Cryptic canister filter???

[pirate9182]

Has anyone had success with turning a small canister into a cryptic zone? If so any tips? Or articles to read?

 

[blaxsun]

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[pirate9182]

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I read a decent amount about turning areas of the sump into cryptic zones and have seen one or two people mentions they accomplished this with a canister filter, however these posts are years old so I was wondering if anyone has had any long term success with this and how I would go about doing it and at what stage in the reefs maturation it would be viable to start. I know I would need live rock rubble and possibly seeding of sponges but that's about all I can seem to figure out.

 

[Mr_Knightley]

I have never heard of this! It sounds awesome though. If I were to do this, I would have a mixture of live rock and something like Matala mat to fill in the gaps for maximum surface area without the risk of clogging. Finding good sponge candidates might prove to be the hardest part, but given time, it would most likely populate itself just with whatever is already in your tank.

 

[CoastalTownLayabout]

The Reef Aquarium Vol 3 has a section on cryptic refugiums. They refer to it as Natural Enviromental Gradient (EG) zonal filtration. Bit of a mouthful!

 

[pirate9182]

The Reef Aquarium Vol 3 has a section on cryptic refugiums. They refer to it as Natural Enviromental Gradient (EG) zonal filtration. Bit of a mouthful!

Thanks for the tip.... maybe I can find an online version as amazon wants $263 for the hard copy

 

[pirate9182]

I have never heard of this! It sounds awesome though. If I were to do this, I would have a mixture of live rock and something like Matala mat to fill in the gaps for maximum surface area without the risk of clogging. Finding good sponge candidates might prove to be the hardest part, but given time, it would most likely populate itself just with whatever is already in your tank.

I have thought about the matala mat my only concern would be it needing to be cleaned over time normally that wouldn't be a concern however my understand is that these sponges can't be exposed to light and air so not sure how I would clean it with out risking some sort of die off. I was thinking that if I put some rubble and maybe one solid piece of lr in the canister with no baskets I could potentially open the canister and siphon out excess detritus if ever needed... but then I run into the issue of low flow while re priming the canister I could potentially damage the sponges. In reality the way I'm gonna stock thos tank I probablly won't need a cryptic zone I wanted to do this as more of an experiment

 

[Mr_Knightley]

I have thought about the matala mat my only concern would be it needing to be cleaned over time normally that wouldn't be a concern however my understand is that these sponges can't be exposed to light and air so not sure how I would clean it with out risking some sort of die off. I was thinking that if I put some rubble and maybe one solid piece of lr in the canister with no baskets I could potentially open the canister and siphon out excess detritus if ever needed... but then I run into the issue of low flow while re priming the canister I could potentially damage the sponges. In reality the way I'm gonna stock thos tank I probablly won't need a cryptic zone I wanted to do this as more of an experiment

I see where you're coming from.. There are a few intertidal species of sponge that can take a fair amount of air exposure, perhaps you could look into one of those. Hymeniacidon perlevis is one I'm keeping right now, doesn't mind light or air exposure.

 

[ReefGeezer]

The velocity needed to carry oxygen through a small closed space is likely too high for many cryptic organisms to survive let alone flourish. In a standard refugium, water can flow over and around the rocks. Organisms can find flow and oxygen levels they desire.

 

[pirate9182]

The velocity needed to carry oxygen through a small closed space is likely too high for many cryptic organisms to survive let alone flourish. In a standard refugium, water can flow over and around the rocks. Organisms can find flow and oxygen levels they desire.

Yea that is true I did have concerns about and that may be why I've seldomly seen people talk about it

 

[Reef-Engineer]

Resurrecting this thread... I plan to do just this. Buy a Fluval 407 or some other large canister filter, fill it with a mix of LR rubble, bio media and some negative space, remove all the normal sponge media or anything likely to clog over time, and just let it run, closed, for a long time. Maybe I'll peak from time to time.

These filters hallmark is providing unidirectional flow across media, so I am not worried at all about anoxic zones. I hope for filtering featherdusters, sponges, and other cryptic critters to take up residence. The way I figure it, it is pretty much just like having a sump fuge area filled with LR rubble, I just dont have the sump space to do it in there.

So for a few Watts, it is a cheap addition of bio media. Which, for many of the minimal rock scape tanks I see today, would be a big help. I'll post pics once I do it.

 

[iannarelli]

Resurrecting this thread... I plan to do just this. Buy a Fluval 407 or some other large canister filter, fill it with a mix of LR rubble, bio media and some negative space, remove all the normal sponge media or anything likely to clog over time, and just let it run, closed, for a long time. Maybe I'll peak from time to time.

These filters hallmark is providing unidirectional flow across media, so I am not worried at all about anoxic zones. I hope for filtering featherdusters, sponges, and other cryptic critters to take up residence. The way I figure it, it is pretty much just like having a sump fuge area filled with LR rubble, I just dont have the sump space to do it in there.

So for a few Watts, it is a cheap addition of bio media. Which, for many of the minimal rock scape tanks I see today, would be a big help. I'll post pics once I do it.

Did you ever set this up? I have a spare Fluval 307 that I could maybe use as one.

 

[Hot2na]

You can have a cryptic zone right inside your tank .. My 75 gal is full of rock which has yellow sponge growing on the undersides of most of the rock and since I stack alot of rock (1980's style ) it grows in between the rocks in shaded areas .. Key is to get some sponge to start growing ...then it will "Crypticize" ..lol

 

[Subsea]

You can have a cryptic zone right inside your tank .. My 75 gal is full of rock which has yellow sponge growing on the undersides of most of the rock and since I stack alot of rock (1980's style ) it grows in between the rocks in shaded areas .. Key is to get some sponge to start growing ...then it will "Crypticize" ..lol

Spot on.

I have cryptic refugiums that were converted 5 years ago from mud/algae refugiums to cryptic refugium with a miracle mud filter. However, I also have cannister filters set up for the same length of time.

Steve Tyree spoke about cryptic zoanal filtration in the 1990’s. More recently, scientific reasearch has focused on cryptic sponges and the sponge loop. On this website @Timfish is my go to person on the sponge loop. In fact, this week, in response to my post on using cannister filters as high flow cryptic refugiums, he posted pictures of a system he set up 20 years ago.

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/n...d-school”-reefer.784640/page-13#post-13018830

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Resurrecting this thread... I plan to do just this. Buy a Fluval 407 or some other large canister filter, fill it with a mix of LR rubble, bio media and some negative space, remove all the normal sponge media or anything likely to clog over time, and just let it run, closed, for a long time. Maybe I'll peak from time to time.

These filters hallmark is providing unidirectional flow across media, so I am not worried at all about anoxic zones. I hope for filtering featherdusters, sponges, and other cryptic critters to take up residence. The way I figure it, it is pretty much just like having a sump fuge area filled with LR rubble, I just dont have the sump space to do it in there.

So for a few Watts, it is a cheap addition of bio media. Which, for many of the minimal rock scape tanks I see today, would be a big help. I'll post pics once I do it.

Did you ever go through with this?

 

[Reef-Engineer]

Did you ever go through with this?

Ive been watching Fb marketplace for a deal, so far id have to drop $200+ on an fx6 or equivalent.

In the meantime i removed my filter socks, put in filter cups, and filled them with LR rubble.

 

[TrottingReef]

I see where you're coming from.. There are a few intertidal species of sponge that can take a fair amount of air exposure, perhaps you could look into one of those. Hymeniacidon perlevis is one I'm keeping right now, doesn't mind light or air exposure.

Do you know where we can find that sponge?

 

[FUNGI]

Has anyone had success with turning a small canister into a cryptic zone? If so any tips? Or articles to read?

I run 3 FX6's cryptic style...all sponges except last one going into pump replaced with LR rubble. Quick rinse in NSW once a year...Nitrate holds steady at 10~15, which is fine for my mixed reef

 

[IceNein]

I would love some actual research on something like this, but I would imagine it would be very difficult to do. It would either require additional control and variable aquaria, or you would have to measure the nutrients going in and coming out, and I have to imagine that the amount of nutrient removal per pass is very low.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I would love some actual research on something like this, but I would imagine it would be very difficult to do. It would either require additional control and variable aquaria, or you would have to measure the nutrients going in and coming out, and I have to imagine that the amount of nutrient removal per pass is very low.

I agree. For all of the talk about cryptic zones, I've never seen any quantitation of what they accomplish in an actual reef tank. I'm not against them. I certainly had lots of areas that would qualify (piles of extra live rock on the bottom of a refugium, for example). I'm just not clear on what it accomplishes.