What Skimmer Should I Get?

[Hawkins]

ok i just watched a video of an anemone swimming, and it scared me

mushrooms shouldnt do that!!

 

[ben1987]

you wont be having an anenome for around a year anyway so there is plenty of time to think about it.
They do walk round and are prone to getting chewed up in powerheads. They need super stable conditions, loads of light. Fish will learn when they have an anenome in their tank to avoid it so they dont get stung or whatever. they also get rather big some of them

 

[Hawkins]

ah ok.

its good that i cant have one for a year anyway, i cant afford metal halides atm!

would my lighting be good enough for most corals? i don't really want to change the hood. its the juwel one which suits the tank and stand. and I don't really like the idea of open top as well.

i have 2 bulbs, which are 28W each. i guess i need the reflectors for them

 

[ben1987]

not 100% sure tbh.
SPS deffinatly not id say.

Stuff like xenia, mushrooms, leathers, toadstools, zoos etc i would think would be ok. I would try a xenia frag first as they are very cheap and you can gauge it from there

 

[Hawkins]

just went to fish shop. its 20 miles away so inconvenient.

but they have a good choice of corals! and live rock, but its £10 per kilo.. =\

some on ebay for £7 per kilo, says you can view before you buy aswell.

they didnt have too many fish, but there is another shop 2 mins away from it, but i didnt go to that one today.

 

[ben1987]

you are likely to use more than one shop, its rare that they carry a good range of both in. Best to find out the days they get their new stock in. If you are ever in Notts check out Wharf aquatics aswel. Thats the biggest ive been to

 

[Hawkins]

hmm ok hardly ever go to nottingham.

supposed to be a good one at peterborough..

 

[IIITYIII]

yeah xenia is a good starter frag, that stuff will live through anything. Xenia is one of the corals that actually likes dirty tanks not saying you should make it dirty but it actually likes water that isnt 100% pure. I dont think ive ever known anyone to kill xenia.

 

[Ter]

"I dont know any advantages of not having a skimmer.. apart from saving the £40 initial cost. "

One of the few advantages of having a lets say 30 gallon tank over a large system would be the low cost of water changes… water changes (cleaning of the tank) are one of the major reasons why large systems have protein skimmers, large water changes on lets say a 200 gallon system are very costly. Skimmers have helped hobbyists lower the costs and have made it easier in keeping a stable system.

Now on a small system, water changes come out less costly….
Here are few advantages that come 2 mind out of larger water changes without a skimmer.

Ever add live food and have it all sucked out by the skimmer within a few hours, limiting the food source for corals?

Additives become expressive over the long term; calc & buff, also po4 binders, carbon become of less importance to a system performing large water changes and are also less of a headache then dealing with the calc & buff mysteries, and large water changes keep important nutrients at stable levels. Also lowering some baddies…

I honestly believe that most advanced users wouldn’t use a skimmer on a 30g system but would employ large water changes (I’ve been wrong before), just cause its brown and it stinks doesn’t make it all bad( ever smell phytoplankton?).

Ter

 

[ben1987]

chances are he isnt going to need to add live food to his tank though. If he feeds live bine to fish then he could knock the skimmer off for a few minutes. Not like he will be keeping SPS or corals that need a constant flow of food in the water just yet. Chances are he will keep corals that are more photosynthetic at first.

IMO skimmer is a muct for a begginer, it allows more room for error and makes life a bit easier

 

[Hawkins]

And Ter, I think you are forgetting i'm a beginner who doesn't even have a marine set-up yet. you are asking me these questions which I cant answer from my experience.

Thanks though, i see your point