So, I am still pretty new at this hobby - about 14 months on my DT and 9 months on my 15g. However, I am really beginning to wonder if water changes are really a good thing / restrict growth?
I know a lot of you will probably have a lot of negative comments on this behavior, but please hear me out first.
I apologize that this is a somewhat long posting.
For the first 10 months I was very good on cleaning my tank - 20%+ WC a week with RO/DI water, blowing off the rocks, cleaning the bottom etc.
However, I never saw any significant coral growth. Xenia would grow a little bit, but my GPS, Kenya, Hammer, mushrooms, etc had not grown at all. I saw few zoa spawns, but even those were very few. However, everything was healthy and I had nursed a BTA from bleached to "normal" brown.
Then my wife had hand surgery, my son had swine flu, I had three herniated disks in my back and the tank was impossible to care for in the same fashion. I topped it off, did a 10-15 gallon water change (of 50 or so gallons) the entire period - it was not easy lugging the water round in buckets and then getting the buckets up and over my shoulder.
In this period, everything flourished - for the first time. Coraline covered all parts of the glass accept for a few places that had little light behind rocks. Coraline would almost completely cover the front glass if I let it grow three weeks.
The macro algae's were growing out of control. Even new species were appearing that must have been hidden in the rocks. To make things even more interesting, since my bottom of crushed coral, several of the species actually became rooted. When I pull them out, I have to shake manually extract the pieces to expose their rather larger (2"x2" or greater) root system.
Also, for the first time the GPS is growing out of control - covering more rocks, growing strait up and onto the back wall of the tank, over pieces of macro algae and even sponges and mushrooms. the Hammer corals have each split from one head to three heads, and the zoa colonies have all almost doubled on their plugs - yes I know they would probably grow faster if off the plugs, but they always dislodge from the LR I attached them to...).
The Medusa worms, and other good worms, are spreading .. perhaps too much and the algae is a little out of control, but I have never been able to get control of that problem so it is really not much worse than it was before the regular and even massive water changes. Obviously, my algae is not really related to export control considering my fish have only received feedings 2-3 feedings a week for months now.
To make things worse, my sump went offline about 1 1/2 months ago and I have only dumped my skimmer cup 2 times in 3 months. It's just useless and never worked well. Either it overflows or it does not skim at all. There are no adjustments and the pump feeding it is new(er).
Oh, and the water is crystal clear - clearer than it has ever been. I'm not sure if it has something to do with the tank being covered with coraline on three sides or not, but overall the tank just looks so much healthier. Even though it has not been maintained in what the hobby considers property.
What are others opinions? I know that most people have said that once you stop playing with the tank things begin growing properly, but I would not expect "playing" to mean maintained,but rather moving rocks, corals, etc.
I know a lot of you will probably have a lot of negative comments on this behavior, but please hear me out first.
I apologize that this is a somewhat long posting.
For the first 10 months I was very good on cleaning my tank - 20%+ WC a week with RO/DI water, blowing off the rocks, cleaning the bottom etc.
However, I never saw any significant coral growth. Xenia would grow a little bit, but my GPS, Kenya, Hammer, mushrooms, etc had not grown at all. I saw few zoa spawns, but even those were very few. However, everything was healthy and I had nursed a BTA from bleached to "normal" brown.
Then my wife had hand surgery, my son had swine flu, I had three herniated disks in my back and the tank was impossible to care for in the same fashion. I topped it off, did a 10-15 gallon water change (of 50 or so gallons) the entire period - it was not easy lugging the water round in buckets and then getting the buckets up and over my shoulder.
In this period, everything flourished - for the first time. Coraline covered all parts of the glass accept for a few places that had little light behind rocks. Coraline would almost completely cover the front glass if I let it grow three weeks.
The macro algae's were growing out of control. Even new species were appearing that must have been hidden in the rocks. To make things even more interesting, since my bottom of crushed coral, several of the species actually became rooted. When I pull them out, I have to shake manually extract the pieces to expose their rather larger (2"x2" or greater) root system.
Also, for the first time the GPS is growing out of control - covering more rocks, growing strait up and onto the back wall of the tank, over pieces of macro algae and even sponges and mushrooms. the Hammer corals have each split from one head to three heads, and the zoa colonies have all almost doubled on their plugs - yes I know they would probably grow faster if off the plugs, but they always dislodge from the LR I attached them to...).
The Medusa worms, and other good worms, are spreading .. perhaps too much and the algae is a little out of control, but I have never been able to get control of that problem so it is really not much worse than it was before the regular and even massive water changes. Obviously, my algae is not really related to export control considering my fish have only received feedings 2-3 feedings a week for months now.
To make things worse, my sump went offline about 1 1/2 months ago and I have only dumped my skimmer cup 2 times in 3 months. It's just useless and never worked well. Either it overflows or it does not skim at all. There are no adjustments and the pump feeding it is new(er).
Oh, and the water is crystal clear - clearer than it has ever been. I'm not sure if it has something to do with the tank being covered with coraline on three sides or not, but overall the tank just looks so much healthier. Even though it has not been maintained in what the hobby considers property.
What are others opinions? I know that most people have said that once you stop playing with the tank things begin growing properly, but I would not expect "playing" to mean maintained,but rather moving rocks, corals, etc.
