Carnation Coral Tank

[Epos]

I've decided it's time to attempt my carnation coral tank. I'm planning on using a little 3 gallon nano and feeding huge amounts of DT's with 100% water changes every week. Does anybody have any extra advice on how to get these things thriving? All I plan on keeping are carnation corals in this tank so I can do pretty much whatever is best for them without worrying about any tankmates. I'm thinking about using water from my sps system for the water changes so that way my sps tank can benefit from the small partial water changes and the carnations can benefit from water that is relatively nutrient rich, less caustic, and lower in calcium and carbonates compared to freshly mixed saltwater.

 

[XxKnuckleheadxX]

100% water changes are bad. and i would do a new water change not whats left from the sps tank. the reason for a water change is to replace the elements that get used up.

 

[Bifferwine]

I don't know... I've never heard of anyone trying this before. It will be interesting!

 

[Epos]

Well the point of the water changes in this case is not to replace elements (if the only reason I did water changes was to replace elements I'd just dose more), but to lower the huge amounts of nitrates I expect to build up from such heavy feeding which I think is probably the key to keeping these things alive. I use Seachem salt which is extremely high in calcium, carbonates, and trace elements when freshly mixed which is something my sps love and that I highly doubt the carnations will appreciate as I plan to be doing enough water changes that the tank will pretty much be at the levels which Seachem salt mixes up at if I just use fresh salt mix. I'm also not sure what would be bad about 100% water changes, especially in this case where nitrates will likely build faster than even 50%-75% water changes can take care of over time.

 

[XxKnuckleheadxX]

i didnt mean the only reason is to replace trace elements. these corals need good water conditions not left over water from another tank. by doing 100% changes you will never give a chance for the water to become stable. corals dont produce much waste like a fish or feeding does. so if its gonna be a straight carnation tank then your totally wrong about the nitrates etc after its done cycled.

 

[Bifferwine]

I actually disagree with what Knucklehead said.

The only way to keep carnations alive is to pump their tank absolutely full of food. Basically, spoiling your own water. They are non-photosynthetic and need to be fed plankton on a constant basis to survive.

Your water quality will go downhill fast if you're not doing huge water changes. Yeah, the coral's not the one producing the waste. You are by feeding it so much. But there's no other way around it. Large, frequent water changes would be a must for keeping a dedicated tank like this, IMO. Your nitrates are going to be sky high if you don't do huge water changes from all the food you add rotting.

 

[XxKnuckleheadxX]

well poo on you! i did say something about feeding though! lol i actually got a few in my last shipment. you want them lol

 

[Epos]

Ya biff, that was what I was thinking. But who knows? Maybe these corals will absolutely hate the huge swings in nitrates from high levels down to 0 and would prefer a constant higher level. My sps tank is also just an sps tank, nothing else (except my harlequin shrimp) so the water coming from there is pretty close to pure. It's a 26 gallon bow hooked to a 30 gallon sump with a skimmer that comfortably handles up to around 60 gallons of water. So the water coming from that system has about half the concentration of organic compounds and nitrates that you would expect from a reef its size. Not to mention the weekly/bi-weekly 50%-75% water changes that get done on it. I also have a pretty good hunch carnations won't appreciate the crazy high levels of elements that come out of freshly mixed Seachem salt. It's great for corals that produce a skeleton, but from my experience at work soft corals grow a little better when calcium and alkalinity are kept a little lower. But again, that's just a hunch, I'll have to see how everything plays out. Thanks for the advice everybody!

 

[bjohanson1234]

You could try adding an algea scrubber to keep the nitrates and phosphates down.

https://www.livingreefs.com/mega-powerful-nitrate-and-phosphate-remover-diy-t16734.html

 

[wontonflip]

AH Found it.....check out this thread:

https://www.livingreefs.com/new-pico-reef-3-years-old-1-gallon-vase-t19119.html

He did 100% changes. I even asked him how that wouldn't cause problems. He's had success...but he's also very diligence in his pico tank's maintenance.

regarding the water changes, taking all of the water out gets me the most waste export and it does not affect the nitrifying bacteria that are stuck to walls, rocks and the animals themselves which oxidize ammonia. There are nitrifiers as well in suspension that get removed at water change, but they pale in proportion to those located within the massive surface areas found in the curves and notches of the reef itself. THis is also why using UV sterilizers in large systems has no effect on cycling nitrifiers, those can only sterilize what passes through them but will not harm the surrounding bacteria that do most of the work.

100% water changes are ideal in any system, the single best analogy is your car's oil. Imagine pulling up to the station and having them change 20%. 20% helps you avoid algae about 20% as well as a full change would, but in the case of larger systems these giant changes are impractical. I'm just saying they would help a system, not hurt it. When fish are involved you just have to take care to match the params perfectly, I don't have to match them perfectly with these corals, they are tough.

I think the amount of waste the algae uptake in the coral tissues is certainly there but negligible compared to the amount of food I was feeding. If every piece of mysis was inside a polyp I might not have to change the water so much, but you can see the spillage which is dumping a whole lot of nitrogen into the system...100% water changes are the key.

so, in this system, the different between a 20% water change and a 100% water change is literally 3 seconds more siphoning and three seconds more refilling. So, with each water change in this tiny reef model I am illustrating two critical points:

a. the resiliency of reef animals. My temp and specific gravity are never matched perfectly, only generally, and these animals have an innate tolerance to these cycles which is something like the abuse they get on a reef flat in fiji after rain storms (which alter temps and salinity greatly)

b. the fact that 20% changes are not helpful compared to 100% changes in any system, and if it were, oil changes in your car would only cost 5 bucks per quart changed every three months! lol. Of course changing some water is better than none at all, but an important discussion point here is why do 98% of reefs or fish tanks develop crappy algae over time...changing only small amounts still leaves nutrients to sink up in the tank and in time will become liberated back into the system and begin visual degradation of the tank (eutrophication)

I want to also point out detritus removal is a water change's heartbeat. The more detritus you can remove in a change regimen, the less actual volume of water change is needed. When you change water, you are changing out the chemicals liberated into the water column from *stored up pockets* of waste in your system. The water change does not remove these generation sources if you only suck up tank water!! It only resets your water column to 'clean' and therefore it can catch and hold your waste dumps until the next removal. Skimmers also help in this...part of the reason I employ these heavy changes is also because I don't want to strip my system to the bone every time I clean it, I can't, it's packed too much. For the pockets of waste I do have, I need to be taking out as much trash as I can at cleaning time so algaes won't have any food sources. You guys have filters and skimmers to lessen this loading a bit making 100% changes ideal, but not required when paired with good tank husbandry. My reefs illustrate that 100% changes certainly don't hurt, and these mechanics can be extrapolated upwards to the science of larger tanks indeed!

I would also like to point out the difference in water change habits between these two videos. These reefbowls are two different ones. In the vid with the boxer crab and shrimp and all the feeding, that was the tank that gets changed out two or three times a week because I am choosing to feed it heavily to keep these kinds of corals. In the video where the sealed reef tank was there, that reefbowl had corals that didn't require a lot of feeding so that bowl ran two weeks in between water changes, matching what you guys have in a maintenance routine yet only at the gallon level. One does not have to change as often as I do, I just do it to see how much a tank can support.

Hey what did you guys think about the sealed half gallon sps reef that does not evaporate, how nice would topoff elimination be in a hundred gallon reef!! Too much heat though. if you scaled up my system to a normal sized one, your cooling fan would be as big as your house he he

 

[ccCapt]

So the water coming from that system has about half the concentration of organic compounds and nitrates that you would expect from a reef its size.

Sorry, but I got a little chuckle out of that. How did you ever come to that conclusion? What did you use to analize the concentration of organic compounds? You have a Shimadzu TOC Analyzer in your garage? :D
Shimadzu TOC 5000
This instrument is in excellent condition.
Purchased for over $31,000.00

 

[daugherty]

I also have a pretty good hunch carnations won't appreciate the crazy high levels of elements that come out of freshly mixed Seachem salt. It's great for corals that produce a skeleton, but from my experience at work soft corals grow a little better when calcium and alkalinity are kept a little lowereverybody!

i have crazy xenia growth and before i got rid of most of my softies they grew like crazy with high levels of everyhing in the salt

 

[yote]

Something to think about here.
What if fed something like live rotifers?I dont if they are a cold water plankton or not.But if they ARE a warm water bug,then feeding live ones shouldnt be to bad for the water quality.
Yeah,you'd have to set up something to grow them,but even that shouldnt to bad.

 

[yvr]

Keeping Dendronephthya is quite tricky because they are filter feeding and keeping them adequately fed is tough. You can try a commercial coral diet. I have one carnation coral in my tank which I have had for over 2 yearsI feed it (the whole tank) twice a week with both TM Pro-Coral Phyton and Pro-Coral Zooton as well as oyster eggs and live baby brine shrimp every few week. I recall reading in Reef Aquarium vol. 2 that a European hobbyist had great success keeping carnation corals by stirring up his sand bed, causing the detritus to become suspended in the water and allowing the coral to feed.

 

[reeffreak]

Keeping Dendronephthya I recall reading in Reef Aquarium vol. 2 that a European hobbyist had great success keeping carnation corals by stirring up his sand bed, causing the detritus to become suspended in the water and allowing the coral to feed.

I've been saying that for years.Not only is it beneficial for carnations but all corals.Unless you are running a DSB,stirring the sand is a good thing.

 

[dcantucson]

Them are fightin' words. Stirring the sand bed to most is a no-no!

 

[Epos]

sorry ccCapt, what I mean is that it has about half the concentration of organic compounds and nitrates that it would have if I didn't have it hooked to a volume of water that is the same as the tank itself. I obviously can't speak for every system the same size of mine, I was just generalizing. I think I put up a better explanation than "Mai Watr iZ KleanN LOlolOlUlolul."

 

[Epos]

Thanks reeffreak, I hadn't thought of that and it sounds like an awesome idea.

 

[reeffreak]

Them are fightin' words. Stirring the sand bed to most is a no-no!

You get a big fat.....