Augh excuses excuses !
Why don't you just drill a hole in the bottom of the tank and run a pipe
down though
you cabinets into you basement into a 50 gallon refugium w/skimmer and then
pump it back up...
hehehe ; )

"Cindy" wrote in message
. com...
TheRock wrote:
Why no protein skimmer ?

Because it's an 8-gal. hex sitting on my kitchen counter, viewable from
all sides. At the time I set it up I couldn't even find a skimmer small
enough that had a decent review, but anyway there's nowhere to put one
that doesn't look terrible. So I do regular water changes instead.