SPS Lagoon without protein skimmer

[Jacek56]

Every day brings something new. Colours are getting better and better without skimmer, how is this possible???Well, it is possible biology does the trick.

Untitled by Jacek Kowalski, on Flickr

 

[watchguy123]

Thank you.
Maintenance is strait forward. Filtration mats are replaced every 1-2 days, activated carbon is change every 30 days, zeolites are change every 8-12 weeks, every day dose of: ZS 1.2ml x2/day, SP 1ml/ day, ZB 5 drops daily, ZF 5 drops weekly, CB 1 ml daily. WC are performed every 1-2 weeks 30-70ltr, depends on my mood. :) Basically I try to follow KZ maintenance book, except I do not have to clean the skimmer :) and I dose much, much less then it is written on blue bottles.

reef tanks require work and eliminating a protein skimmer and its yucky maintenance/cleaning is very cool. I have a separate frag tank that runs without a skimmer, actually with very little in mechanical filtration of any sort.

Your example is stunning. It seems the more we know, the more confusing it becomes. I think protein skimmers primarily remove DOC and help oxygenate the water. Your carbon works on the DOC's and your filter media gets rid of some of the larger stuff ( uneaten food, etc) plus detritus, I presume. Bacteria and tiny critters are apparently pretty darn effective in a tank. The maintenance schedule you describe is indeed straight forward but it still is a lot of devotion and work. It would be nice to see how far down this road of reducing our workload and yet maintain a stable tank will get. Kudos on your beautiful acros, just stunning.

 

[Jacek56]

Thank you, I am honoured. Your collection of Sps is stunning. I wish this kind of sps you got were available in Poland.

I fully agree, more we know the more confusing it becomes.
I don't know if you read this http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2011/3/aafeature ? Very interesting article and observations.
Regarding that skimmer helps oxygenate it's a myth, in my opinion. Together with my fellow aquarist in Poland, we performed few tests. We run ours aquaria with skimmer on and off and we measured ph level at the same time. There was no any change in the reading of ph. The conclusion is that oxygenation of the water takes place on water surface and depends on level of O2 in the room were you have your aquarium.
This is very very well explained in this article
https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/ph-and-the-reef-aquarium.7/
System is designed for my wife and is user friendly as much as possible. She is fully in charge now when I am away for 6 weeks. Therefore daily maintenance is reduced to only couple of minutes, to replace filtration mats it's take only 30 seconds + 1 minute for dosing, that's it.

 

[SpiderWeb]

Very very nice reef! About 4 months ago my Tunze 9410 skimmer motor died on my 120g. I decided to hold back replacing it just to see the effects. Other than my phosphates rising from .05 to .14, the tank is doing very well! Acros polyp(s) extension are better than ever. I had a dying blue Millie that is recovering nicely...I think I may need to up my water changes to bi-weekly. I have another skimmer pump coming soon but I think I may run it only 8 hrs a night, after lights out. I must say growing acros has been a challenge for me! Congrats on your success!

 

[Crabs McJones]

That is gorgeous!

 

[TbyZ]

Last year when for the first time I saw system run without skimmer I could only say WOW. So I decided to give a trial.

Hi Jack;

There are far better ways of removing DOC from the water than using a skimmer.
But skimmers do perform a very useful function when keeping sps. The removal of water column heterotrophic bacteria.
I'm not refering to water column bacterial removal in regards to carbon dosing.
There are direct correlations with poor coral health and water column bacterial densities.
Do you use any particular method to deal with this?
I guess efficient removal of bacteria food (DOCs) using ROX for example would be one method.

cheers

 

[Jacek56]

Hi Jack;

There are far better ways of removing DOC from the water than using a skimmer.
But skimmers do perform a very useful function when keeping sps. The removal of water column heterotrophic bacteria.
I'm not refering to water column bacterial removal in regards to carbon dosing.
There are direct correlations with poor coral health and water column bacterial densities.
Do you use any particular method to deal with this?
I guess efficient removal of bacteria food (DOCs) using ROX for example would be one method.

cheers

http://www.marineaquariumservice.com/cloudy-marine-aquarium-water/



In well established tank removal of heterotrophic bacteria is not an issue. This might be an issue when the nutrient cycle is still being established and a balance of the heterotrophic organic reducing bacteria and autotrophic nitrite reducing bacteria have not been fully established yet.
I have never expirence this issue when I removed skimmer from the system.

I dose bacteria regularly, blow the rock, sand and remove detritus from the bottom of the tank.

 

[TbyZ]

http://www.marineaquariumservice.com/cloudy-marine-aquarium-water/



In well established tank removal of heterotrophic bacteria is not an issue. This might be an issue when the nutrient cycle is still being established and a balance of the heterotrophic organic reducing bacteria and autotrophic nitrite reducing bacteria have not been fully established yet.
I have never expirence this issue when I removed skimmer from the system.

I dose bacteria regularly, blow the rock, sand and remove detritus from the bottom of the tank.

I'm not refering to bacterial blooms during cycling either Jack.

Feldman et al found tanks that utilised skimming & activated carbon had TOC levels at natural coral reef levels but water column bacteria levels at only 1/10.
Tanks that didn't use activated carbon or skimmers had higher TOC levels than natural reef waters but water column bacteria counts about the same.

Feldman noted that sensitive corals, like Acropora do well in the low-bacteria-count tanks but not so well in the tanks with higher bacteria counts.

This and other studies showing direct correlations with poor coral health and water column bacterial densities is what I'm getting at.
Keeping water column bacteria counts in an aquarium lower than on a natural coral reef seems to be a positive for sps health, and methods to reduce it in the aquarium must be considered.
I'm not saying that skimming is the only way to do it though.

 

[gregkn73]

I'm not refering to bacterial blooms during cycling either Jack.

Feldman et al found tanks that utilised skimming & activated carbon had TOC levels at natural coral reef levels but water column bacteria levels at only 1/10.
Tanks that didn't use activated carbon or skimmers had higher TOC levels than natural reef waters but water column bacteria counts about the same.

Feldman noted that sensitive corals, like Acropora do well in the low-bacteria-count tanks but not so well in the tanks with higher bacteria counts.

This and other studies showing direct correlations with poor coral health and water column bacterial densities is what I'm getting at.
Keeping water column bacteria counts in an aquarium lower than on a natural coral reef seems to be a positive for sps health, and methods to reduce it in the aquarium must be considered.
I'm not saying that skimming is the only way to do it though.

I was always considered bacteria plankton, one of the best food sources for more of our corals, if o2 levels are not affected. And one major reason i am no using skimmer either. Can you give us a link to those studies showing the opposite?

 

[TbyZ]

I was always considered bacteria plankton, one of the best food sources for more of our corals, if o2 levels are not affected. And one major reason i am no using skimmer either. Can you give us a link to those studies showing the opposite?

This was a comment I read from Steve Tyree.

“There are direct correlations with poor coral health and high pelagic (water column) bacterial densities. Some dissolved organics will always be present within a closed system. The issue is density. That is why skimmers were needed to become successful with Acropora initially. “

Tyree's comment reminded me of an observation Feldman made in his paper -

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2011/3/aafeature
Bacterial Counts in Reef Aquarium Water: Baseline Values and Modulation by Carbon Dosing, Protein Skimming, and Granular Activated Carbon Filtration
By Ken S. Feldman

3. Results and Discussion

The surveyed reef aquariums divided into two distinct sets of husbandry protocols; aggressive and passive. The aggressive husbandry practices included protein skimming, GAC filtration, and regular water changes in an active effort to scrub the water of nutrients. The passive approach did not involve any of these procedures. Interestingly, the aquaria subjected to passive husbandry exhibited bacterial counts that fell within the range seen on authentic reefs; 200 - 1000K/mL. On the other hand, the tanks that "benefited" from careful attention to nutrient removal protocols displayed bacteria/mL counts that fell far short of these numbers. In addition to monitoring water column bacteria counts, the TOC levels were examined as well. Not surprisingly, the tanks with "unpurified" water exhibited TOC levels greater than those seen with the skimmed/GAC-filtered tanks. The "purified" aquaria's TOC levels fall within the typical TOC range seen on authentic, healthy reefs; the passively husbandry tanks were 2-3x higher.


The observation that, at least among this small set of aquaria examined, the water within the skimmed/filtered tanks had only ~ 1/10th of the population of (water column) bacteria that the unskimmed/unfiltered tanks had was a real surprise. It speaks to one aspect of aquarium husbandry in which a perhaps important parameter (?), water column bacteria counts from authentic and healthy reefs, is not reproduced at all effectively in these home aquaria. Sensitive corals, like Acropora, do not thrive in the high-bacteria-count/high-TOC-level tanks examined, although soft corals do well. On the other hand, SPS corals do well in the low-bacteria-count/low-TOC-level tanks.
=====================================================

Although Tyree may have be referring more so to an increase in the percentage of heterotrophic & virulent bacteria specie densities, created by higher percentage of certain sugars contained in DOC from various primary producers on unhealthy reefs, Feldman’s observation would suggest that certain densities of water column bacteria, above a certain concentration, are detrimental to sps corals no matter the bacteria type.

 

[gregkn73]

, Feldman’s observation would suggest that certain densities of water column bacteria, above a certain concentration, are detrimental to sps corals no matter the bacteria type.

From your link :-)

"Aquaria subjected to active filtration via skimming present water column bacteria populations that are approximately 1/10 of those observed on natural reefs. The consequences of this disparity on the long-term health of the tank's livestock are not known. How do reef tank organisms adapt to such a bacteria-deficient environment? Is the whole food web in an aquarium perturbed, or are there compensatory mechanisms that maintain an appropriate energy transduction through all of the trophic levels? Is "old tank syndrome" related to possible nutritional deficiencies stemming from this bacteria "gap"? Alternatively, could "old tank syndrome" be symptomatic of a gradual decrease of bacterial diversity as a consequence of selective skimmer-based removal of only bubble-susceptible bacteria? At present, it is not possible to go beyond speculation on these points - further research is needed."

Authors conclusion are different than yours...

 

[TbyZ]

From your link :)

"Aquaria subjected to active filtration via skimming present water column bacteria populations that are approximately 1/10 of those observed on natural reefs. The consequences of this disparity on the long-term health of the tank's livestock are not known. How do reef tank organisms adapt to such a bacteria-deficient environment? Is the whole food web in an aquarium perturbed, or are there compensatory mechanisms that maintain an appropriate energy transduction through all of the trophic levels? Is "old tank syndrome" related to possible nutritional deficiencies stemming from this bacteria "gap"? Alternatively, could "old tank syndrome" be symptomatic of a gradual decrease of bacterial diversity as a consequence of selective skimmer-based removal of only bubble-susceptible bacteria? At present, it is not possible to go beyond speculation on these points - further research is needed."

Authors conclusion are different than yours...

No; What you just posted are not the author's conclusions. He's proposing possibilities based on assumptions derived from the fact that skimmers only remove bubble sususceptible bacteria. Did you note his use of >>>?

He did note the fact that sps do well in the tanks with lower w.c. bacteria, & not so well in the tanks with natural reef bacteria levels.
I don't use a skimmer.

 

[TbyZ]

Apologies to Jacek. I just realized i mistakenly called you Jack.

 

[gregkn73]

No; What you just posted are not the author's conclusions. He's proposing possibilities based on assumptions derived from the fact that skimmers only remove bubble sususceptible bacteria. Did you note his use of >>>?

He did note the fact that sps do well in the tanks with lower w.c. bacteria, & not so well in the tanks with natural reef bacteria levels.
I don't use a skimmer.

Actually what I quoted is a part from its conclusions chapter of his paper. He concluded that more experiments needed , to determine if the lower bacterial populations and fewer strains of bacteria, counted in skimmed tanks, is the cause of old tank syndrome and other bad staff :-) He pointed that sps do better in skimmed than unskimmed tanks, but in Sanjay's skimmer less tanks , he is not using WC, gac, gfo and I guess he never measure K, trace elements if he is measuring kh , CA and Mg! :-) so it is not surprise that sps doesn't thrive at those tanks and he any way didnt correlate the high bacteria populations with sps health!

Personally reading this paper was a major influence to go skimereless! Bacteria populations similar to a healthy reef, proof of high predation on those bacteria from our tank inhabitants , was major reason to go skimereless :-)

PS Sorry Janec to discuss other things than your wonderful tank , but I thing that is useful for someone to decide what an awful expense is the skimmer :-)

 

[TbyZ]

and he any way didnt correlate the high bacteria populations with sps health!

Well, actually -

"Sensitive corals, like Acropora, do not thrive in the high-bacteria-count/high-TOC-level tanks examined

SPScorals do well in the low-bacteria-count/low-TOC-level tanks."

Anyhow, my point isn't actually about skimmers, & i don't use one. My point is, there's evidence that sps health is affected by water column bacteria densities.

 

[gregkn73]

Well, actually -

"Sensitive corals, like Acropora, do not thrive in the high-bacteria-count/high-TOC-level tanks examined

SPScorals do well in the low-bacteria-count/low-TOC-level tanks."

Anyhow, my point isn't actually about skimmers, & i don't use one. My point is, there's evidence that sps health is affected by water column bacteria densities.

If you copy paste a little more of the article

"The observation that, at least among this small set of aquaria examined, the water within the skimmed/filtered tanks had only ~ 1/10th of the population of bacteria that the unskimmed/unfiltered tanks had was a real surprise. It speaks to one aspect of aquarium husbandry in which a perhaps important parameter (?), water column bacteria counts from authentic and healthy reefs, is not reproduced at all effectively in these home aquaria. Sensitive corals, like Acropora, do not thrive in the high-bacteria-count/high-TOC-level tanks examined, although soft corals do well (see pictures). On the other hand, SPS corals do well in the low-bacteria-count/low-TOC-level tanks (Fig. 6). These observations raise a number of questions, chief among them perhaps are, (1) "Do water column bacteria counts have any relevance to the short-term or long-term prospects for maintaining SPS in captive aquaria?", and (2) "What is the relationship between TOC and water column bacteria population?" The former question, whereas perhaps more interesting, remains unanswered. The latter question (TOC vs. bacteria population), which bears on the topic of carbon dosing, will be addressed below."

From this article there is no evidence that sps health, is affected by High bacterial counts! He states clearly that this question is unanswered!

By reading all the article and the questions rised from those experiments and I quoted them earlier,what he actually wants to investigate further, is if the selective removal of bacterial strains by skimmers, affect negatively our tanks , as far old tank syndrome etc! Not any mention, to the point YOU want to make...

 

[Jacek56]

I fully agree the article gives us more questions than answers.



The ultimate proof that SPS do very well without skimmer. Since day one, no skimmer, dry rock but long time cycling, bacterial bloom. But when a few pieces of liverock had been added the biological engine started with the full power.

Apologies to Jacek. I just realized i mistakenly called you Jack.

Your translation was perfect, Jacek in English is Jack. :)

 

[TbyZ]

I fully agree the article gives us more questions than answers.



The ultimate proof that SPS do very well without skimmer. Since day one, no skimmer, dry rock but long time cycling, bacterial bloom. But when a few pieces of liverock had been added the biological engine started with the full power.



Your translation was perfect, Jacek in English is Jack. :)

Hi Jacek. My point regarding w.c. bacteria was never intended to be pro skimmer. Nor am i suggesting that an sps tank must use a skimmer. I don't use a skimmer & I'm not a fan of skimming. The fact skimming decreases bacteria diversity is a possible problem.
My point was that Feldman noted that sps did well in low w.c. bacteria count tanks but not in tanks that had bacteria counts that were equal to, or greater than natural reef waters, & his observation led to his posing the question "Do water column bacteria counts have any relevance to the short-term or long-term prospects for maintaining SPS in captive aquaria?"

I'm suggesting that higher water column bacteria densities could also harbour a high density of, for instance, flagellated heterotrophic bacteria, which would be a problem.
Maintaining lower densities of water column bacteria overall addresses this. I was asking you if you use measures such as UV, or ozone for this reason because your tank is very successful.

Cheers :)

 

[Jacek56]

Hi Jacek. My point regarding w.c. bacteria was never intended to be pro skimmer. Nor am i suggesting that an sps tank must use a skimmer. I don't use a skimmer & I'm not a fan of skimming. The fact skimming decreases bacteria diversity is a possible problem.
My point was that Feldman noted that sps did well in low w.c. bacteria count tanks but not in tanks that had bacteria counts that were equal to, or greater than natural reef waters, & his observation led to his posing the question "Do water column bacteria counts have any relevance to the short-term or long-term prospects for maintaining SPS in captive aquaria?"

I'm suggesting that higher water column bacteria densities could also harbour a high density of, for instance, flagellated heterotrophic bacteria, which would be a problem.
Maintaining lower densities of water column bacteria overall addresses this. I was asking you if you use measures such as UV, or ozone for this reason because your tank is very successful.

Cheers :)

I do not run ozone or UV why, see this part of the article.

"One concerning point in the experiment described in Fig. 7 involves the role that the UV sterilizer might play in influencing bacterial levels; Are we killing significant numbers of bacteria by UV treatment, thus suppressing population growth? The UV sterilizer in use is a 57W flow-through model from Aqua Ultraviolet. In order to probe this question, we re-ran the "week-in-the-life" experiment with the UV sterilizer off, but the skimmer on continuously, Fig. 8. The observed bacteria/mL values over the course of 5 days fluctuated between 60K and 90K (~ 50% change) for this particular time period. Thus, there did not appear to be any significant bacteria population increase in the water column when the UV sterilizer was off, and it is probably safe to conclude that the UV sterilizer does not have a significant effect on the bacteria population levels in the tank’s water column."

I think stability is the answer, biological stability. For some reason system without skimmer is more stable in my opinion. Bacterias living in LR, ceramic bed, zeolites give no room for flagellates or cyano development.

Another interesting topic

"The Coral Holobiont
A coral's holobiont is comprised of close associations between the coral animal itself, its symbiotic zooxanthellae, and a diversity of associated microbes including bacteria, archaea, algae, and fungi. These associations can take place in the coral's immediate environment, on its surface, within its tissues, and within its skeleton (if present). This paradigm emphasizes the potential contributions of each component to the overall function and health of the coral (Rypien, 2010). The dynamic nature of these relationships can be seen in a comparison between freshly collected corals from the Red Sea region that were then placed into marine aquaria. A microbial community shift in the bacteria inhabiting the surface mucus layer was documented for collected corals when placed into the captive marine aquarium. The differences that emerged between corals from natural and captive environments suggested an adaptation of the mucus bacterial communities to the different conditions (Kooperman, 2007).

Disruptions within a coral's holobiont have the potential to negatively impact the coral's health. Altered bacterial community structures have been linked to both coral disease and bleaching (Kvennefors, 2010). Coral bleaching occurs if the endosymbiosis between corals and their symbiots disintegrates during stress (Ainsworth, 2008). Even so, shifts in the holobiont's bacterial community component may not be a direct cause of coral bleaching. While bacterial communities play important roles in coral stasis and health, environmental stressors appear to be the primary triggers for coral bleaching, and bacterial involvement in patterns of bleaching appear to be the result of opportunistic colonization (Ainsworth, 2008).”

 

[TbyZ]

I do not run ozone or UV why, see this part of the article.

"One concerning point in the experiment described in Fig. 7 involves the role that the UV sterilizer might play in influencing bacterial levels; Are we killing significant numbers of bacteria by UV treatment, thus suppressing population growth? The UV sterilizer in use is a 57W flow-through model from Aqua Ultraviolet. In order to probe this question, we re-ran the "week-in-the-life" experiment with the UV sterilizer off, but the skimmer on continuously, Fig. 8. The observed bacteria/mL values over the course of 5 days fluctuated between 60K and 90K (~ 50% change) for this particular time period. Thus, there did not appear to be any significant bacteria population increase in the water column when the UV sterilizer was off, and it is probably safe to conclude that the UV sterilizer does not have a significant effect on the bacteria population levels in the tank’s water column."

Feldman made the observation that the UV had no effect on pelagic bacteria counts. For no stated reason, this alleviated his concerns?
Concerns about what?
Was Feldman's UV set up correctly? Apparently not.
With the correct UV bulb wattage, & very importantly, correct flow/contact time, UV filtration does remove virulent pelagic bacteria from the water column. This is a positive.
He didn't mention ozone.

I think stability is the answer, biological stability. For some reason system without skimmer is more stable in my opinion. Bacterias living in LR, ceramic bed, zeolites give no room for flagellates or cyano development.

skimmers only remove pelagic bacteria. They have no effect on benthic bacteria.

"The Coral Holobiont
A coral's holobiont is comprised of close associations between the coral animal itself, its symbiotic zooxanthellae, and a diversity of associated microbes including bacteria, archaea, algae, and fungi. These associations can take place in the coral's immediate environment, on its surface, within its tissues, and within its skeleton (if present). This paradigm emphasizes the potential contributions of each component to the overall function and health of the coral (Rypien, 2010). The dynamic nature of these relationships can be seen in a comparison between freshly collected corals from the Red Sea region that were then placed into marine aquaria. A microbial community shift in the bacteria inhabiting the surface mucus layer was documented for collected corals when placed into the captive marine aquarium. The differences that emerged between corals from natural and captive environments suggested an adaptation of the mucus bacterial communities to the different conditions (Kooperman, 2007).

Disruptions within a coral's holobiont have the potential to negatively impact the coral's health. Altered bacterial community structures have been linked to both coral disease and bleaching (Kvennefors, 2010). Coral bleaching occurs if the endosymbiosis between corals and their symbiots disintegrates during stress (Ainsworth, 2008). Even so, shifts in the holobiont's bacterial community component may not be a direct cause of coral bleaching. While bacterial communities play important roles in coral stasis and health, environmental stressors appear to be the primary triggers for coral bleaching, and bacterial involvement in patterns of bleaching appear to be the result of opportunistic colonization (Ainsworth, 2008).”

Yes, increased densities in certain pelagic bacteria has been documented to have a negative impact on the functioning of the holobiont population & coral health.
this is why pelagic (water column) bacteria counts need to be controlled. The take up of disolved organics is one way of achieving this.

I recently purchased Steve Tyree's Captive Maintenance Advanced Techniques vol 1 & 2. Cryptic Sponge and Sea Squirt Filtration Models.
I'm only up to chapter 1, page 41, but I'll quote some of Tyree up to this point -

"One of the new filtration techniques is the natural pelagic bacterial consumption that tropical sponges possess. Sponges can give the aquarist a natural method to control pelagic bacterial densities."

"In addition to these dissolved organics, sponges can filter particles up to about 50 microns in size and they are very efficient consumers of bacteria. Sea squirts also consume bacteria and can also consume small sized particulate matter. In an odd sort of way sponges and squirts can be compared to the artificial canister filter or box filters where water was forced through a filter medium. Sponges and squirts have the added benefit of consuming bacteria and being completely natural" (Tyree 1998b).

"One of the basic advantages to using sponges and squirts is that they filter pelagic bacteria from the water column very efficiently."

"The primary text of this book defines how to setup a captive system that has natural capabilities to filter dissolved organics and bacteria. This filtration is meant to replicate what occurs in the twilight zone or low light cryptic zone of coral reefs" (Tyree 1998b).

Tyree obviously considers the removal of pelagic bacteria advantageous.