charcoal in filter yes/no?

[wwc]

Hello world,

 

 

I have been running a 20 gallon reef tank for several months. I generally have a good system going -

 

about 25 lbs of live rock,

 

non animal thingies - 4 patches of zooanthids, 4 patches of mushrooms, a finger leather, a candycane (small), and a torch that is growing quite well. Ohh! and some bright orange sun polyps that I bought before I knew what they were and the LFS didn't tell how care intensive they are.....

 

animal type thingies - tomato clown, a royal gramma, 1 peppermint shrimp, 4-7 snails, and somewhere between 6 and 10 hermit crabs.....

 

On the mechanical side I am running 2 power heads and 1 baby power head for water movement and have a corallife 130 watt light on timers.....

 

I change 20% water weekly or maybe 10% every 3 days and sometimes dose with iodine, buffered calcium and mineral supplements lightly.

 

With all that general description said, I also run an outside filter just to filter the water. I have am having a slowly developing algae problem on my rocks and first tried an emerald crab - and the sucker seemed to have just crawled in the rocks and died.java script:smilie(':(')

java script:smilie(':(')

 

So I was thinking about adding a charcoal bag to my filter to help absorb out the stuff the algae would like - the ammonia and nitrate stuff. But somewhere on this board I could have sworn that I read that charcoal in a filter for a reef tank was a bad thing.

 

(I did do a forum search for the word charcoal and didn't see any dedicated discussion on this topic, though some people mentioned using charcoal occasionally to polish the water.)

 

 

Comments on charcoal please?

 

P.S. I have also been trying take some good digital pix of my tank w/ my g4. But I have not figured out the settings that seem to take a nice pix of the whole tank, it always seems to be washed out - any suggestions on that minor item?

 

thanks - wwc

[Mnesarchus]

I think you mean Carbon not Charcoal.

 

Corals are animals, not 'non-animal thingies'.

[Chyendra]

i've heard the only Caron is good for is get get rid of the odors in the water. I don't think it removes ammonia or nitrate, but you should check your phosphate levels. Algea seems to like phosphate.

[Dingo]

Activated carbon and activated charcoal are the same thing. It is great for taking out the yellow from your water, and any bad odors, and also chemicals released by the corals.

 

Unfortunately, it will not remove the products of the nitrogen cycle. Neither ammonia, nitrite, or nitrate.

 

IMHO, it is a good thing to have in your filter, but doesn't do much against algae. For that, search for "red slime" or "hair algae" and you will find detailed causes of and solutions for the problem.

 

If you have any ammonia at all, your tank is not finished cycling, and your critters were put in too soon.

[seabass]

Carbon is a good chemical filter that will help remove odors and keep your water clear. It will strip some trace elements so some people only use it a few days out of the month; however, I run SeaGel (a mix of carbon and phosphate remover) in my HOB power filter all of the time.

 

Phosphates can promote algae since (along with nitrates) they provide nutrients for algae. Partial water changes can be performed to lower your nitrate levels.

 

As Dingo stated, carbon doesn’t remove nitrates. However, a protein skimmer can help slow the production of nitrates as it removes dissolved organics before they go through the nitrogen cycle. Note that protein skimmers also remove necessary elements from your water so, if you use one, it is necessary to replenish these elements through partial water changes and dosing with products like B-Ionic.

 

WWC, when you state that you are dosing iodine, I assume that your test kits indicate that your levels are low. You should only dose when your test kits indicate that you are in need. An overdose of iodine can crash a tank. By the way, iodine also promotes algae growth.

[wwc]

thank you all for the feedback

 

Regarding my language for corals - my apologies if I offended by flippant language , I did my writing my watching my child play - not a good setting for mature language and thought.

 

My biggest bust is not thinking of searching by carbon instead of charcoal - thanks.

 

Ammonia and Nitrate levels are zero, I'm getting some very slooooow growth. Though one of my snails has an afro over an inch long.

 

Iodine - I didn't realize I could test for that, my understanding was that the mushrooms and other items abosorbed or used it. And if you read the back of the bottle it asks to dose multiple times a week.

 

On my 20 gallon tank, I add 1/5 or 2/5 of a ml (Iodine) a week gradually through my topping off process every night. The amount corresponds to the water change of 2 or 4 gallons.

 

Guess I'll go get a kit to test for that till I get a better feel for how my tank is responding.

 

Again, thanks for clearing up the issue w/ using (or rather not using) carbon to help w/ the algae problem.

 

Last note - my emerald crab of purchase a week ago crawled out this morning and died in the front of the tank. So I may go get one of those critters again to fight the growth fight. . . .

[technoshaman]

Double check that your emerald didn't just molt and leave his shell out. I have found that they usually go to an open area to discard their old exoskeleton then hide for a day or two to recuperate - emeralds are VERY hardy IME and do not die easily.

[wwc]

welll, that has me a little concerned.

 

When my shrimp molts it is obvious which is the shrimp and which is the molted skin (ghost like)

 

Does the crab when it molts still look dark green and be firm in texture? Have 'hair' on the legs? Could pose for a drivers license photograph of the real self?

 

I looked at the critter body pretty close before performing a burial service in the toilet. I would dislike to think I flushed a creature I was responsible for into the sewer system.

 

:*(

[mattie]

the easiest way to see if the emerald crap is there or just the molted shell is look at the eyes if there are the little black dots which represent the eyes that was him if its unusally vacant in that local its just his old shell. his old shell will still be green and firm with the fuzzy legs and all. I doubt the emarld died if things were going wrong he would most likely be the last survivor.

 

for your camera there should be on the focus or program list of functions a setting called MACRO this setting alows you to take pictures of things under 2.5 feet away if your camara does not have that setting you wont be able to take clear pictures of anything up close.

 

as far as the algae it could be a number of things

1 try slightly shorter time on the lights with the timer

2 try getting ro/io water form the local fish store

3 more snails and hermits

4 lastly if you must do the water changes with tap water you may have a high silca count. The brown colored algae loves silca so each time you cange the water your adding more siilca which will cause an bloom of algae which may last 3-7 days so you can go try a water change every 2 weeks to once a month and monitor the water condition or if you want to do water change every week try a gallon or two at a time

 

lastly adding activated carbon can only do good but if your filter setup does not incorperate it in a factory type of install don't go out of your way to implement carbon in your filter. it has its benfits but i haven't used carbon in years