no way in hell i'd run a nano without a skimmer, you couldnt pay me to do it!!!!!!
my motto: get a skimmer or get bent!!

i use a skimmer 24/7 on my 15 Gal sump due to me alway being on the road. if my business trip gets extended for some reason it buys me a few extra days without the need for a water change. Its just added insurance for me. I have my system mostley automated and i can be on the road almost 3 and a half weeks before problems begin to occure.

blind addition to the thread.

I have a 20gal Long nano without a skimmer.
I just feed very sparsely, I've yet to see my tank even register any ammonia.

Skimming is done by waves in nature crashing against the coast forming the same foam you get in a skimmer, if nature skims then it must be worth doing!

went real cheep on a counter current skimmer its not super but in my 15 it seams to work quite well i have a constant level side sump so the water level is easy and I have a micro compressor for air drive (i think this is why it works so well its a 1/2 gal compressor in the other room ) ran the tank without for the first 2 months but noticed a decent improvment in stability after installing will probably in time upgrade and will then look for sugestions

Where do I vote on the poll ?

Yes, I'm using Prizm Deluxe Skimmer. Althought it pulls out good and bad stuff in the water, I rather stick with it better than leaving bad stuff in the tank.

So,
Some people use them and some don't. What do we have then? No real clear answer to the question. In the rawest form this is what I gather.

The thing here is that we want to remove "waste" from the water.

Skimmer remove everything that it can from the water. It dosn't discriminate between good and bad stuff in the water.

Just doing water changes doesn't get all the bad out of water because you have to leave some of the water behind.

So neither work perfect. So, what it comes down to is:

Run a Skimmer and you'll have the extra cost of the skimmer and running it plus, you have to buy chems and trace elements to keep the water quality up.

Don't run the skimmer and you have to more water changes and put more out for salt and purified waters(if you buy or run a purifier).

I'm missing some stuff here and we can split hairs all day but, it seems you do what works for you. I guess....


-Brian

skimmers arent needed on lightly stocked tanks I dont believe. clams/SPS may be too demanding w/o one though. you need some method of keeping nitrates down either by macroalgae export, remote deep sand bed, coil denitrator or large water changes.

I personally did a lot of research before I spent my hard earned money on something I did not need. I found these little pad things that you put in your filter that take out the organic compounds, however they turn into little nitrate pads I would imagine. I decided to use a skimmer. I have a 10 gallon nano, I have a Red Sea Prism Deluxe. It's rated for use up to 90 gallon tanks, I turn mine down to half of the max flow, they always over rate the skimmers anyway. I haven't had any stunted growth or coral death yet and my skimmers been on there 6 months. I suppose that the corals are getting all the beneficial trace elements. I add a few supplements every other week or so, but not too much. I was told that as long as you were getting the dark green brown color out of your skimmer, that was a good indication you were taking only the crap out, if it is light in color, there was too much water being taken out, and that was doing nothing but increasing the amount of top off water you needed to add. I am always learning which is a good thing, so if I am wrong I expect to be told so, especially here on this forum

i guess my question is this: I have a NanoCube 24g, and there really isnt a good option in skimmer for me, would the fuge I have set up suffice for the nutrient export in order to keep SPS happy, or is SPS out of the question. Thanks,

-Mike

Yes, in tank with messy eaters. Posting questions to successful skimmerless, filterless keepers about how did they do that, mostly receiving no full replies. I guess, it's a best guarded secret in the hobby.

No skimmer for me! I prefer doing water changes every now and then and not having to dose my tank with trace elements and other items.

I had a BakPak pulling out watery skimmate so i finally ditched it and now have a super quiet tank. I am considering a fuge though.

.... nope, nota.

venturia 24 7
except when feeding

Izzue

No, not yet. I keep alot of filter-feeding organisms that I have allowed to proliferate on my LR, and i couldn't bear to part with any of the inhabitants of my little reef city. (Social Feather Dusters RULE!) I do 10-20% water changes weekly, run chemi-pure in the otherwise empty power filter, and weekly trim the cheato in my display (to each his own, but i think it looks cool framing the rockwork). Leaving out a skimmer can work for my zoo/star polyp garden, but if I ever branch out into SPS i'll at least run a low-end (read: cheap as hell) skimmer for half of the day. Currently, i rely on cryptic organisms for most of my mechanical/biological filtration. The assortment of sponges and tubeworms inhabiting the lowflow and darker areas never ceases to fascinate me. LOVE YOUR NON-PHOTOSYNTHETIC FRIENDS, TOO!

Ok this bring me to a question of something I have been trying to learn/read more about. I have heard of skimmer causing a supersaturation of oxygen in the water . Now I dont quite get this... in the natural reef, there ARE levels of supersaturated oxygen, even in lagoons and areas with little surface movement. the reason I am having such a hard time with this is that I have been told by a Marine Biologist who owns a LFS...whom I respect and listen to (has a coral named after him) that this supersaturation can actually harm, even kill your marine life. This really doesnt make any sense to me. I found an article from Eric Borneman talking about the levels of oxygen in our home reef, and the levels in the ocean. Needless to say our home reefs have much less of a concentration. So while I do NOT run a skimmer I would think that the addition of one could only help not harm. Can anyone shed some light on this for me? Can we supersaturate our home reefs with Oxygen... is there any negative effect to this? So go through your books or Google it for me, and help me figure out why a person who is so knowledgeable in this hobby, is giving this advice.

No one?

Bump, sorry but still looking for some light on thsi subject. ANYONE?

Prizm skimmer (soon to be replaced with Tunze DOC) in 20 gal pupfish
Tunze DOC in 10 gal reef

For the people that say a nano is to small for a skimmer. What size would you start skimming?

Deltec AP600 and ATI Bubble Master 200

I use a tunze nano, got it so I could keep SPS in my 5 gal. So far it's been working great for most inhabitants, but I do think my largest and oldest zoa colony might be going a little hungry lately. Not sure though, I'm going to give it a little more time. I may need to start adding plankton more often to replenish the tank.

i have the same question as well.

but yea..i love my skimmer. it keeps my water super clean and pulls out a lot of floating algaes.

I didnt when i started my tank end of Feb 08 but i just added one about 4 days ago and it seems to pull alot of yellow gunk out every day and helps make my water look clean and clear would probally recomend on gettting one along with regular H2O changes you should be set

no but my hubbie want's to add all kinds of things to my tank.

Nope.

I had one on the old tank because I didn't have a fuge or filter and was borrowing it (just a standard tank)

On my NC12 and my new BC29 I just run filter pad, chaeto and a return pump only in the back.

running a reef octopus protein skimmer. lame quality ftl

Remora FTW. I used to run assorted crappy skimmers on my tank, with assorted results.

1) Airstone skimmer, kinda worked, got similar skimmate to the prizm
2) Prizm Pro, kinda worked, got darkish tea colored stuff out when dialed in right
3) Skilter, used in an emergency, not worth the power bill on it.
4) Remora, works great and is pulling out black gunk daily.

Everything in my tank has looked better when I run a skimmer however (with the exception of the skilter) and everything is getting really happy and more colorful with the remora on there now, so I use one and enjoy it.

yes...

I use a Tunze 9002 on my 20H (in the left chamber of an Emperor 400 o_o)

I use a Tunze 9002 in my RSM 130,i hate that noisy f*ck*r....

Still waiting on my replacement for it.

I dont run a skimmer on my 15 gallon reef tank. I have a small bio-load and I do two 3 litre water changes a week. Would use one one a larger tank though.

I am running an AquaC Remora nano on my 12g Aquapod. It fits perfectly on the back with the input pump in the first chamber and the output flows to the second chamber.

It does a great job as I have a decent bio-load (1 fish and coral fed every other day.)

My experience with AquaC has been fantastic - they stand behind their products and don't make you go through hoops to get to solutions.

Todd

I had started a thread like this awhile ago...

But the bottom line is the brought the Remora C along with the surface skimmer box...and my water is crystal clear. I love it.

It helps keeps the surface clean and my cup fills up atleast every 2 days. I had to raise it a bit, because it's pulling out some tea colored stuff...when at first it was straight GREEN.

I guess my tank is pretty clean. I have 1 fish and no corals (which will change this week) so I guess it's running out of gunk to skim.

I was doing water changes every week and it's been 2-3 weeks and I haven't touched my water bucket!

It's great...I was in the same boat as a few of the people here...and said, "as long as I do water changes...it'll be fine". That sh1t gets old really fast, and with a skimmer it helps out.

I spent $240 after everythings, (Remora - $170, Surface Box - $40, Tax)

It's a well spend investment...I had the Seaclone and it was pure trash...

I do now, though I didn't for my first three years in the hobby.

I now run a Tunze 9002 in my 20H + 10g system. I must have a low bioload because after the break-in and initial scummy load, I don't get a whole lot of skimmate. It isn't an adjustment thing either. Maybe I just need to start adding some juicy foods.

Also, could we put the poll back in?

I do now...

yes and no and no (3 tanks)

I had nothing and wrote in this very thread 3 years ago when i started my first nano reef. Recently added a skimmer and I am regretting spending the $175 for it. Trying to return it now and should have stuck skimmer-less like i had from the beginning. There's no need ultimately to have one and believe that systems our small need the nutrients, unless you have some crazy fish / bioload.

what poll?

and yes I use a skimmer... fairly big but not big enough to suck the salt out of the water E.G. BM

I really don't think anyone but me cares what I run. Currently on my 20g I have an Aquafuge with modified skimmer which I think does great. My 75g has a modified Coralife 65 which I think also does great.

I use a Tunze Nano Doc Skimmer 9002 and love it.

No f'ing kidding. I have a Remora on my 20g that is 5 feet from my bed, and it's so frickin loud! But people say to run them all the time. I wanted to check out a Tunze, but I'm not sure if the investment is worth it, just in hopes for a little peace.

There are plenty of arguements for and against running them all the time... I only run my skimmmer for a couple of hours a day and it does just fine.

Yepp

Yes

EDIT: And seeing the black skimmate gunk it pulls out I can't imagine going on without one.

No skimmer for me but I'm working on a Algae turf scrubber so I can feed more and leave in the food while taking out nitrate/phosphate I personaly find it's the next step up in the hobby for anyone that is use to running skimmerless tank

Yes, I use a classic oceanic protein skimmer (from what I hear it's an 80's model design but it works great). lol

Without skimmer:
Food = happy fish = fish waste = dissolved particles = ammonia + bacteria + misc. organisms = ammonia = happy fish = good

With skimmer:
Food = happy fish = fish waste = dissolved particles + skimmer = dissolved particles = ammonia = happy fish = good

Skimmer fails:
Food = happy fish = fish waste = dissolved particles = ammonia = bacteria + misc. organisms = ...ammonia = sad fish = dead

Is my logic sound or am I missing something?