Your thoughts on plumbing two systems together

[Mr Cob]

Just curious of some of the thoughts out there.

So...we have an 85g that will soon become an SPS only tank (because it's shallow) and a 220g that will become LPS and softie only tank because it's large and has lots of shadow lit areas that should be great for chalices and healing frags.

The idea is to dump both tanks into one large sump that will be under the 220g. I'm leaning more towards this idea because at the moment the 85g runs hot after 6 hours of continuous light and I know the 220 (under lit with only 2 x 250w mh) will act as a big chiller.

Well, after talking with Ace last week he mentioned it would be nice to export more nutrients from the SPS tank and put less concern on this with the 220g which has had me thinking ever since so just thought I would post up and get some more input.

Pros of plumbing them together: less maintenance, less equipment, easier to control water temp

Cons of plumbing them together: cannot control parameters specific for each type of coral, if something goes bad/wrong more stock is affected

I was also thinking...there are tons of successful mixed reefs out there and this would essentially be the same thing if they are plumbed together.

[Kristy]

Don't you keep them both very low nutrient anyhow by having so few fish? It seems like that is sort of taken care of in your systems, as opposed to most other reef setups where it's a challenge. And you also have control of the difference in flow between the two tanks, which would assist with nutrient export somewhat.

Biggest con I see is the one you mentioned about something going wrong impacting more/all of your livestock.

[Mr Cob]

good point Kristy...very few fish and lots of water changes...every time I bag a coral.

with that said it seems the only real con is the chance of something going wrong which is also limited because we don't dose anything aside from fiji gold and you can't really overdose that stuff, we dip everything and don't allow new rock into the systems even if it's part of a larger colony...it gets fragged.

[Texreefer]

Alelopathy ? not sure how it is spelled. if the larger tank is mostly LPS and Softie and your using it for healing frags i would be a little concerned with chemical warfare... i'm sure using plenty of carbon filtration would help. probably not that big of a concern but something to think about.

[Mr Cob]

yes, that's a concern, even in the current tanks as is...my only solution has been to keep distance between the mother colonies and run carbon after fragging. Before putting the colonies/frags back into the system I dip them in Brightwell Aquatics MediCoral to help in healing and I temp acclimate them back into the display to help keep them from being so ticked off.

Any other ways of combating this? So far it hasn't been a real problem.

[Texreefer]

in a normal system that is all you need to overcome those potential problems.. however, sounds like your sytem will be almost 3/4 LPS/ softies and only 1/4 SPS. there is a lot more potential in a system like that... you could build a 2" or 3" in line GAC filter that feeds the sps tank but i'm not familiar with your setup... i'm leaning towards it not being a problem with regular maintenance and carbon...

[Mr Cob]

that sounds about right Mike, thanks for the suggestions. Appreciate it.

[Europhyllia]

So where are the corals before they go into that system. Dipping new arrivals won't affect the eggs so there still is a potential for an outbreak of something it's been dipped for - unless you have a separate quarantine system that will hold the new arrivals until any bug hatches and can be killed with a dip

[Mr Cob]

So where are the corals before they go into that system. Dipping new arrivals won't affect the eggs so there still is a potential for an outbreak of something it's been dipped for - unless you have a separate quarantine system that will hold the new arrivals until any bug hatches and can be killed with a dip

very aware of this but unfortunately we can't be 100% sure to never get pests with our current process of dipping but we do go above and beyond in trying our best to limit the amount of pests that could potentially enter our systems by removing rock from the corals which may contain eggs or larger pests. To answser your question...no, we don't quarantine corals for a week in a separate holding tank and dip daily for a week. Anyone aware of anyone that does do this? That would be great to have the means to do this.

So...that's another reason to have the tanks plumbed separately.

At some point I hope that we can be completely sustained through farming all of our corals, a lot less risk when nothing is coming in...but that's a long way out and definitely not going to happen any time soon with the current space we have.

[allan]

310 gallons not considering the sump which I'm assuming is another hundred... That's a lot of volume. Doesn't seem like a lot could happen quickly.

Until I started running bio pellets I didn't have a problem running a mixed reef. But then again I don't have those rare pieces that you deal with.

[Mr Cob]

hey Allan...any drawbacks to your multiple systems plumbed together?

yes, the new sump will be about 100g

I'm still leaning towards plumbing these two systems together to simplify things...

only real con at this point in my opinion:

1) if something goes bad all corals could be affected and at the moment the only real main concern is...pest eggs not caught in the dip/acclimation process of new corals

[allan]

When I got that red bug it did get to both systems. Of course the cure did as well.

I think outside what youre asking here is the business risk. How much does two systems add to your overhead vice that of the cost should you, worse case possibility, tank your investment in livestock. Your largest investment is in hardware (assuming here) so you'd have to figure out what the bottom line amount and contrast that to your increased cost in maintaining to systems.

I would imagine that if you were really infected you wouldn't be throwing stuff out and the treatment would be wholistic anyway.

Would you be picking your sps and softies from the same source? If so do they separate their livestock? Doesn't do you any good to separate I they don't.

I guess the bottom line for me is that I really enjoy the single system over that when we were running two systems. Too much work and your redundancy isn't redundant anymore unless you pony up that many more bucks.

Ping would be a good guy to ask as he had all seven seas represented in his office, tied to one system.

[Mr Cob]

thx Allan.

Coral comes from several sources. Up to 4. I think I'm comfortable with the risk of plumbing these two tanks together. Between myself, Jack and Harish we have other systems to source if ever needed, plus we don't go out of business if we lose all coral as we have a drygoods side of the business as well (wet acrylic).

[Mr Cob]

I also forgot to mention we have mother colonies in other systems as well.

[allan]

Rob, if you like you can take a look at mine. Learn from my mistakes if you will.

I made plenty. :)

Jack has seen it, I've since then hard piped the once-frag tank into the sump.

[Mr Cob]

man I'd like that...long overdue bro.

I'll send you a PM and we'll see when's a good time.

[kkiel02]

If you were trying to grow out your corals for fragging I would seperate them but if this is the "sale side", if that makes sense, I would just plumb them together as well. The reason I say this, as you already know, LPS and softies thrive in dirtier water than SPS. So in the long run you could frag more LPS and Softies from less prestine water than your SPS tank. But if you are just selling these items versus growing them out I dont think it would really be worth trying to keep two systems up and running.

Hope that made sense. lol