UV affect on corals?

[NY_Sea]

I have always wanted a powder blue tang but am hesitant because of their history in captivity and how they are prone to white spot ich. Don't want to kill off all my current fish from ich.

I have never run a UV on my mixed reef and was considering adding one specifically for help beating ich if I purchase a powder blue.

Does a uv sterilizer have any negative effect on sps, chalices or coral in general?

 

[saltyphish]

I don't believe they do, I ran one on my biocube for a year and never noticed any ill effects.. Also for what it's worth I have read they are not effective at keeping ich at bay. I have heard the PB's are ich magnets though so I can see your concern. Maybe try TTM to make the PB ich free?

 

[brandon429]

agreed. no harm to the entire ecosystem and all corals, and unhelpful for ich. Must seek other counter measures

 

[bct15]

A uv sterilizer is highly effective at killing free swimming ich, when used properly. This is very well documented and is scientific fact. It is extremely important to get the flow rate through the uv sterilizer correct in order to kill the parasites. It probably will not keep your system entirely ich free, but should assist in managing ich while your fish acclimated and builds up it's own natural defenses.

If your flow rate is too high thorough the sterilizer, it will be completely ineffective in killing ich. You want to be sure it is slow enough and had a high enough turnover rate to actually make a rent in your ich population.

It will have no effect on your corals.

 

[brandon429]

the length of threads that counter-link that it cant beat ich are over 30 pages but all in all I love the devices and would always use one or have one handy. I think the mere variation on being able to control ich drives those threads, repeating what was shown in a lab in the home tank etc...

 

[ReefMadScientist]

I wouldn't consider a UV sterilizer as a "Ich Killer". It may kill free swimming ich in the water column but does not kill all in the water. So using a UV sterilizer for this reason is useless.

Quarantine, feeding well, and having a less-stress tank is more crucial in combating ich.

 

[bct15]

Again, it is scientific fact that there is a 100% kill rate to ich parasites with a certain exposure to uv. This can not be disputed. The threads that claim it is unproductive come from imporoper use of a uv sterilizer, either the exposure time is not correct (to high of a flow rate) or the uv sterilizer is undersized and does not provide enough tank water turnover with the correct exposure rate.

For example, if to get the correct exposure time you have to have a flow rate of 10gpm but you have a 300 gallon tank...the uv sterilizer will appear to be ineffective. If toget the proper exposure time your flowrate through the uv sterilizer is 180gpm on a 300 gallon tank, the uv sterilizer will appear much more effective.

Again, the uv sterilizer will not eliminate ich but will assist in managing. It will only be effective if used properly.

Uv sterilizer a are very good at doing what they were designed to do, kill whatever passes through them that has a lethal exposure rate that is at or below the exposure rate available from the current flow rate passing through it. This means it kills everything that passed through it that is as strong or weaker than your target. Ich is very resilient so a lot of other micro-organisms passing through it will get killed as well.

 

[brandon429]

I love those kind of outright claims, they are easy to test

also happen to be a big believer in oversized grossly overdone uv vs just properly sizing one. slowing the flow, and increasing the gallonage rating 30x over is helpful in any situation where uv is warranted. we can beat some of the ugliest dino strains doing pond sterilizers on nano tanks, so again im the choir when it comes to liking oversized uv.

so to prove the point, you need to amass some threads where you reeled in ICH tanks and had them do the big uv. gotta sell them on the proofs it w work counter to what they've been reading in those threads, get em to stay in touch w you and update the threads so the proof transmits to others, and if its true then it w carve a new niche among claimants that uv wont work for ich in any repeatable manner which are numerous.

so in my call, the scientific links again mean nothing if those scientists cant reproduce the outcome in joe and janes tank across the web and collect them in forum threads. the outcome w be simple, those w tangs never QT w never have any ich. that's the bar we met for peroxide work, ya'll do the same for uv and the rule breaking will be fun to watch.

 

[jcdeng]

To answer the OP's question: It won't affect anything as long as you don't make 100% of your return water pass through it.

 

[bct15]

In not really sure what all of that says, but reports by a bunch of people not using something properly is not evidence that something does not work.

If 300 people install a return pump with the return plumbing hooked up to the intake, then claim it doesn't lift the water back into their tank, does that mean it doesn't do exactly what it was designed to do?

Garbage in = garbage out

 

[brandon429]

no its reverse of that assessment, its better if you make a thread to show it does work. using regular peoples tank across the web, wield and prove what those science links say. its really hard to get what works in a lab to xlate into someones tank and all its variables, so make the thread that proves them all wrong.

start up a thread where you state you can cure tanks of ich and they'll post up in droves. advise them on which uv to buy, track the thread, should be easy.

 

[jcdeng]

In not really sure what all of that says, but reports by a bunch of people not using something properly is not evidence that something does not work.

If 300 people install a return pump with the return plumbing hooked up to the intake, then claim it doesn't lift the water back into their tank, does that mean it doesn't do exactly what it was designed to do?

Garbage in = garbage out

You misunderstood, I simply mean the pods and phyto that will concern corals' health, I don't mean it won't affect anything in relation to ich and pathogens. This is how I run mine with a very slow flowrate eheim compact pump.

 

[diablomaster9045]

I have always wanted a powder blue tang but am hesitant because of their history in captivity and how they are prone to white spot ich. Don't want to kill off all my current fish from ich.

I have never run a UV on my mixed reef and was considering adding one specifically for help beating ich if I purchase a powder blue.

Does a uv sterilizer have any negative effect on sps, chalices or coral in general?

what size tank? What return pump? What stand height?Does the return line have a manifold?


the only thing that UV is harmful to is the beneficial waterborne bacteria.

 

[bct15]

no its reverse of that assessment, its better if you make a thread to show it does work. using regular peoples tank across the web, wield and prove what those science links say. its really hard to get what works in a lab to xlate into someones tank and all its variables, so make the thread that proves them all wrong.

start up a thread where you state you can cure tanks of ich and they'll post up in droves. advise them on which uv to buy, track the thread, should be easy.

Where did I say a uv sterilizer will rid a tank of ich?

I only claimed that how effectively a uv sterilizer manages any target is how well it is implemented.

 

[brandon429]

I might have misunderstood. as long as you meant that hooking up any uv to a typical reef tank wont do anything to ich then Im clear. I don't have a horse in the race, just going off large threads that make the counter claim pretty well, without scientific documentation

some of the confusion in those giant threads is when someone claims for sure it works and then doesn't produce a large thread showing it working, if its true that they've killed ich in a lab setting using some arrangement of UV that may not have bearing in the reef threads where people want it gone

 

[jcdeng]

UV, simple as this, if you don't run one, you can have 100 parasites swimming in the water column, if you run one, you will have 50 free swimming parasites. If you are the fish, which scenario would you prefer?

2nd, besides the cost of the unit and replacing bulbs and that little extra electricity (compare to your 10000000 watt light) whats the harm? so why not add one if you can afford it? Besides, it will clear up the water better than carbon, if you are looking for more par for the corals. Oh yeah, you can use the money you save on carbon to replace that uv bulb too.

 

[bct15]

It does effectively reduce the ich parasites in the water column when used properly. Most people who don't see it work either don't have the proper flow rate are are using an undersized flowrate. It is scientific fact that certain organisms have a threshold of how much exposure to uv lighting they can handle before they die. If they are exposed to this threshold then they will die. That is the end of that arguement, there is no disputing it. It is equivalent to an amount of heat, or lack of oxygen an organism can handle. Past the threshold and it will die.

Looking for some long thread explaining this is counterproductive. There is plenty of available research on the subject. Again, just because a bunch of people are using something a tool incorrectly does not mean it doesn't work. To sit and argue that point is counter productive, if somebody lacks the ability to evaluate information that is on them.

The lethal uv exposure rate is widely available, also the exposure rate vs flow rate is available for almost all uv sterilizers. After that it is up to the user to use it properly.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

UV, simple as this, if you don't run one, you can have 100 parasites swimming in the water column, if you run one, you will have 50 free swimming parasites. If you are the fish, which scenario would you prefer?

2nd, besides the cost of the unit and replacing bulbs and that little extra electricity (compare to your 10000000 watt light) whats the harm? so why not add one if you can afford it? Besides, it will clear up the water better than carbon, if you are looking for more par for the corals. Oh yeah, you can use the money you save on carbon to replace that uv bulb too.

There are potential drawbacks, and I would not run one on my system. Specifically, I dose organic carbon to my system in large part to drive the growth of bacteria that feed various organisms (sponges, etc.). I want those bacteria to remain alive, not to pass through a UV and be killed, break apart and spill their guts into the water column where it is essentially wasted.

Also a UV does not remove organic matter from the water. It may reduce yellowing, as a weaker sibling to using ozone, but GAC removes the organics while a UV does not.

 

[brandon429]

It does effectively reduce the ich parasites in the water column when used properly

the people in the web threads only want it gone, since we can't measure anything but ich or no ich on a tang, this seems like a safe claim where the status quo can proceed but wont rate this as any win. They may reduce some ich, but others will still be left in the tank=not a fix for the masses, which imo is why UV isn't used well for any measurable ich control and those threads showing proof otherwise are still to be made. claims are never short, proof threads are for sure.

 

[bct15]

To further break is down,

Assume somebody has tuned their uv sterilizer in order for it reduce their ich population by half each day. But then through reproduction they population triples every four days. It would look something like this.

Day 1 100%
Day 2 50 %
Day 3 25%
Day 4 75% from tripling - 37.5%
Day 5 18.75%
Day 6 ~ 10%
Day 7 ~ 5%
Day 7 15% from tripling then 7.5%
And so on

Of course this is over simplified but explains how the concept works.