are refugiums worth it?

[Garf]

I don't know if you realize this, but 15 grams dry weight of cheato removed is the equivalent of exporting 0.36ppm of phosphate and 22ppm of nitrate in a 100 gallon aquarium. Its also 5 full sheets worth of nori. It's actually pretty substantial.

You probably don't need anywhere near 120w to get that amount though. There are some pretty substantial refugium lights that only pull about 20W.

Hmm. It never did reduce nutrients as much as advertised, survival of the most watery perhaps.

Edit - I never did try drying it out properly, just like most other folks. We used to just let it drip for a few seconds and throw it on some scales, lol. I liked algae back then

 

[monkeyCmonkeyDo]

Refugiums imo are indeed suitable but need to be large and scaled to the size of the actual.dispaly or aquarium to be effective imo.
D

 

[Garf]

Well, would you Adam and Eve it? I actually did do the dry weight test, and contrary to the popular belief that algae is 70 to 80% water, I evidenced it over 94%. That changes the nutrient dynamics a bit, lol.
This was also a squeezed sample, not a soppin wet one, which would raise the water content significantly.

Quantifying Biomass - Page 3

Thought it was about time we did some comparisons of biomass per surface area of screen. Maybe some of the myths can be dispelled and get the most efficient usage data for scrubbers. I'll kick it off; (I know you need to do dry mass for it to be accurate, but wet mass will suffice for now)...

algaescrubber.net

 

[RedoubtReef]

I have an 80 gallon display and it never looked better than when it was running with a 75 gallon refugium.

 

[King_CRAB]

I have a separate cheap 10 gallon for growing chaeto. My system is about 1 year old, 100 gallons, I have no skimmer. My numbers are fine. I use a grow led for the chaeto.

 

[blstravler]

I have always run one - currently I’m working on adjusting it better so I don’t drop down to Zero P and N.

 

[ZombieEngineer]

Well, would you Adam and Eve it? I actually did do the dry weight test, and contrary to the popular belief that algae is 70 to 80% water, I evidenced it over 94%. That changes the nutrient dynamics a bit, lol.
This was also a squeezed sample, not a soppin wet one, which would raise the water content significantly.

Quantifying Biomass - Page 3

Thought it was about time we did some comparisons of biomass per surface area of screen. Maybe some of the myths can be dispelled and get the most efficient usage data for scrubbers. I'll kick it off; (I know you need to do dry mass for it to be accurate, but wet mass will suffice for now)...

algaescrubber.net

Still substantial even then. Numbers I posted earlier still apply but if 94% water by weight, those numbers are weekly export not daily.

 

[Dan_P]

Worth it for what?

Nutrient export - while the theory is sound, it doesn't seem to make sense when you look at the size of most refugiums vs the amount of nutrients you need to export. Investigation by BRS suggested it would take an awful lot of chaeto to have much impact at all. If this is your goal, get a turf scrubber (still not sure how effective those are but more efficient than macroalgae)

Chaetomorpha may not be the best algae for nitratrate and phosphate uptake. Ulva is probably a better choice because it can grow faster and is not so demanding about water flow and spinning. I think the space needed to grow enough algae to remove so much nitrate per day is a subject often avoided. Like every other subject in this hobby, the science supporting claims is missing.