Reducing water changes by adding supplements

[Knowleman]

Can you reduce the frequency and percentage of water changes through
the clever use of supplements? If so, are there any general guidelines?
What supplements are recommended for a mixed tank (fish, corels,
shrimps, anemone, etc)? If you get the supplementation right, is it
possible to do away with water changes altogether?

[[email protected]]

Nice idea, but unfortunately no. You can add supplements to correct those
things that decline with time and consumption (trace elements, calcium etc)
but you can't realistically add supplements to correct things that are
accumulating (although some additive manufacturers make some wild claims!).

Doing water changes dilutes organic wastes, helps reduce nitrates,
phosphates etc. and automatically replenishes missing or used elements.

The addition of additives is also difficult to get right because there's a
lot of stuff that you can't realistically measure (trace elements for
instance) and therefore dosing is a bit hit and miss. It is very easy to
screw up your water chemistry!

Overall, it is easier and safer to carry out small but regular water
changes. The key is to make the water change routine as painless as
possible. I have built a mini water processing plant in the garage with
RO/DI system and storage tanks which are permanently connected to the sumps
of my systems, by opening a couple of valves and flicking a few switches I
can carry out a basic water change in about 10 minutes. After years of
carting buckets of water around it is the nearest thing to utopia I've
found!

Mark

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[unclenorm]

Hi, the simple answer is yes if the tank is properly set up using only
live rock and a deep sand bed plus a protein skimmer for filtration,
and a good flow system. But I'm afraid in your case the answer would
be no as your tank is over stocked, for a 50g tank you should not have
more than 10'' of fish (full grown size).
I have systems that have never had a water change in 5 or 6
years mind you they range from 90g up to 300g.
regards,
unclenorm.

[bergzy]

you will hear a lot of people say you should change water on a regular
basis and others swear by never doing water changes.

well, i will say that both are correct. sad and ironic isnt it?

why are both correct? because they are the masters of their own domain
and can do whatever to their ecosystem.

from a guy who has kept freshwater fishes for over 30 years (under 40
years old) and reef aquaria off and on for 15 years. i will say that
water changes for me prove to be a much easier method to maintain a
reef aquaria.

fish only salt water aquariums are somewhat easier to manage with less
water changes due to their ability to tolerate more unfavorable
conditions.

hence, the keywords are 'tolerate' and 'unfavorable'.

like any other captive critter's well-being we are responsible for...i
feel it is our duty to tend the optimal condition in a closed
environment...otherwise, we should leave them where they are.

i have tried the 'completely closed self-sustaining system' idealology
before and it works...in the short run...whatever the definition of
short run may be. over time, accumulation of certain unremovable and
unmeasurable compounds wreak havoc on your reef inhabitants (coral) and
other essential macro and trace elements levels are way out of wack.

again, you 'can' do no water changes...it is up to you. supplements,
in my experience, are pretty close to useless, expensive and almost
always dangerous to use no matter how experienced one is. over
time...the elemental levels, measurable or not, are not going to be
'optimal' for your inhabitants.

i am lazy...so i rather spend 15 minutes, if that, on my 300g system,
without getting my hands wet due to proper water change equipment set
up, to do a water change. i rarely/never test my water parameters
because i know that a good regular water change schedule puts
everything in balance. it is much, much, much harder and takes A LOT
of time to test the water of what parameters are off to try and balance
everything with additives.

but what do i know...i am learning something new every day!

hope this helps...

[Knowleman]

I don't know ... who lets amateurs like this into the forum - only 30
years fishkeeping experience :-)

Thanks for a really interesting post.

[Knowleman]

Hi UncleNorm - Interesting comment on over-stocking. With all the
conflicting advice, we have taken the approach of adding stock very
gradually, monitoring water quality as we go. Most of the fish now are
nearing their full size (according to the book) and so far, we haven't
had a hint of elevated levels of undesirables.

I wonder if the length the "inches" thing is always appropriate as the
inch/mass ratio is different for smaller species versus large ones - to
take an extreme example, an inch length of big fat grouper probably
represents over 10 times the biomass of an inch length of slender
banana wrasse, dot-dash blenny, scooter bleny, etc.

We have deliberately kept to fish that are relatively small as a
strategy.

Looking at it on an empiracle basis though, how do you tell if a tank
is overstocked in practice?