UV sterilizer when to add one

[Acronuts]

:ooh:I wanted to know w/ my new 180g when will be a good time to add a uv sterilizer?
The tank has been running 2 wks but has most of my old water, old LR, and about 50% of the old sand.
I figured I could start at around the 5th week. Why? Well I thought that the uv would not be selective in which bacteria it zapped. Adding too soon might kill beneficial bacteria that I may need right now.
What are your thoughts?

 

[blackhawk86]

Well i dont think there are beneficial bacteria actually in the water column and if there is it isnt much and would cause no harm to your cycle. There are down sides to running U.V. though like it will kill you copepods ands any other beneficial bugs that fish, coral, and inverts like to eat and what i think is the worst part about running U.V. (and is why i dont run one anymore) is it will kill the coraline algae spores that are in the water column making it almost impossible to grow coraline if you run it 24/7. What i did was took it out my system and made it portable so if theres ever a parasite out break or hairalgae out break I can tose it in and let it go to work. I do just fine without running it though and have never had to break it out after i uninstalled it.

 

[oceanparadise1]

i dont think you should if this is a reef tank as it will kill a lot of the pods actually all of them

 

[Yellowtang]

i dont think you should if this is a reef tank as it will kill a lot of the pods actually all of them

IME ran a sterilizer for 5 years still had lots of pods? A sterilizer will only kill what goes through it not other stuff in the tank..

JR,