Dave W's 3000 gal plankton/reef tank

[dave w]

OK, so I just googled a few and see some commercially made ones.  They look a little small for what I need, and I can't find where they are also used as permanent food dispensers.  Has anyone else tried that?

[DaveS]

OK, so I just googled a few and see some commercially made ones.  They look a little small for what I need, and I can't find where they are also used as permanent food dispensers.  Has anyone else tried that?

I made one. It was my first attempt at acrylic work. I figured if I could do that well, I might move on to a sump or ATO container. It took me (I only spent) 20 minutes to realize it's tougher than it looks on YouTube. I had leaks at various seams. But for a fish trap, those leaks are not a problem so I highly recommend buying some scrap acrylic and doing that yourself.

[dave w]

Thanks DaveS.  I have put off acrylic work long enough and agree that it's time I started building things like this.  A fish trap would be a good way to begin because of your point that leaks won't matter.

 

Do people think that feeding fish from the fish trap is still a good idea?

[dave w]

I have a crazy idea and want some people's feedback on it.  Given that I have a lot of light in the south facing greenhouse, algae filtration screens is probably a good way to remove nutrients.  Most algae turf scrubber advocates say to scrub the screens every 14 days before they become self shading.

 

I'm thinking of putting a 24" dishwasher in a spot under the tank and making pvc racks for ATS screens, and each rack is sized to fit into the dishwasher. I'd guess that each rack will hold 20-25 of those yarn screens from Walmart.  Maybe two sizes of ATS racks, a 6-7" shallow one for the top rack of the dishwasher and a deeper rack of 12" for the bottom.  Then I put 14 racks of each size in the tank.  Every day I harvest two racks and wash them (probably without detergent) in cold water.  I should probably remove all the dishwasher drain screens to prevent clogging.  Probably the heating element too.

 

It might be a time saver over hand scrubbing the algae.  But hand scrubbing leaves a base residue of filamentous algae that quickly sprouts again, machine washing may remove the base residue.   Then again, machine washing may not be strong enough to remove the algae and I have to do the smelly hand work anyway.

 

Any thoughts?

[Anemone]

Neat idea. Maybe a pilot test would be a good start. You could try different cycles, hopefully you'll find the right balance somewhere between China and pots and pans.

I think those filter screens are also to protect the pump, and stop the little arm holes that jet out the water from getting clogged. You might have to leave the screens in place.

[Origami]

How much time would you really save, Dave, since you'll have to make two full trips to clean two screens? One to unload and wash, and the other to retrieve and reload in the tank? Plus, do you really want the screens that clean? Is it desirable to lleave a few threads of algae to jumpstart new growth? If your screens are the same size, can you build some sort of tool to manually harvest both sides at once in a couple of swipes?

[AlanM]

Yeah, mine peels right off the plastic canvas that I use to grow algae using an old and super rusty drywall scraper.  It doesn't get it totally clean, but I think it's better that it's not pristine.  It takes 1 minute to do.

[dave w]

Alan and Tom, you're probably both right.  Most algae people recommend that you leave a base after scraping off the algae which grows back quickly.  I just remember algae cleaning as a smelly gunky mess and because I will have a lot to do each day I'd like to see if it can be automated.  

 

The screens would be the same size, so the tool you recommend could just be a couple of stiff brushes cleaning both sides at once.  

 

I just that I know myself too well.  Smelly messes don't get done every day, and automated ones probably do.  It's a lot easier to lift a rack of screens out and put it in the dishwasher than individually clean 20 or 40.  

 

Anemone, I'd do a pilot test with our house dishwasher but my wife would not speak to me for a week.  So that's out.

[L8 2 RISE]

I agree that itm's probably not a time saver. What would be, and where I thought you were going, would be to find a way to rig up a dry area for lights in the dishwasher, or use some of the new waterproof LED strips that are coming out, and leave all the algae trays in the dishwasher permanently. Drill two holes and run pipes through the wall into the trays. Test it to see how often and for how long you have to run to get the algae off, then program or put it on a timer to do that. You would only have to open the door to check on it every once in a while and no mess.

 

Obviously that's ideal, not sure how feasible it would be, but it would be pretty cool!

[dave w]

L8 2 RISE,

 

I'd love to get underwater lights and use them for algae filtration.  PaulB's LED fixture got me thinking in that direction.  But for a first step, I think I'll try a traditional algae filter.  Let's see how much those new waterproof LED strips cost before I make that kind of jump.  

Edited March 8, 2016 by dave w

[dave w]

Has anyone ever used fine nets to stop/prevent ich?  I read that the planktonic ciliate form of ich is about 50 microns in size.  If so, could I pump the tank water through a 20 micron net and remove the swimming stage of the parasite?  A fine screen would clog quickly, but that is the point.  Its primary use would be to remove detritus.

[Origami]

Has anyone ever used fine nets to stop/prevent ich? I read that the planktonic ciliate form of ich is about 50 microns in size. If so, could I pump the tank water through a 20 micron net and remove the swimming stage of the parasite? A fine screen would clog quickly, but that is the point. Its primary use would be to remove detritus.

The guy from SeaSave used to write about this approach. Not many thought much of him. They thought that he came out of left field on many topics. However, I can't say one way or another. There is some appealing logic to it, though.

 

Sent from my LG-V510 using Tapatalk

[dave w]

Ideas from left field, low opinion from his peers.  I wonder why I haven't heard about him before?  He sounds like my kind of guy! 

[Anemone]

The fine mesh idea seems like it would work about as well as a UV sterilizer. You'd need to filter / sterilize the water faster than any ich spores could find a fish host. Tricky if you've got any caves, tunnels, nooks, or other rock work. Might slow down the spread but seems iffy for complete eradication.

[Origami]

Ideas from left field, low opinion from his peers. I wonder why I haven't heard about him before? He sounds like my kind of guy!

It was quite a few years ago that I remember hearing about him. He had a website up that illustrated some Day ideas such as using a set of plastic drawers as a layered filtration system, and using 5 gallon water bottles as QT systems. I think one of the QT systems implemented a fine pore filter aimed at mechanically trapping trophonts. Again, I have no idea of of this idea works, just that it was out there. His website may still be up. Look up SeaSave. I think that they were in Glen Burnie or someplace nearby.

 

Sent from my LG-V510 using Tapatalk

[Coral Hind]

It's been way too long without an update. I want pictures too.

[GraffitiSpotCorals]

Yea what's going on with this project?

[dave w]

Coral Hind and Piper27 (and my other WAMAS friends),

 

Sorry it's been so long since I checked in.  Around January a couple of friends who are commercial beekeepers convinced me to become one.  I wanted to continue with fish breeding at the same time as beekeeping, but found that I am best when I be single minded with one business, not two.  And beekeeping took up all my time for the past 6 months, along with my regular job and being a dad.

 

I hope to have time to get back to fish breeding sometime soon, but I really don't know when that will happen.  I'm only up to 200 beehives and you need to get at least 500 to be a serious beekeeper.  That could be a few years.  Also, I was getting tired of re-inventing the wheel so many times.  My advice to anyone building a large system is to be prepared to build many things from scratch because the tank size precludes many "off the shelf" solutions.  It was exhausting.  Winter heating and summer cooling of a greenhouse are still problems that I haven't fully solved yet, and there's not much stability in a system without good water temps.  My geothermal cooling isn't hooked up and my solar hot water collector isn't past the framing stage.  Just too many other things to do.

 

Thanks to all for your encouragement and I hope to reciprocate with some fish news in the next year or so.  But for a while, the tank continues to grow lots of nice algae and nothing else.  I hope to get back in the hobby again soon.

Edited July 30, 2017 by dave w

[GraffitiSpotCorals]

Well that's a sad update, all that time on research, work, money and thinking put into this and your taking a break when your this close :(

What are the temperature swings in the summer and in the winter? What about on the very hot and very cold days, what's the swing then? I think tanks can take a much larger swing than most people think as long as the swing is constant day to day during the summer and then the winter.

It would be nice to see a picture of what it's like now.