“Keep you hands out of the tank”— literally or figuratively?

[Streetcred]

Literally & figuratively, stop messing with your tank. The old saying that nothing good happens in a hurry is true. Get your params into the general zone in the life cycle of the tank and then chill. Let nature do its thing and practice zen patience.

 

[Streetcred]

Literally & figuratively, stop messing with your tank. The old saying that nothing good happens in a hurry is true. Get your params into the general zone in the life cycle of the tank and then chill. Let nature do its thing and practice zen patience.

 

[Streetcred]

Literally & figuratively, stop messing with your tank. The old saying that nothing good happens in a hurry is true. Get your params into the general zone in the life cycle of the tank and then chill. Let nature do its thing and practice zen patience.

 

[Streetcred]

Literally & figuratively, stop messing with your tank. The old saying that nothing good happens in a hurry is true. Get your params into the general zone in the life cycle of the tank and then chill. Let nature do its thing and practice zen patience.

 

[Streetcred]

Use caution with Chemiclean. I'm 2 for 2 in getting dinos after using Chemiclean to get rid of cyano. Make sure you have a plan to rebuild your bacterial population.

Chemiclean and like products will kill ALL bacteria, good and bad.

 

[Old Fritz]

Chemiclean and like products will kill ALL bacteria, good and bad.

I disagree, I've used chemiclean in my tanks and customers tanks a lot and never had a tank recycle. Other algae may seem to bloom because areas that were once taken over by cyano are now free and since the nutrient problem wasn't solved many other types of algae might take over.

 

[Old Fritz]

And if you can believe their statements they also claim it doesnt harm or kill invertebrates, fish, or nitrifying bacteria. However a lot of companies do put some bs in their statements. But from personal experience what they say is true

 

[Lousybreed]

I do use a non fragrance soap that is made for food facilities and wash my arms up to my armpits (my tank is deep). I think deodorant is the number one thing you should be worried about and then next is fragrances from soap, last but not least is lotion!!! Bad stuff!!!

 

[JCTReefer]

30 minutes ago I just had my hand in the tank!.. literally! Unfortunately my NO3 and PO4 had been bottomed out for a while and I had a nasty outbreak of dinos and cyano. Spent weeks reading "Are you tired of battling Dino's thread"..
That being said, I've been dosing sodium nitrate and seachem phosphorus. Plus a round of chemi clean. After dosing for just 5 days, my Dino's have disappeared to the eye. Of course the cyano didn't last long after the chemi clean. So I would say sometimes tweaking is necessary. But for the most part chasing numbers is a bad practice on the big 3.. And constantly moving things around is a bad practice. Stability, stability, stability. Ok, time to keep my hands out of the tank for a while! I do have a dedicated pair of arm length gloves. They come in handy. Also keeps the clownfish from trying to take a chunk out of my skin!!!

 

[Tyler Miceli]

At the end of the day stability is #1. Everyone will have different parameters that work for them. Chasing numbers is a huge mistake in the hobby. Patience and keeping things stable will win. As long as your system is stable everything will adjust to it in due time!

 

[Graffiti Spot]

I think hands out of the tank refers to stop moving corals around. Your hands aren't going to hinder the growth of corals unless they are moving the corals around and not letting them settle in one place and grow.

 

[HB AL]

Does it count if I'm just putting them in to kill aiptasia every couple weeks or so?

 

[JoeIII]

The less you can disturb the tank, literally and figuratively, the better in my experience.

When I am traveling and away 5 days a week for months at a time is when our tank does best. When I am home I tend to "tinker" - adjust the skimmer, fuss with filter pads, move a frag around, fuss with chemicals and dosing to get parameters back in line, etc. Oh, and buy new coral and fish - a new fish never fails to disturb the balance of power in our community for weeks.

I am always amazed at how good things are going when I've been away and too busy to mess things up

 

[Fishnut]

The less you can disturb the tank, literally and figuratively, the better in my experience.



I am always amazed at how good things are going when I've been away and too busy to mess things up

. Totally agree with you.

 

[LimestoneCowboy]

Interesting observation.

 

[LimestoneCowboy]

Been in the reefing hobby for about 20 years and I have always been one who makes sure (as best as possible) my hands are clean and rinsed before going in the tanks. That being said, for years I have noticed that when I go in, there is an immediate drop in ORP on our Apex followed by about a day where the pH curve will be noticeably lower that the days prior and will take about a week to recover. We were just in Cabo this past week so I actually have a bit of that observation that I can share before it disappears on the Apex. We left the night of 11-29 and then returned the night of 12-6 when I did an alk test and then a PO4 test the next am. For both of these tests, all I did was have the "clean" tips of 2 fingers in the system filling up the Hanna checker's cuvette. I want to stress that this is purely observational and I want to be careful drawing conclusions from this data that aren't based on any experiment. That being said, this observation to me might lead to the following question. Did both pH and ORP drop due to the corals "noticing" that our hands are in the tank causing them to photosynthesize less for some reason? This would then be measured as a drop in ORP/pH due to the less O2 being produced. Ironically our second system which is our QT for corals is on a kH Guardian so I am in there less grabbing cuvettes of water to run Hanna tests. I need to add another pH or ORP probe to that system to rule out of this is environmental, but its still interesting to see. Here is a snip of the pH curve before it disappears. #thecoralsknow ;-)

 

[fish farmer]

At the end of the day stability is #1. Everyone will have different parameters that work for them. Chasing numbers is a huge mistake in the hobby. Patience and keeping things stable will win. As long as your system is stable everything will adjust to it in due time!

I started "chasing numbers" this past spring.

I bought new test kits(Salifert) and started to pay attention to my tank and begin to clean things up. I started to slowly drip kalk and do routine WC's. I struggled to see a pH over 8....added chaeto.....not much change.....thinking about CO2 scrubbers, outside airline, etc, etc. I started testing with a new Salifert kit last week....pH 8.3.

So......I'm back to doubting my test kit....and retesting and checking other water sources before I lose sleep over it.

 

[jan4scuba]

What happens when your coral starts growing and you have to make some "tweaks" moving coral around. Has anyone used sterile gloves so as not to contaminate the tank with what's on your hands?

 

[Mikedawg]

What happens when your coral starts growing and you have to make some "tweaks" moving coral around. Has anyone used sterile gloves so as not to contaminate the tank with what's on your hands?

I haven't in the past, but after reading these responses I think I will; box of latex gloves is pretty cheap

 

[Joshua Kerstetter]

I've been up and down this road many times. Every time I learn something new, or teach myself a new practice.. I seem to forget something I learner earlier. The stop putting your hands in the tank was very real for me in my first saltwater tank because it seemed like every single time I'd put my hands in my 4 foot tank I'd break a piece off the only acro I had. This was kinda fun because I learned how to 'accidentally' frag new pieces from what I broke off. After all my friends had frags and I placed many pieces of that acro across every rock I had I though maybe I should knock that off. With my new tank, I forgot to stop chasing numbers, and after many salinity swings, temperature swings, calk and alk swings, I knocked that off too. Also with the new tank I kinda went the reverse, I'd buy new frags, put them on a frag rack to 'get used to the new tank', then procrastinate to place them anywhere and I'd lose a few, or I'd finally get around to placing them, see they weren't doing well, and neglect to try to re position them to save them. Its a constant battle with me, too much.. or too little. Few things I've learned that others have said.. always wash up, I'm like a surgeon before I put my hand/arms in the tank. Also when you do use gloves, RINSE FIRST. Even powder less gloves I've see put some sort of dust/powder.. something in the water that doesn't seem right. Also from a health perspective for myself, on my long tank maintenance days I plan to basically get a shower after a lot of tank time, it may just be me, but if I have my arms especially in the tank for too long without a good rinse my skin will start to itch almost like poison ivy.. its not alot.. and doesn't get red, but some toxin, or something not great is going on there, so I always limit it. I also try to minimize my exercise before tank time as well. Due to family/kids etc, I stack my activities on weekends, so in the early afternoon I tend to go on runs like 3-6 miles, then while I'm still 'dirty' come back to do minor tank stuff, like filter pads, clean skimmer cup, stuff like that, then its shower time, but I always make sure I get off any excess sweat before exposing the tank to myself. Also it helps to mention.. my issues with chasing numbers there's always a element of bad testing procedures.. or testing incorrectly, when getting weird results, make sure to replicate, or if possible retest with a baseline then compare before making adjustments.

 

[Tyler Miceli]

I started "chasing numbers" this past spring.

I bought new test kits(Salifert) and started to pay attention to my tank and begin to clean things up. I started to slowly drip kalk and do routine WC's. I struggled to see a pH over 8....added chaeto.....not much change.....thinking about CO2 scrubbers, outside airline, etc, etc. I started testing with a new Salifert kit last week....pH 8.3.

So......I'm back to doubting my test kit....and retesting and checking other water sources before I lose sleep over it.

You're going to lose your mind chasing my friend, test your water weekly and try to enjoy the hobby. I know it's something you're very invested in and want to stay on top of things. Dont be lazy and your tank will come out just fine

 

[westmichigan]

I’ve noticed that when someone complains that their reef tank is all out-of-wack, and that they have made this tweek, and that adjustment, and basically it seems as if they are wildly ‘chasing numbers,’ advice often includes the phrase, “... and keep your hands out of the tank.” I am sure that literally, dirt and oils and ‘whatnot’ from the arms and hands are not great for a tank, but are people speaking more figuratively when they say “... and keep your hands out of the tank”— as in, ‘stop trying to monkey with it every 10 minutes’ and just let it stabilize? Just curious. Thanks

Definitely both IMO. I use gloves so I don't have to worry. Shoulder length rubber gloves off Amazon are cheap. Nitrile gloves for handling frags. I'm sure that it doesn't do alot of damage putting your hands in the tank. I just throw my gloves on and do what I need to. I am a mechanic so it's just easier and I don't have to worry about what I had my hands in earlier. And as far as chemicals. I'm sure they have their place. I have what is recommended on hand just in case. I had a fish die randomly. (Out of 25 clownfish). I freaked and went to put chemicals in and last minute decided to do more observation. I didn't see anything so I have left it alone. Its been a few weeks and nothing. Right now I have cyano and I did order the chemiclean just to have but for now I am just going to monitor it. If it doesn't handle it self I will later. I really struggle with the aspect of leaving things alone but I know the feeling of acting fast and then not being able to undo what i have done.

 

[JoeIII]

Regarding elevated ph... That will have more to do with being away rather than simply keeping your hand out of the tank. Carbon dioxide in your breath will bring ph down, so it will always trend upwards if the house is empty a while. I even see lower ph on the weekends when everyone is home all day compared to weekdays when everyone is out for 6-8 hours