refigium and wet dry filter?

Question

i currently have a wet dry running on my 40 gal reef tank and have good success. i wanted to add a refigium and my question is weather or not it would be too much to run both. i'm looking to get a mandrin and need more pods for their survival.

thank you for the responces. ok, my wet dry is next to my tank kind of out of sight. the fuig will be on a stand on the other side of the tank and will be another display. i have a 40 colum tank 18" x 20" base and 30'' tall. needless to say, i have no room in my stand for anything. i started with a canister filter but that wasn't doing much for me and having to clean it every 2 or 3 days was too much so i did away with it. what i was thinking, was to get a double outlet overflow with 1 to the fuig and 1 to the w/d. other idea was to get another smaller overflow to go to the fuig and set it so it was at a higer level so that i could put a smaller pump in the fuig to create less flow through it. i also did not want to use the w/d after the fuig and loose pods through the filter pad. would kind of defeat the purpose. the fuig is a homemade 10 gallon that i've cut plexi glass and made 3 baffels which will also help to keep water from overflowing in case of a power outage.

only reason the fuig is not set up yet is because i want it to be perfect with no problems since i'm at work 10 hours a day. i also had the idea to "T" into the hose going to the w/d with a shut off valve to control flow to the fuig, but don't feel this is a reasonable method either. all this because i was too much of a rush to buy a w/d. could of spent an extra $100 to get one that had a fuig built into it if i would of known they exsisted.

Answer 1

that would depend on how large your wet dry filter is and how large your refigium is you wanted. If your filter can handle a 50, go for a 10 refigium. there should be no problem.

Answer 2

Adding the refugium for pods for a mandarin would be a good idea - these fish should have live food, and don't always fare well on the bottled pods (Tropical Fish Hobbyist just did an article on feeding mandarins in nano reef tanks in their Feb. 2007 issue where some fish didn't eat them at all, one ate three bottles worth in a few days and was losing weight - you might want to see if you can find a copy of the issue).

Since the pods rely on very small items for food, you might find them easier to raise in a refugium planted with macroalgaes, and the macroalgaes will use the tank nutrients for growth. Unless you have a problem with high nutrients in your tank, running both types of filters might be too much. At any rate, I'd have the refugium be the first system in the filtration, then have the water flow from it to the wet/dry so the algae and pods get first crack at the nutrients and detritus - if they're starved by fewer nutrients in the water, you'll get less pod reproduction.

There's also the matter of having the room for both systems, especially if you plan to have them both beneath your tank (a good place for a wet/dry, because they aren't as attractive, but a refugium can sit beside or above the main tank and with interesting macroalgaes, even be something to look at itself.

Answer 3

Well, first off understand what a refugium is. It is a type of biological fitration system where you use organic things to remove organics from the water for cleaner water. Some people use Macro Algae, some use corals like Xenia, some use Mangrove plants, etc...personally, I always added a deep sand bed, then small chunks of live rock, then covered it with Macro Algae. Worked great. You don't have to worry about adding the extra water volume for your filter because it is a type of filtration system. You can add it and you'll be fine. You'll probably even be glad you did because it will keep your water a lot cleaner. As for pods.....ya, a fuge will help GREATLY. My system drained into a sump that had the skimmer on it, then the skimmer dumped back into my fuge adn the both connected to one line with the return pump. Sumps and Wet Drys usually have faster water turn over and fuges you want slower water turn over to allow the organic what ever time to remove the organics from the water. Personally, on my next tank I'm going with one large fuge and skipping the sump. I'm going to stick a few baffels in the fuge for oxygenization (sp); but will run it 95% as a fuge. Hope that helps!

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