Who Doesn't Do Water Changes

[ct103]

I will confess that I do not do the water changes as often as i should but they are necessary in order to keep a healthy system and about once a year or so I take everything out of my sump and clean all of the build up of detrius and algea. My sump contains a rather large amount of LR for its size I also have cheato and lots of life so I have a build up of stuff. Maintenance is required in this hobby or failure is unavoidable.

[travis32]

So what are some variables on frequency of water changes? Some I can think of (pretty major ones) is number of fish. Number of corals, rates of element consumption by the corals, type of filtration: Macro, DSB, BB, excessively large amounts of LR, Amount of water volume, CUC, and much more probably.

If we narro WC down to serve the purpose of removing waste.. No one has said the primary reason WC are required. So, Let's narrow it down.. -- To remove waste from fish and food, I'm assuming.

What if a system is lightly stocked, (say 4 or 5 medium fish in say a 125g tank and a 55g sump that's lightly fed. Vs. a 125g tank with 20g sump, stocked with 12 - 15 medium sized fish that has to be heavily fed to keep the fish full.

Scenerio A I could see one getting by with a WC a couple times a year if done right. Scenerio B I see some serious toxicity and algae issues occuring within 6 months if not sooner if no WC were done.

That's assuming all other things were equal-- skimmers, macro, and etc.

[chris88]

I will post some new pictures soon. Tap water in the two cites i have lived in Canada has been more then adequate for running my reef tanks.

[mthomp]

i guess my question is this, Why take the chance? it isnt like water changes are hard or time consuming.

[sslak]

After 5+ years of reefing I can say with confidence that you need to do water changes. Sure, for a month or two you can get by like Mr. Golfoo above with a join date of June 2010. Eventually all those excess nutrients build up and overwhelm the biological filtration and you will have an outbreak of algae, or worse.

If you don't do water changes, especially with no skimmer, the system will begin to look worse and worse and worse...until one day you realize your tank looks terrible and something must be done.

It's much easier to just do the maintenance regularly and avoid the huge battle when it all begins to pile up. Every time I let my water changes slide I saw the condition of the tank decline. It's easy to see.

Seriously, how hard is it to fill a bucket of water, measure out some salt, let it sit with a heater and pump while it mixes?

You sir, are in the wrong hobby. Laziness. No excuse.

[bnumair]

every situation is different.
i have a 120 gal reef tank with 3 different tangs 5 clowns reefsafe wrasse and 10 peppermint shrimp 2 cleaners shrimp and 3 emerald crabs. i have about 20 different kinds of healthy corals and gorwing with 700+watts of MH lights and actanics T5's.
now to your question. i have a 15 gal sump with 25 lbs of live rock 50lbs of live sand few pads and sponges a small deep sand bed and a korilline sulpur denitrator. NOT RUNNING SKIMMER it adds a lot of micro bubbles for some reason so its been down for 2 months.
i do water changes once every 3-4 months. but i evaporate about 3-5 gals a day and i refil RO/DI water everyday mixed with trace elements.
i have had no problems with the tank even with the skimmer down and very few water changes. i have a very balanced monthly schedule that works for me. i will post it here in few.
Good luck

[chimmike]

with all that feeding, it's only a matter of time before you have a massive algae bloom.

I agree, without a skimmer and all that feeding, you're begging for trouble not doing any water changes. 4 months old is young in terms of tanks.

[bnumair]

this is the schedule i follow and seems to work for me. All products are used in quantity recommended by the manufacturer.

[lisafoster]

I have neglected at times for a few months and not done water changes as soon as I do them again my water looks cleaner my corals look happier. It is very simple to do the water changes 2x monthly. I have been using my tap water for almost 2 years with no algae . I am getting nervous reading these posts now I was not aware that over time that could cause my tank to crash. I could go the r/o way I just get nervous to change things around .

[sanababit]

Originally Posted by b2d2t

You have to do water changes its part of the deal, if you dont your tank will fail. Second Definitely buy a R/O system , it may cost a pretty penny but will be worth it.

No true, never say you are going to fail at something, i dont do water changes and have a tank going on now for 3 years, albeit i started like everyone else, doing my weekly/montly waterchanges i stopped to experiment and see any effects of not doing them, this experiment has been going for about 2 years now, i've done 1-2 water changes since but that is because i had a leak and lost water, but that is it, so i can say you can have a succesful tank without waterchanges, BTW, my not doing waterchanges doesn't mean i am lazy, it means that there are other methods of maintaining a tank, and i intend of finding them all

sana

[chimmike]

see, but you're skimming, which is one way of removing a lot of gunk from a tank, as well as running phosban/carbon.....he's doing neither!

[sanababit]

Originally Posted by chimmike

see, but you're skimming, which is one way of removing a lot of gunk from a tank, as well as running phosban/carbon.....he's doing neither!

My skimmer is between a piece of junk and a little better then a cyclone skimmer, lol, it skims but not that good, to tell you the truth i only use it to aereate the water and bring more Oxygen, that is it, i use an algae scrubber for filtration, maybe he can try that and foget about doing water changes

sana

[outy]

I said it once ill say it again.

There is no such thing as a tank with no water changes, ONLY the time before you HAVE to do one.

Its not fun when you HAVE to.

there has been one or two proffesional tanks on here that I have seen that have done 10 years without a water change, theres only so long you can go before the waters chemistry gets all out of whack. these I believe were Italian tanks larger then 1000 gallons with natural substrate AND then to top it off come to find out they were being fed with natural seawater so they really dont even count

[Floowid]

The longest I go without a water change is 2 weeks.

[InLimbo87]

The solution to pollution is dilution. :P

IMO water changes are the easiest and best tool to keeping your water quality where it needs to be for your tank to thrive.

[sruiz]

pitmindi : read my signature "dont forget your water change"

Let me answer your question:

Everyone here or 99 % of people with livestock do water changes, the other 1% just had their tank crash and have no livestock left.

lol

not to be rude but "I tried it once...and that was enough for me!" YOu might be satisfied with the way it looks and readings you are getting but I think you might be more sucesful if you do regular water changes.

Do yourself a favor and fill up 5 gallon bucket with your water then compare it to a 5 gallon bucket of fresh water.
Then you decide which one you will put back in your tank.. Green/ brown or Clear Crisp Water ? its not rocket science

[sslak]

Originally Posted by bnumair

every situation is different.
i have a 120 gal reef tank with 3 different tangs 5 clowns reefsafe wrasse and 10 peppermint shrimp 2 cleaners shrimp and 3 emerald crabs. i have about 20 different kinds of healthy corals and gorwing with 700+watts of MH lights and actanics T5's.
now to your question. i have a 15 gal sump with 25 lbs of live rock 50lbs of live sand few pads and sponges a small deep sand bed and a korilline sulpur denitrator. NOT RUNNING SKIMMER it adds a lot of micro bubbles for some reason so its been down for 2 months.
i do water changes once every 3-4 months. but i evaporate about 3-5 gals a day and i refil RO/DI water everyday mixed with trace elements.
i have had no problems with the tank even with the skimmer down and very few water changes. i have a very balanced monthly schedule that works for me. i will post it here in few.
Good luck

For how long? You joined RC in 2009, is that when the tank started? I don't consider that long term success, or proof that your 4 water changes per year is sustainable. Not only that, he's talking about NO water changes...none.

It's widely accepted that bigger systems offer better stability, you wouldn't get away with that if you had a 14g BioCube. As you said, it does depend on the system but water changes are inevitable.

[Jason S]

I do not water changes because I have to... I do them so I do not get to a point where I do HAVE to. It is simply the easiest part of preventative maintenance that I can do to ensure the health of the animals I am obligated to care for. I have been reef keeping for 13 years, and I have seen alot, and made many mistakes. A tank crash is not something I want to go through again, so I will do everything I can to ensure it does not happen.

Stating "everything looks great" is not a valid excuse to not perform them. Everything "looked great" in my tank before it crashed 9 years ago. In fact, everything appeared to be thriving. After the crash, I had a massive battle with Hair algae. This crash was purely due to my neglegent maintenance routine... or lack there of. I am not saying you WILL fail, but why on earth would you take that chance???

Besides, my corals thank me for it.

[hardiel]

There's way too much patronizing here for my particular taste. I don't understand all these opinions, without mentioning a single fact. Why don't we just read (or read again) what the Master said?.

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-10/rhf/index.php

In my experience. I have a 100G with 3 fishes: one Yellow Tang, One tomato and one mean SOB yellowtail, also one peppermint and 40 in snails, red and blue legs. And a few purple mushrooms. I love them all.

A couple of years ago I went through a nasty divorce, lots of personal problems, illness and whatnot. WC were after last in the list of things to do. The tank went months without WC. The skimmer was working. Feeding was sporadic (couple of times a week) and no dosing anything. Half of the lights (VHO) were gone.

I didn't lose a fish. The mushrooms were growing and everything was just getting by. Nobody died. No algae (no super powerful lights) blooms, no red slime, nothing.

I just restarted the tank because I couldn't get the nitrates to go down and I wanted to add more livestock and the tank look nicer.

When I recovered I emptied the tank. bleached the rocks, got rid of the sand. Bought new LR, a MH fixture and a GFO reactor. Fixed the skimmer and i'm dosing ca, alk and mg.

Coralline is thriving and everything looks good (maybe the lights) but without a WC in 2 years the tank was just OK.

What I don't like is people here with "your join date is XXXX" (you know RC is not the center of the universe), "I'll buy your tank in craiglist" and all these reactions to people that are only exposing here their experiences without WC.

Summary: if you are not helping, you are a PIA.

[Jason S]

Hardiel... I am not trying to be patronizing at all, but this is from the conclusion in the article you linked:

"Water changes are a good way to help control certain processes that serve to drive reef aquarium water away from its starting purity. Some things build up in certain situations (organics, certain metals, sodium, chloride, nitrate, phosphate, sulfate, etc.), and some things become depleted (calcium, magnesium, alkalinity, strontium, silica, etc.). Water changes can serve to help correct these imbalances, and in some cases may be the best way to deal with them. Water changes of 15-30% per month (whether carried out once a month, daily or continuously) have been shown in the graphs above to be useful in moderating the drift of these different seawater components from starting levels. For most reef aquaria, I recommend such changes as good aquarium husbandry. In general, the more the better, if carried out appropriately, and if the new salt water is of appropriate quality."

I will state it again... Water changes are the single most important, and easiest form of preventative maintenance. In some systems you can be fine for a very long time, but the rule of thumb is that you will not be fine forever without them. Stating that everything looks fine is not an arguement to not perform water changes.

You are correct... join date is not an argument to how much you know... I just found out about reefcentral in January of this year, but have been doing this for 13 years.

[sslak]

I didn't say RC should be the center of the universe. I said 1 year of reefkeeping does not prove long term sustainability of a particular husbandry method. I wasn't trying to patronize anyone.

You also just said you "restarted the tank" because the nitrates wouldn't go down, but follow it up by saying water changes aren't needed. I don't understand.

I am not saying skipping water changes will cause a horrific crash 100% of the time, but I do know that performing water changes is easy, and can only benefit your aquarium, so there is no valid reason not to do regular changes.

[Paul B]

According to the LFS where I bought the tank, this type of system does not need water changes, and in fact frequent water changes would be detrimental.

I wonder how he made that up.

I do very few water changes in my 100 gallon 39 year old reef but I don't use tap water, I have a large skimmer and I know what I am doing.

[sanababit]

Originally Posted by Paul B

I wonder how he made that up.

I do very few water changes in my 100 gallon 39 year old reef but I don't use tap water, I have a large skimmer and I know what I am doing.

that makes two of us, except for the 39 years, i am only 3 years in, lol

sana

[Saltyveins]

I do WC once a week, it keeps my cal, alk, mag, and nitrates all in check and make my corals and fish happy at the same time. To me doing a WC once a week is way easier than dosing everything else several times a week. Yes I am new to RC, but not to reef keeping.

[outy]

Originally Posted by Paul B

I wonder how he made that up.

I do very few water changes in my 100 gallon 39 year old reef but I don't use tap water, I have a large skimmer and I know what I am doing.

Hey Paul Hows it going, long time no see.

when ever I think my tank is getting old I always think about yours lol im now 1/3 of the way there lol

The more knowledge i "understand" about this hobby the longer I have gone without water changes, I think 4 years was enough this time and I know I wont be repeating this episode. I didnt do it on purpose and now I have the time to devote to my maintenance.

for those that are talking tank crashing thats absurd, you will just see a slow decline in your tanks health when it needs love, you will have mystery deaths of your less then hardy inhabitants though and algea and bacteria blooms yes your buddy cyano