Limited reef and fish care

[Sweet Freddy]

I have a 90 gallon reef tank with around 6 fish although I lost a 3 striped damsel due to old age yesterday. He was around 9 to. My reef has various soft coral and they thrive. My fish consist of a clown various damsel and a couple of tangs. All the fish are older than 7 and are very healthy. I feed once daily but sometimes skip a day and they get regular seaweed but pretty much eat the same thing with no variance of flake food and seaweed. When I first got this aquarium I was constantly mothering it with all the testing on water quality and ect. Spending tons of cash on chemicals testing equipment salt lighting ect ect ect. I changed the water out every 1 to 2 weeks as well. Constantly busy mothering that thing. One day about years ago I realized I was spending a fortune on the whole operation and a whole lot of time. I could never go on any trips without constant worry of a crash or some other issue. I finally decided that no more....I was just gonna do the bare minimum and if it all died then so be it. That was 5 years ago and this thing is no better or worse off than when I nursed it all the time. I've done exactly 2 water changes in the past year and never have to buy the expensive salt like I was doing prior. I change my filter sock maybe once every 4 or 5 weeks and periodically I will clean the protein skimmer but cant even rember the last time I did that. I never test any portion of it for any type of water quality. The only time I test water is for salinity during water change which isnt often. It has automatic water fill so I'm not bothered with that either. My whole point to this post is I see tons of people in this hobby worry about all these parameters and it's just not necessary for a basic reef tank set up. I never have disease issues or that type thing. The only thing I do regular on mine is feed fish and the occasional glass clean for algae. Anyone else do limited upkeep on their set up? My reef tank is about 12 years old and going strong.

 

[chaseadams442]

I have a 90 gallon reef tank with around 6 fish although I lost a 3 striped damsel due to old age yesterday. He was around 9 to. My reef has various soft coral and they thrive. My fish consist of a clown various damsel and a couple of tangs. All the fish are older than 7 and are very healthy. I feed once daily but sometimes skip a day and they get regular seaweed but pretty much eat the same thing with no variance of flake food and seaweed. When I first got this aquarium I was constantly mothering it with all the testing on water quality and ect. Spending tons of cash on chemicals testing equipment salt lighting ect ect ect. I changed the water out every 1 to 2 weeks as well. Constantly busy mothering that thing. One day about years ago I realized I was spending a fortune on the whole operation and a whole lot of time. I could never go on any trips without constant worry of a crash or some other issue. I finally decided that no more....I was just gonna do the bare minimum and if it all died then so be it. That was 5 years ago and this thing is no better or worse off than when I nursed it all the time. I've done exactly 2 water changes in the past year and never have to buy the expensive salt like I was doing prior. I change my filter sock maybe once every 4 or 5 weeks and periodically I will clean the protein skimmer but cant even rember the last time I did that. I never test any portion of it for any type of water quality. The only time I test water is for salinity during water change which isnt often. It has automatic water fill so I'm not bothered with that either. My whole point to this post is I see tons of people in this hobby worry about all these parameters and it's just not necessary for a basic reef tank set up. I never have disease issues or that type thing. The only thing I do regular on mine is feed fish and the occasional glass clean for algae. Anyone else do limited upkeep on their set up? My reef tank is about 12 years old and going strong.

Wow this is great advice!!! People need to realize that you don't have to put a ton of effort into a tank and it can still thrive!!!