I wrote:
This is why we care about demonstrated results, not just your unusual
theories.

"bo0ger1" .@. wrote on Sat, 02 Dec 2006:
Are you assuming I am alone with my findings? I am the only one that has
realized WC are not necessary? Poor assumption.

It would be far more interesting to hear about a long-time reefkeeper, who
has successfully kept a tank growing stony corals for multiple years, all the
while using only a skimmer and live rock/sand, but no water changes and no
refugium or mangroves. Only dosing Kent's Essential Elements.

After all, that is your claim, isn't it? That one can successfully grow a
coral garden of stony (e.g. acropora) corals without water changes? With no
other special maintenance, merely stop doing the water changes?

Yet, you seem to be the only one on this group who supports that strategy.
But you don't have even one multi-year stony coral reef tank which has been
maintained in this way.

This is why your claims are not credible.

What you never acknowledge is the possibility that biochemistry may be
going on that you are NOT aware of.

This was my point from the beginning. That the majority of you do not know
what is going on at the biological level.

Perhaps I emphasized the wrong word. Biochemistry may be going on that
YOU are not aware of.

You have never admitted that your own knowledge may be incomplete. (And water
changes are one approach to dealing with incomplete knowledge of biochemistry,
which we all -- even you -- must suffer from.)

(And you can't possibly know 100% of the biochemical needs of 100% of reef
organisms.)

Your correct. How would knowing this or not knowing this make any
difference for a WC or NWC tank. Is the water in your aquarium in better
shape than mine?

Yes, probably my water is better.

Especially for ionic or organic compounds that you aren't currently testing
for, but yet which are bioactive.

Are any of you people actually reading my responses? Which of my water
parameters that I have given will not support coral life? Don't give me
that coral toxin crap either, I have a skimmer.

What proof do you have that a skimmer is a sufficient solution to the topic
of coral toxins? Where is your SCIENCE, mister science boy?

Do you use a charcoal or UV filter? Lots of reefkeepers swear by them as well.
What function do you think they serve, if any, compared to just a skimmer and
live rock/sand?

Also: You realize, I hope, that your skimmer slowly removes "good" things
(like salt) from your water volume, along with "bad" proteins. What is your
strategy for replacing the lost salt? (Salt also decreases due to splashing,
"salt creep", etc.) I'm sure you have evaporation too, and must add fresh
water regularly. How do you keep your level of salinity constant, using only
freshwater and Essential Elements?

Do you measure your calcium levels? Calcium in the water volume gets used up
by corals (and some other marine organisms). How do you keep your level of
calcium sufficiently high?

Your answers to all these questions betray a naive, arrogant, chem major in
college with no practical experience at keeping a reef tank. You think that
what you read in a book answers all questions that need to be answered, without
any need for the complexity of the real world.

Contradict with the "practices of reef keepers". You really think I am
alone here don't you? Very delusional aren't you?

Yes, I do think you're alone.

Would you like to point to specific individuals, either on this newsgroup or
else published marine scientists, that agree with you?

Who do you have in mind that recommends growing stony corals without water
changes? (Or macroflora.)

All I see is you. Someone with a lot of opinions, but no experience.

-- Don
__________________________________________________ _____________________________
Don Geddis http://reef.geddis.org/
If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We
might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason.
-- Deep Thoughts, by Jack Handey [1999]