annual maintenance - 50% water change & other considerations

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psteeleb

Premium Member
any of you out there do a massive water change once a year?

It's something I'm seriously considering for several reasons, but primarily to help offset an established tank crash that happens to some people after about 3 years. I also want to consider dealing with my sand bed, maybe by replacing some and adding some more seed stock from some other members. please offer your suggestions.

Another reason I'm planning on this is due to some strange events over the past months that I suspect are due to build up or depletion of trace elements.

In doing a major water change, I'm serously thinking of doing two 30% changes over a week (net 51%) versus one large 50% one. Primarily due to capacity but also for acclimation.

what are your thoughts? and are there any other things you would do to the system on an annual basis?

For example, I plan to do an interceptor treatment prior to the massive water change, with this in mind are there other treatments, cleanings etc that could be considered. Like maybe shaking up live rock to break free detrius or scrubbing, or water blasting, stirring up the sand bed surface etc.
 
I have done massive water changes more than once a year several times with no problems. I have LR that is over 18 years old and I also go in once a year and remove rock and take it through 3 different buckets to clean excess detrius. I will then change bucket once the last bucket becomes somewhat dirty. This requires quite a bit of water to do as well. I see no problem at all in doing 30% changes twice in one month. I do 30% changes regularly anyway..I have been fortunate in not having to treat tank so not sure what everyone would recommend on that..HTH
 
I like the concept of rinsing the live rock like that. Do you have a sand bed, or do you avoid rinsing the rock on the bottom of the tank? One of my biggest long term concerns is the sand bed and not disturbing it to much, but I am looking for feedback on posibly vacuuming out or just stiring up the top most 1/4 inch or so.
 
I do have a DSB and have taken out all of the LR but I do not disturb the DSB other than doing a massive water change once all the rock is out. When you take all the rock out you will have a good bit of detrius that is stirred around so I just change as much water as possible without disturbing the bed...Some may be able to chime in and say it is OK to vacumn top of bed but I have been scared too as I feel I get enough detrius out with rock wash and massive water change...
 
I do not understand how you can pull out all your live rock every 18 months. The corals are grown over it and it would never fit back in the same way. Are you talking about a fish only tank?
But as far as the water changes. I try to do about 50-55 gallons a month on a 220. If I do it every other month, I have done 50-55 gallons every two -three days, 3 in a row with no problems.
I am not sure about the total water volume being changed though. As I do not shut the tank down, I pump in the new water into the sump, while I am siphoning water out of the tank.
I think those tank crashes that can happen after several years can happen for a variety of reasons. One could be the reason you kind of allude to, a build up of dissolved organics building up in the tank. Another could be missing links in the whole cycle or process of a healthy tank that can die off over time or do not reproduce well in a tank environment.
I replace about twenty pounds of live rock in my refugium every year or so with fresh uncured live rock.
 
@Rick wrote:
...... Another could be missing links in the whole cycle or process of a healthy tank that can die off over time or do not reproduce well in a tank environment. I replace about twenty pounds of live rock in my refugium every year or so with fresh uncured live rock. said:
I like this idea, especially uncured to maximize the replacement of things that don't reproduce well or die off over time. I suspect the 20# is not enough a bio load on the existing system, so no big deal, and you maximize the life diverisity. I would think you would want to mail order directly from a supplier to avoid middle men storage vats etc. Please elaborate.
Click to expand...
 
I have bought it online and locally. You can ask local stores when they are getting live rock in and pick it up the day it arrives right out of the box. And yes 20 lbs of uncured live rock means very little to my system. You want fresh rock with all the diversity on it you can get.
 
I've changed 55g a week on my system that holds 330g of water and had no ill effects. I'd prefer to just do one 55g water change per month. You might check out this article for 1g a day versus a 50% water change:

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

And here's the article that was just released that is way less scientific. :wink:
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2007-11/nftt/index.php

I don't bother my DSB, but I do add a couple of new bags of sand annually to the tank. I also don't expose my LR to air if I can avoid it.
 
Rick,
Let me elaborate a little more on my statement of taking all LR out of tank to clean. I have done this several times in the past few years but it was always due to moving the tank. I have done it recently since I upgraded to a larger tank as well and the corals all found a nice new spot. I did not clean the LR that the SPS are attached to as they are much to fragile as you all know but I do have a few hundred pounds of LR that needed to be cleaned up. When I was over at Tri's house to borrow his suction cups he also spoke about adding 20 or so pounds of uncured LR to his tank and had no ill effects but of course his setup is 560 gallons plus around 200 gallons of sump...
 
Marc - I read your article on water changes a day or so ago - you did a good job on the write up. On the sand bed; when your adding did you take some out?

As for the rock, I am really after the detritus, I may just take a few and shake them up in the tank during the water changes. I think I’ll also hook up some ¾” tubing to my main pump and blow in and around the rock work to stir things up some. I was thinking about doing the bucket thing but after your input I’m leaning toward minimizing that. If I do take some rock out it will be for drilling some more holes in them for pegs. I may take some zoa rocks out and iodine dip them, jus to perk them up a little.

I’m still leaning toward two 30% water changes, maybe a week apart.

So anyone have any suggestions on the sand bed? I’m still thinking I want to just scrape the top ¼” or so to suspend some detritus and freshen it up a little
 
I echo Rick, I mean the water is not where the nasty is so doing a massive water change once a year really won't get you anywhere.

I have also started this yearly "switch" of live rock since Rick told me a couple years ago. It makes total sense. i put about 20-30 lbs of new and swap out some of my old. The LFSs are always willing to make that swap and like he says just show up on the day they get it and they'll do the swap.
 
It should be part of our regular routine to blow off the liverock with a turkey baster or small powerhead to release trapped detritus, getting it back into suspension so the skimmer can extract it (or a filter sock). Weekly would be ideal, but at least monthly.

I don't add more sand to increase the height. I'm adding it to replace what has been lost. It seems to be evaporating, for lack of a better term.
 
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