"bo0ger1" .@. wrote in
m:



wrote in message
ups.com...
Well, I don't know who Booger is but here's some pictures of my tank
...

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/alanfromw...ank/index.html

Last water change was about a year ago, I add Kent's "essential
elements" once a week but I've no idea if it makes any difference.

Ditto! I do the same thing, only I add Kent Marine essential elements
1once a month or so. No water changes in 2-years! Just a little
algae I need to remedy.

These people here (for the most part) are brain washed into thinking
you need to water changes all the time.


Mmm. You (deliberately, at this point?) mis-characterize water changes,
and the people who make use of them. Derisive comments directed at their
proponents does not hold nearly as much weight as demonstrated proof of
their being unnecessary. Talk is cheap, (and insults are free), especially
on the Internet. In that respect, blackhole555 has contributed an order of
magnitude more content with one post, than you have in the last three weeks
at r.a.m.reefs. You go on about water changes being a grand conspiracy of
unneeded work for the laboring aquarium proletariat, but have yet to offer
a shred of evidence that it works for you, other than your dubious word.

Water changes are a health/preventative measure for a closed aquatic
system, with a conscious reason for their use, not some mindless habit.

Analogy; People can live to be sixty or older on an exclusive McDonald's
diet. Some people can even thrive on it, usually if they're picky about
what they choose off of the menu. But for most of us, a healthy diet and
regular exercise are a much surer road to longevity. Water changes are the
equivalent of a person having a light workout 3 times per week, i.e. a
simple, proven, reliable method for improving one's health.

Application of analogy; Sure, just about everyone here has _already_
recognized that you can maintain a simple FOWLR tank without water changes,
and fairly easily so (keep the fish mass down vs. tank size, amount of
liverock and number of supporting detrivores, pick species which don't
produce an abundance of secreted toxins, and avoid messy eaters).
There are also instances of reefkeepers who can strike a balanced system
without water changes (often with either a technologically elaborate setup,
a means of nutrient export, or both), but that doesn't detract from the
value of water changes for those for whom it works, either. There are
several ways to live a healthy lifestyle...


To blackhole555, that's a beautiful tank! How big is it, and the sump?
A sump/refugium type-setup for nutrient export seems to be a recurring
theme to those reef tanks I've seen which report little/no water changes.
Do you think you would you be as confident of not changing your water, if
you were lacking that aspect of your setup? ...Do I see a Vecton UV
sterilizer in that cabinet, too?

Regards,
DaveZ
Atom Weaver