To fuge or not to fuge

reeferlover

reeferlover

New member
Well I have a fuge with live rock and cheato. It started full of rock and a hand full of cheato. Now it's just rubble on the bottom and basket ball size chaeto. I don't like it. It's dirty and I can't have any flow though it really because of the sump design. I want to just take half the baffle out and make it a double sump with the return pumps in the middle. But don't like doing water changes. And it seems to be keeping my tank clean. But Idk what it would be like without it. Should I ditch it. My skimmer is nice and does a great job. I have no algea in my display and in want to keep it that way. Any advice everyone
 
I just want to be able to increase the return to my frag tank. I can't now because it cause a lot of water to come over the baffle separating the fuge from the returns. And it's dirty and there is a lot of debris in the bottom of the fuge. I know it's going to cause excess nutrients. I guess I could just pull the rubble out.
 
Be aware taking out a Fuge will cause and imbalance with your system if you think you having an Algea problem now you might experience and even worst problem later on. I only say this becasue I discontinued mine on my 55G years ago and boy was that a Big mistake.... Fuge are and important part of a healthy reef, some folk deal with it and some folks can deal without it. If you are running high nutirents in your water, you would defenitly want a Fuge. If you're running a Low-Nutirnet system then some systems can deal without a Fuge.... but in anycase if it a broke don't fix it...
 
I have a 50g cube in a window of my house with no fuge & absolutely no algae. I had a severe algae problem at 1st set up (3 different macros & HA) but it's all gone & the tank is stunning!
 
my hob fuge broke last month, i took it off and didnt replace it or have plans to. i got a little bit of algea but i just upped my vinegar dosing a bit. not a big problem. just be ready to do a WC or run GFO, or carbon :)
 
As much as we want everything to be pretty...a sump is just that...a sump. It's a place where we grow algae so our display doesn't. It's a place where the display's water goes to be cleaned. The refuge is very beneficial to our tanks. I have a friend that has been running a tank skimmerless for 12 years and I swear it looks like a piece of the ocean. His system is filtered by a refugium alone.
 
BigBarnacles said:
As much as we want everything to be pretty...a sump is just that...a sump. It's a place where we grow algae so our display doesn't. It's a place where the display's water goes to be cleaned. The refuge is very beneficial to our tanks. I have a friend that has been running a tank skimmerless for 12 years and I swear it looks like a piece of the ocean. His system is filtered by a refugium alone.
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+1. I have a coworker who got me into keeping reefs after many, many years of freshwater. His top four tips for me were: weekly water changes, lots of water flow, refugium, and most importantly keeping your hands out of the tank or wearing shoulder length gloves.
 
I always rinsh off first. I have never had to wear gloves. I'm clumsy enough. I'm gonna leave it for now. I'm too scared now. Haha. But I'll be looking for a hob or some other means of keeping a fuge. I would hob of my sump. I'm just so ocd about my tank. I hate having this messy thing. Also last night I was mixing up the rubble and noticed its much cooler on the bottom of my fuge. I may have to put a power head in there. Or take out the rubble. I love feeding a lot. So I need all the help I can get ridding my tank of nutrients. Thanks guys.
 
reeferlover said:
But I'll be looking for a hob or some other means of keeping a fuge. I would hob of my sump. .
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I've got this one FS. Just needs a pump:

HOBFugeSkimmer.jpg
 
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