# anyone done a freshwater REFUGIUM? (to lower nitrates etc)



## aaxxeell (Jul 28, 2007)

hey guys after setting up a refugium in my reef tank, i did a bit of research on the net but couldnt find much info on whether anyone has lowered their nitrates by any significant amount by adding a refugium in their sump???

im not worried about extra costs of setting it up or electricity from lighting etc, i just want less waterchanges and better water quality for my fish 

any have any info they can share on the subject?


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## Number6 (Mar 13, 2003)

I've done many refugiums on fresh water and I've come up with about 10 different designs... 
each time I've copied salt water refugium ideas and just swapped the salt water component out for a freshwater alternative.

Just go ahead and build one... they work great. 
You can even have a reverse photoperiod... main tank has lights on during day and refugium has lights on at night!

Hope that helps.


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## exasperatus2002 (Jul 5, 2003)

what benefit would the refugium have in freshwater?[/list]


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## Number6 (Mar 13, 2003)

ammonia eating plants, small critters can live and help feed the main tank of cichlids, can even be a great little fry trap in a pinch...


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## mithesaint (Oct 31, 2006)

aaxxeell said:


> hey guys after setting up a refugium in my reef tank, i did a bit of research on the net but couldnt find much info on whether anyone has lowered their nitrates by any significant amount by adding a refugium in their sump???
> 
> im not worried about extra costs of setting it up or electricity from lighting etc,* i just want less waterchanges and better water quality for my fish  *
> 
> any have any info they can share on the subject?


I'm not sure a refugium is going to get you that much improvement on your current situation. It's awfully difficult to get less water changes AND better water quality!! :dancing: If nitrate accumulation were the only reason we do water changes, then using plants as a nitrate sponge would make more sense to me. Unfortunately, there's lots of other substances that accumulate in the water that a refugium doesn't help with. Personally, I'd spend the money and effort into making a water change system that's easier or quicker. Nothing beats regular water changes for happy fish.

Just my $0.03. Inflation sucks :lol:


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## Number6 (Mar 13, 2003)

mithesaint said:


> If nitrate accumulation were the only reason we do water changes, then using plants as a nitrate sponge would make more sense to me.


It is a reason for the frequency of water changes though... my use of refugiums sure lets me do less frequent water changes. I still do the same volume e.g. 50%, but I can do those monthly vs weekly if the refugium is efficient enough.


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## aaxxeell (Jul 28, 2007)

Number6 said:


> mithesaint said:
> 
> 
> > If nitrate accumulation were the only reason we do water changes, then using plants as a nitrate sponge would make more sense to me.
> ...


 :thumb: thats what i was hoping for, just the same as my reef tank.
if only we could run freshwater protein skimmers too :lol:


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## aaxxeell (Jul 28, 2007)

any chance of a pic number6???
i'd like to see the comparison of stocking vs refugium size & amount of lighting etc
opcorn:


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## Number6 (Mar 13, 2003)

aaxxeell said:


> if only we could run freshwater protein skimmers too :lol:


You call protein skimmers LESS work than water changes? LOL
No way! 
I can't stand emptying that brown gunk... that's work... a hose to the laundry sink is not work! :lol:


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## aaxxeell (Jul 28, 2007)

i actually spent big and bought an overkill ReefOctopus NW150 rated for an 800L tank, for my 180L system (3ft 100L, sump 80L)

:lol: :lol: :lol:

so yeah its less work for me...


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## Mcdaphnia (Dec 16, 2003)

If only we could make freshwater skimmers???? They were invented in fresh water aquariums and the saltwater people borrowed the idea and adapted it to saltwater. Some goldfish breeders and discus keepers still use protein skimmers. It is just that the skimmers you see are designed and calibrated for saltwater. Most are not capable of the bubble formation and turbulence needed for freshwater skimming.

If you click around on this company's website, you should find freswater sprotein skimmers called by one of the other names for this kind of equipment -- foam fractionator


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## Mcdaphnia (Dec 16, 2003)

If only we could make freshwater skimmers???? They were invented in fresh water aquariums and the saltwater people borrowed the idea and adapted it to saltwater. Some goldfish breeders and discus keepers still use protein skimmers. It is just that the skimmers you see are designed and calibrated for saltwater. Most are not capable of the bubble formation and turbulence needed for freshwater skimming.

If you click around on this company's website, you should find freswater sprotein skimmers called by one of the other names for this kind of equipment -- foam fractionator


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## BenHugs (Jan 13, 2007)

I'm working on both a freshwater skimmer and a plant refugium oh and I'll have a house plant (phillodedron) growing out the back of my tank (called aquaponics). So I'm interested to see where this goes.
I started a post on which plants are the best nitrate suckers I'll post the link on this thread.
good luck :thumb:


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## BenHugs (Jan 13, 2007)

Here's my link to putting plants in a sump
http://www.cichlid-forum.com/phpBB/view ... highlight=
I hope it helps.


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## Qaddiction (Oct 16, 2007)

I am going to build an algae scrubber like is discussed on the saltwaterfish.com site for my fresh water tanks. Supposebly it will bring your nitrates down to zero ppm. That's what I'm looking for! Here is the link to which I refer:

http://www.saltwaterfish.com/vb/showthread.php?t=330606

I'm just going to make an add on off of my sump. Hoping to start making one this next week. Hope it works!


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## aaxxeell (Jul 28, 2007)

Qaddiction said:


> I am going to build an algae scrubber like is discussed on the saltwaterfish.com site for my fresh water tanks. Supposebly it will bring your nitrates down to zero ppm. That's what I'm looking for! Here is the link to which I refer:
> 
> http://www.saltwaterfish.com/vb/showthread.php?t=330606
> 
> I'm just going to make an add on off of my sump. Hoping to start making one this next week. Hope it works!


sounds good mate, it depends how stocked your FW aquarium is vs refugium size/plant type/lighting etc
0ppm would be great, but *** only heard of it on reef tanks

what fw plants would u use for an algae scrubber???
oh and what would u grow it on? eggcrate?


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## boredatwork (Sep 14, 2007)

Number6 said:


> mithesaint said:
> 
> 
> > If nitrate accumulation were the only reason we do water changes, then using plants as a nitrate sponge would make more sense to me.
> ...


I would like to re-iterate what was said that water changes function for more than just nitrate reduction. The necessity of water changes has been well documented.

http://www.americanaquariumproducts.com/AquariumKH.html

If your measure of when you "need" to do a water change is the nitrate level then a refugium will obviously allow you to decease your water changes, whether in water volume or frequency. However, if you accept that water changes are necessary for more than just nitrate reduction, then there are a lot of other things you need to have your refugium take care of if that is the only thing you are using to decrease water changes.

I will admit though, I have a small 10 gallon tank that has several large plants and the nitrates never go above 0 while decently stocked and I don't do water changes as often as my 125G. However, I attribute that to my negligence, not because I am satisfied with the low nitrate level.


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## aaxxeell (Jul 28, 2007)

yes, but accumulation of other nasty's in the water are still being removed with waterchanges... just less often :lol: 
i do agree with what your saying but from what *** read...
the other chemical compounds and other unwated detrimental stuff usually affects the wellbeing of the fish when a tank is run for 6months+ using denitrators etc

im aiming for healthy water parameters, just waterchanges less often.
i am aiming for every 2-4 weeks (and im willing to slightly understock too)

im also setting up my little 25gal all in one system as a SA planted tank and want a reasonably low maintenance tank, what plants and fish is your 10g stocked with?


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## Mcdaphnia (Dec 16, 2003)

Just to see for myself, I set up a 75 with CellPore denitrator blocks and let it run for over a year, adding water only for evaporation and a tiny bit for the removal of fish. I kept it loaded with fry as a growout tank, usually African cichlids, which grew very well the whole experiment. The blocks were stacked against most of the surface of a full length Mattenfilter and there was a reverse sand filter on the tank as well. It is not just the build up of other minerals and chemicals, but the depletion of some from the water so I did add a reef aquarium designed potassium iodide solution, because that mineral is rapidly used up by the life in the tank.


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## Mcdaphnia (Dec 16, 2003)

Number6 said:


> ....I would like to re-iterate what was said that water changes function for more than just nitrate reduction. The necessity of water changes has been well documented.
> 
> http://www.americanaquariumproducts.com/AquariumKH.html
> ....


Did you link to the wrong article? I ddn't see any documentation about water changes in this article, only the promotion of their products such as Wonder Shells.


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## Qaddiction (Oct 16, 2007)

aaxxeell - take a look at the thread. It has pretty good detail on the materials used in the algae scrubber. The screen is like a vinyl mesh. There are some links in the thread if you want to see an example. No plants used. Just plain old algae.


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## Number6 (Mar 13, 2003)

boredatwork said:


> I would like to re-iterate what was said that water changes function for more than just nitrate reduction. The necessity of water changes has been well documented.


Links please... if you have no links showing that the frequency of water changes must remain the same with the use of a refugium, then you fibbed! :wink:

With the use of a good refugium, nitrates are 0 ppm so ammonia, nitrite and nitrate are not waste products we need to remove with water changes.

What we do need to remove are other waste products and we must perform water changes to keep these within tolerances of the species we have in the tank. IME, it requires far less frequent water changes to keep those other waste products within tolerance levels even for sensitive species like Discus or Blue Rams when using refugiums. 
if you have experiences or documentation suggesting this is wrong, provide it.

Else, get off my soap box! :lol:


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## boredatwork (Sep 14, 2007)

Mcdaphnia said:


> Number6 said:
> 
> 
> > ....I would like to re-iterate what was said that water changes function for more than just nitrate reduction. The necessity of water changes has been well documented.
> ...


Hahaha. I should have included the remark "Ignore the product placement." Honestly that is my favorite article on water chemistry if you can expertly separate the chemistry from the marketing.

But no, that is the correct link, its just that the water change issue is a side point. Actually the point it makes is the one you stated. If you read the whole article while it is trying to promote the wonder shells, the case for the wonder shells is that the water provides more significance than just providing oxygen to the fish. The water also supplies dissolved minerals, nutrients, and electrolytes which are necessary for correct bioregulation. However, with fish living in water there are two byproducts: some minerals and chemicals accumulate and some are removed. For these two reasons wonder shells are a great product! OK not really, but for those two reasons water changes are important - 1) if water becomes less ideal over time and 2) it makes sense to maintain ideal water then 3) water change are useful. QED. Maybe with that connection in mind the article will be more helpful?

If you still don't like that article I won't harbor any bad feelings, but unfortunately that is the only saved link I have other than the one in the library which, on second glance, makes the very same claims, just without some of the explanation. 
http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/water_changes.php

I know there is even more in depth information regarding the significance of water at http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/index.shtml but I don't feel like finding the specific articles because their search is just horrible. Certainly the articles under the "Water" section are useful.

In all honesty no one really knows what is going on in a fish tank. There was that awful "discussion" about water change techniques a while back that illustrated that very point. I am not saying if you don't do water changes your fish will die. What I am saying is that from what we do know, it seems that water changes provide more benefit that just reducing nitrate concentration - they provide dissolved nutrients, minerals, electrolytes, that can otherwise decrease over time. Replenishing these through water changes seems like the best thing to do, even if not "proven" necessary. Certainly a live fish is better than a dead fish, but other than that its hard to know what a happy fish is - even though so many people seem to make the claim!

And I already said that in my 10g tank more often than not I dont do water changes on a regular basis so I know that its not a matter of life or death. In fact more than those fish just surviving there is always an overflow of babies in that tank. It just seems like the better thing is to do frequent water changes - not that there is some magical number.

At the end of the day there is no way to legitimately defend or dispute any of these claims so we just ending up doing whatever we feel like.


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## aaxxeell (Jul 28, 2007)

i suppose i will just have to take the plunge and do it...
well thats when i make my mind up about what im gonna stock my 125gal with :lol: 
i will build a refugium like this as a display under the main tank...

http://www.aquahobby.com/board/viewtopic.php?t=29491


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## BenHugs (Jan 13, 2007)

As I get near completing my setup. I wonder, if I was to have a working FW protein skimmer, a refugium stocked with plants and my aquaponics up and running. What would actually build up in my tank that would make me need to do water changes??? What in nature removes these substances?? I know it's a huge lake but doesn't lake tang.. only lose it's water through evaporation??


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## Number6 (Mar 13, 2003)

BenHugs said:


> As I get near completing my setup. I wonder, if I was to have a working FW protein skimmer, a refugium stocked with plants and my aquaponics up and running. What would actually build up in my tank that would make me need to do water changes??? What in nature removes these substances?? I know it's a huge lake but doesn't lake tang.. only lose it's water through evaporation??


water seeps down through the ground, or, in bodies like Lake Tang, the lake itself has murky depths for for things to dissappear into the void.

In theory, you can replicate the natural filtration abilities of swamps/bodies of water, though in practice, it turns out to be quite complicated...


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## BenHugs (Jan 13, 2007)

Number6? said:


> water seeps down through the ground, or, in bodies like Lake Tang, the lake itself has murky depths for for things to dissappear into the void.
> 
> In theory, you can replicate the natural filtration abilities of swamps/bodies of water, though in practice, it turns out to be quite complicated...


I'm in................ where do I start


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## CichlidLover2 (Jul 31, 2005)

Qaddiction said:


> I am going to build an algae scrubber like is discussed on the saltwaterfish.com site for my fresh water tanks. Supposebly it will bring your nitrates down to zero ppm. That's what I'm looking for! Here is the link to which I refer:
> 
> http://www.saltwaterfish.com/vb/showthread.php?t=330606
> 
> I'm just going to make an add on off of my sump. Hoping to start making one this next week. Hope it works!


Thank you for giving me an excuse to not do my homework! That post was very long but still very educational!


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## Number6 (Mar 13, 2003)

BenHugs said:


> I'm in................ where do I start


Pump water into a very very deep tank or other container, get weeping tile and lay it on the bottom and make layers of substrate above the weeping tile. 
Water has to flow down through the substrate and into the weeping tile where it can flow out of a drilled hole in the tank and back into the aquarium.

Plants and a light are part of this contraption, and then the key is... figure out some way to stop the bacteria and the like from caking up the substrate and flooding everything!!!

I forget what this whole setup is called, but you can occasionally find articles on it on hyrdroponic sites.


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## BenHugs (Jan 13, 2007)

Number6 said:


> BenHugs said:
> 
> 
> > I'm in................ where do I start
> ...


I have one of those in my yard I call it a septic system. 

My tank on the other hand does have a similar setup but the subtrate is not anywhere close to being deep enough as far as I can tell. So how does this differ from an undergravel filtration??? system???(besides the depth of the substrate)


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## aaxxeell (Jul 28, 2007)

BenHugs said:


> As I get near completing my setup. I wonder, if I was to have a working FW protein skimmer, a refugium stocked with plants and my aquaponics up and running. What would actually build up in my tank that would make me need to do water changes??? What in nature removes these substances?? I know it's a huge lake but doesn't lake tang.. only lose it's water through evaporation??


do nitrates and other substances evaporate? *** heard of a Massive marine aquarium over here in Aus' that never dose any waterchanges but has alot of evap' and uses lots or RO water to top it up...

apparently its been this way for years and all fish & inverts thriving like any other well mantianed tank.
(just me thinking out a loud)

lake tanganyika is VERY deep average of 200m (1470m max), and the substrate is made up of calcified rock, shells, rubble, sand... surely there would be plenty of places anerobic bacteria could colonize and consume nitrates in deeper low oxygen zones & where there is no sunlight (sounds like natures denitrator)

not to mention fish only inhabita small % of the lake, around the rocky shorelines.
tha vast majority of the lake is impossible for the cichlids to live in as its too deep, this means out in the deep theres not much food, very hard to spawn (exept for cyprichromis) and most importantly no oxygen.

in a massive water mass with the cichlids only living in a small % of it surface area exposed to the air there is alot of evap' and alot of rain catchment... this may also affect the situation.

(sorry for the rant i just think out aloud)


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## Biotoper (Apr 14, 2006)

I have a 75 with a built-in wet/dry in the back. In the trickle tray I am growing emergent pothos, a common vine houseplant - the tray is just packed with roots and I have big vines trailing off the tank and strung along the walls. The lights for the display also light the pothos, so no extra lighting needed.

If you are going to set up a sump as a veggie filter, if the tank is anywhere near a water tap and a drain pipe I would recommend setting up a system for automatic or semi-automatic water changes. I have a 100g built into the wall, behind the wall is a 50g sump with constant cold FW drip over bioballs and a drain pipe set at the sump water level, so the tank is constantly replacing a small amount of water. I've thought about lighting the sump and throwing fast growing floating plants in it, but have never bothered.

I've started playing around with pumping water above the 75 to trickle through trays with gravel and vegetable plants (spinach, lettuce, herbs, etc.) for a true aquaponic system.

On algae scrubbers, there is much controversy for SW over whether they are better than chaetomorpha, the preferred veggie filter. For FW, I think floating plants would be a better nutrient sponge and lower maintenance. If one really wanted a system that kept nutrients down to a minimum between WC, I would think a FW version of something like a bare-bottom reef tank would be the way to go: no substrate and lots of turbulence and surface agitation in the display and sump, sump packed with floating plants like hornwort and strong light, good mechanical filtration that is cleaned often.

On the idea of a FW refugium for critter production, I would love to hear of anyone who has successfully done this, such as maintaining a daphnia population in their sump.

Ryan


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