What are the most important things to you for maintaining a healthy reef? What brought biggest failures?

[Screwgunner]

Most important thing is keeping water up to standards . And knowing what you are looking for .

 

[Treefer32]

Biggest equipment failure was a heater that leaked electricity caused the deaths of 17 fish over a 3 week period.
Biggest natural failure is not monitoring phosphates. Biggest success, managing phosphates! Many treatments for phosphates manage nitrates as well. So, I have 3 methods for exporting nitrates and phosphates that allow me to feed heavy have a large bio load (27-28 fish right now) and phosphates are around .06 ppm. Right where I need them to be.

 

[LRT]

Biggest equipment failure was a heater that leaked electricity caused the deaths of 17 fish over a 3 week period.
Biggest natural failure is not monitoring phosphates. Biggest success, managing phosphates! Many treatments for phosphates manage nitrates as well. So, I have 3 methods for exporting nitrates and phosphates that allow me to feed heavy have a large bio load (27-28 fish right now) and phosphates are around .06 ppm. Right where I need them to be.

Holy bioload batman. What size system? How are you exporting?

 

[Screwgunner]

Biggest failure was using straight well water .Water turned green . Uv took care of that then hair algae. Natural would have to be red flat worms they covered my whole tank ,I hit them with flatworm x the poison they release killed everything but my clowns.

 

[Drew1600]

Personally,

1. Consistent husbandry. Form good habits. Reefs love stability.

2. DO NOT decide to randomly clean your sandbed one day, lol bad decision.

*4 months ago* - "One siphoning would do some good since I never have"

Been dealing with the aftermath ever since.

Basically, intervene with your system as little as possible.

 

[Paul B]

Feeding the proper food which is food with living bacteria in it's guts.
Allowing the fish to live naturally like they do in the sea with all the things they encounter in the sea but not the things that will eat them.

 

[ClownSchool]

When you take into consideration well-being and what that means to your health, all you do is extend that to your aquariums. If you neglect your body, your body with time tell of that neglect. When you love your body, exercise, eat right, and love others as you would want them to love you, you have hit success for well being. Those that extend this concept to a reef tank will start to see the benefits of this in a fury, those that don't will see what you asked at the end of your question, FAILURE.

You can love your fish, but don’t loooovve your fish

 

[Ross Petersen]

Communicate with as many people as you can on Reef2Reef, Facecrack, at local fish stores, and so on. There are so many nuances and fine details in this hobby it's impossible to catch them all on first go / ever...

Question --> Chat with friends --> Research --> Question --> Spend $$$ --> Do regular water changes with precision

Most important: enjoy the beauty of the reef, watch it mature, and embrace challenges as they come.

 

[Reefvision]

Biggest failure was using straight well water .Water turned green . Uv took care of that then hair algae. Natural would have to be red flat worms they covered my whole tank ,I hit them with flatworm x the poison they release killed everything but my clowns.

Flatworms exit is great ,but beware of the toxin created. I removed all fish after a previous bad experience occurred and now am dosing it and observation for eggs hatched and then redosing. I think it’s good now

 

[clicfacil]

La falla más grande del equipo fue un calentador que perdió electricidad y causó la muerte de 17 peces durante un período de 3 semanas.
La mayor falla natural es no monitorear los fosfatos. ¡El mayor éxito en la gestión de fosfatos! Muchos tratamientos para los fosfatos también controlan los nitratos. Entonces, tengo 3 métodos para exportar nitratos y fosfatos que me permiten alimentarme con una carga biológica grande (27-28 peces en este momento) y los fosfatos están alrededor de .06 ppm. Justo donde necesito que estén.

Could You explain the 3 methods for win the batle with the no3

 

[Treefer32]

Holy bioload batman. What size system? How are you exporting?

350 Gallon Display and 75 gallon sump (half full).

Export mediums:
I Vodka dose daily (around 4.4 ml per day).
I run a reef octopus skimmer rated for 500 gallons (moderate load).
I run a @Turbo's Aquatics L4 Algae turf scrubber
I run filter socks I change every 2-3 days religiously
I run a 25 micron Nu-Clear Cannister filter from Marineandreef.com that I change the cartridge every 3 weeks.
I run 500 ml of purigen
I do once a month 130 gallon water change (around 33%).


I think that's all of my export mechanisms.