sells the products to make it happen. I guess I would be more receptive if his forum section had a whole bunch of success stories but I am not seeing much of anything. It looks like only 5 new posts since 2017 and none of them that I could find in my 10 minutes of searching was another success story like his. Admittedly I did not spend long searching because I immediately dismissed his method when I read it required 15 parameters to be tested and dosed on a regular basis.

The two thing I hate in this Hobby are water changes and Testing and when I think of the costs of adding all the supplements and doing all that testing I would agree with reefs.com statement that:

"I find it difficult to agree that monitoring and maintaining so many variables with 15 chemical supplements is either easy or affordable. I think most would agree with me that regular water changes are much simpler."

So hats of to Glenn if he really achieved this but IMHO it's just not practical, it's actually insanely difficult.

 

[Reefr]

Amazing colors and scaping, well done
This goes together with your level of understanding as shown in your posts Lasse
Now I am very interested in learning more about Triton Core 7

1) never if it is not an issue
2) Could be important if it is an issue - other times - not important for MY tank

Correct myself - i run Triton Core 7 and have to compensate for elevated salinity with around 0.65 L a day - it means around 0.2 % WC a day


Sincerely Lasse

 

[Rjmul]

I'm not a big water change guy. I dose dose dose and dose

 

[Bruce Burnett]

So, I live in Arizona, and especially in the summer, it’s very dry. I have a 150 gal, and lose roughly 15%-20% to evaporation each week. I have a 10 gallon auto top off, and refill it twice a week. That suffices for a “water change”, right.

No all you are doing is adding makeup water.

 

[Bruce Burnett]

Never did a water change in my 300 gallon system. Over six year period I did a single icp test nothing to low or too high. I had an oversized skimmer and an ATS fed 3-5 times a day plus a sheet of Nori every day and still did not have elevated nutrients.

 

[X-37B]

First of all I have no idea who Glen Fong is, so I apologize if I am stepping on the toes of a well known and respected Godfather of the reefing community.

I just did a quick search of his website and forum and his tank is impressive but it is not an easy thing for me to just accept all of what he is showing and suggesting when he actually sells the products to make it happen. I guess I would be more receptive if his forum section had a whole bunch of success stories but I am not seeing much of anything. It looks like only 5 new posts since 2017 and none of them that I could find in my 10 minutes of searching was another success story like his. Admittedly I did not spend long searching because I immediately dismissed his method when I read it required 15 parameters to be tested and dosed on a regular basis.

The two thing I hate in this Hobby are water changes and Testing and when I think of the costs of adding all the supplements and doing all that testing I would agree with reefs.com statement that:

"I find it difficult to agree that monitoring and maintaining so many variables with 15 chemical supplements is either easy or affordable. I think most would agree with me that regular water changes are much simpler."

So hats of to Glenn if he really achieved this but IMHO it's just not practical, it's actually insanely difficult.

Not if you use his EZ method. Very simple. Do what works for you.
His method has been around for quite some time. Many dont believe its that simple and thats ok.
Only product I use of his is EZ trace. I spend 5 minutes a day dosing by hand.
And yea he wont post because people just want to argue with him lol and dismiss his system just like you did.
No one is the godfather of reefing as you put it.
Taking all of 10 minutes to write it off just makes me laugh.
He is not even involved with the selling or marketing of his method and does not need the money.
Keep doing your water changes as they are a proven method of reef keeping.
Take the time to research his method you might learn something lol.
He has a post here on r2r over 100 pages long.
Happy water changes.

 

[John Smith]

I never did a water change in six years, which was the goal from the get-go. I still don’t know if it’s the right decision but I really want to make it work. I ran into lots of problems with cyano/dino and bryopsis in the first two years. At one point I raised magnesium level to over 2000 ppm to fight bryopsis out of desperation. It did not work, but amazingly, it did not seem to upset any critter in the tank so I let Mg naturally drop to its current level now, still close to 1700 ppm. The Mg concentration was off the scale, I had to dilute it 50/50 before I can test it with Red Sea kit. I lost some corals before I realized that trace elements were depleted and that’s when I started to dose Strontium, Boron, Iron and Iodine. Interestingly, I have learned to dose Iodine by watching the shrimps. When Iodine gets to a certain level, the shrimps will molt. If I reduce the doses, they stop molting and oddly enough, they seem to live longer if they don’t molt. Anyways, water parameters are stable. Phosphate and nitrate are under control. Except for the Monti Caps, and the Toadstool, my corals grow very slowly, probably due to the low nutrient levels. I’ll be very happy if I hit the ten-year mark without a major problem. Wish me luck.

 

[Bruce Burnett]

Not if you use his EZ method. Very simple. Do what works for you.
His method has been around for quite some time. Many dont believe its that simple and thats ok.
Only product I use of his is EZ trace. I spend 5 minutes a day dosing by hand.
And yea he wont post because people just want to argue with him lol and dismiss his system just like you did.
No one is the godfather of reefing as you put it.
Taking all of 10 minutes to write it off just makes me laugh.
He is not even involved with the selling or marketing of his method and does not need the money.
Keep doing your water changes as they are a proven method of reef keeping.
Take the time to research his method you might learn something lol.
He has a post here on r2r over 100 pages long.
Happy water changes.

What many people don't realize even the food we feed out tanks has trace elements. My tanks have been nice not as nice as some but no water changes and I will not put another monti cap or chalice in my tanks. They would grow like weeds.

 

[X-37B]

What many people don't realize even the food we feed out tanks has trace elements. My tanks have been nice not as nice as some but no water changes and I will not put another monti cap or chalice in my tanks. They would grow like weeds.

Yea just pulled my elkhorn monitpora hirsuta. A true coral weed. Looks good and I grew it from a 1-2" frag to this in around 6 months.
Put one piece back today as I really like the look. Easy to frag and remove.

 

[Bruce Burnett]

Yea just pulled my elkhorn monitpora hirsuta. A true coral weed. Looks good and I grew it from a 1-2" frag to this in around 6 months.
Put one piece back today as I really like the look. Easy to frag and remove.

I like Elkhorn.

 

[X-37B]

I like Elkhorn.

If you lived in norcal I would give you one.
I have a couple larger frags but they grow so fast it really doesnt matter.
Here is the piece I just put back today on the same rock.

 

[xiaoxiy]

For a while in the hobby, I was all about no water changes, with a balling supplements. I've swung the other way now and am a big proponent of regular water changes. I've found great success with running AWC (approximately 20% weekly) on my system and only testing for salinity and alkalinity.

 

[Enigma79]

I had a 29g biocube with an aquamaxx skimmer rated for 40G heavy load and 75G light load. I was doing the BRS dosing. My water changes were once every other month (45 days) with 10G change, some times I have pushed it to 60 days, my bio load was small - 2 clowns, lemon goby and a coral beauty.

The mechanical filtration was a - carbon, chemi clean and sponge - I would clean these once a month. I think I was able to stick to this schedule because my bio load was small and my skimmer was a beast. My anemone was splitting like crazy at one point I had about 35 of them in the tank.

 

[X-37B]

For a while in the hobby, I was all about no water changes, with a balling supplements. I've swung the other way now and am a big proponent of regular water changes. I've found great success with running AWC (approximately 20% weekly) on my system and only testing for salinity and alkalinity.

If I had the room and I may when I upgrade I would do a gallon a day.

 

[xiaoxiy]

If I had the room and I may when I upgrade I would do a gallon a day.

I'd definitely recommend it! I have my system setup so that my DOS draws from a 50G reservoir of fresh saltwater in the basement and dumps dirty saltwater into one of my basement drains. I run approximately 3 gallons a day and it's very hands-off.

 

[LRT]

Find myself doing water changes lately only when I screw something up like my Nitrates recently.
Other than that I find myself chasing numbers and dialing things in in the interim and water changes kinda make me nervous when everything seems do be good.
Are water changes truly neccessary if and once you get your numbers dialed as long as you can maintain them with a constant supply of fresh rodi to top off evap?

 

[Back where it all began]

I never directly change the water. I run a 75 gallon mostly leather, Duncan, torch, hammer with a few acro and plating monti. I don’t have a sump so I run a hob CPR fuge and hob reef octopus skimmer. I use 150lbs live rock so I can mostly hide the hobs. The only time I change any water is when I clean the skimmer or the fuge. My fish were selected to do a purpose besides look nice and my CUC does the rest. I run nitrates 5-10 and phosphates 0.08. I only really focus on dkh calcium and magnesium. So far so good.

 

[X-37B]

Find myself doing water changes lately only when I screw something up like my Nitrates recently.
Other than that I find myself chasing numbers and dialing things in in the interim and water changes kinda make me nervous when everything seems do be good.
Are water changes truly neccessary if and once you get your numbers dialed as long as you can maintain them with a constant supply of fresh rodi to top off evap?

Thats a loaded question on this thread lol.
If your new do water changes as they are bullit proof.
Stability wins with or without water changes.
You need to understand it first. Have and follow a plan. Anyone can do it.
Its just that so many people have been told you must do them that is hard to pull away from the crowd.
Do your research until you have an understanding of how it works.

 

[Back where it all began]

Water changes to me seem counter intuitive to the constancy theory. Changing water changes parameters which must then be restored.

 

[X-37B]

I'd definitely recommend it! I have my system setup so that my DOS draws from a 50G reservoir of fresh saltwater in the basement and dumps dirty saltwater into one of my basement drains. I run approximately 3 gallons a day and it's very hands-off.

I am looking at 1 gal a day on a 300+ system in the future.
Simple to implement and will fit in my alloted space.
A gal a day wont upset my balance and will provide a nice complement to my system.
How big is your system?
I will still follow trace element dosing and a carx.