Refugium "dirty" or "filtered"?

[BigMikeFlipz]

Like the title says, How do you Fuge?

 

[exnisstech]

Cryptic fuge after socks /roller but often they overflow before I get around to changing them so I still get plenty of detritus. I never clean a fuge. In fact when I tore down my last tank after 8 years I scraped the mulm out of the old sump and dumped it in the new sump. There was so much life I wanted in in the new system.

 

[BigMikeFlipz]

Cryptic fuge after socks /roller but often they overflow before I get around to changing them so I still get plenty of detritus. I never clean a fuge. In fact when I tore down my last tank after 8 years I scraped the mulm out of the old sump and dumped it in the new sump. There was so much life I wanted in in the new system.

Yeah, i can't change that one, after submitted it's permanent, can someone delete "cleaner is better"?

 

[vlangel]

I have done it both ways successfully and it depends on the application of the sump which I choose.

When I had a seahorse tank, because of their vulnerability to bacterial infections I kept a very clean sump. I used an oversized skimmer that was 3Xs bigger than needed for normal reefs and I never let detritus or gunk build up in the sump.

However, after my seahorses I was ready for an easy tank so am now running a high nutrient macroalgae reef. I do not use any filtration except the deep sandbed, live rock and macroalgae. The water goes down the drain to the sump where there are no filter socks, medium or skimmer. The 30 gallon XH sump is not even partitioned. The drain is on the right and the return pump is on the left. Extra macroalgae is in the sump with some rock and a deep sandbed. I added 5 more fish a couple of months ago to get my nitrates up from 0.

So I say it depends on what you want your sump to do.