Refugium Starter Kit

[ksj88]

Hello, Thank You ahead of time for viewing and any help you might provide.:biggthumpup:

I'm new to saltwater, and I've been reading and reading and reading for the past 2 month. Just now in the past week or so I've really begun buying and figuring out the little details.

Now I'm at the point where I'm looking into where to purchase a refugium start kit. The refugium is 11 gallon in volume, and a part of 30 gallon sump/refug setup with protein skimmer.

So my question is where would, did or do you buy your kit? What's in your kit?

One thing I am sure is that I will have Chaetomorpha and Ogo Algae, not Caulerpa, just don't want to risk anything, keeping it simple. I'll have a clip on lamp, compact compact fluorescent light bulb, day light 5600k+ 60w equivalent. Is that enough light? or should I double up? (I can easily do that)

Still debating on whether to go with a Deep Sand Bed or standard 2" .... (are DSB more trouble than they're worth?... I've done quite a bit reading and with very opposite opinion of the method) What do you think?

Sorry for being so long, many quesitons... thus many ways get it wrong too.

So, ANY input would be great!!! Thanks!!!:beerchug:

[saltysailor]

1. for my starter kit i just got some fully cured live rock and got some macro algea from people in the club and put a light over it.....honestly thats all i needed you can add softy corals and fish later
2. i have about 3" in mine but you can go deeper its just usauly in bigger gallon refugiums...

i dont really now most of these new people but i pretty sure they know what they are talking about, well any one for that matter would :P

have fun when you get it fully set up i miss my tanks dearly

[gogregerson]

Putting sand in a refugium can be a real mess unless you have really good mechanical filtration in place upstream of the refugium. If you have live rock in you system you don't even need sand for anything more then aesthetics in the display. As far as light goes, get the 23w CF bulb. It has an equivalent rating of 100w's.

[SammytheBull]

Here's a picture of my sump/refugium, working great so far, it's a 20g long sump and a 10g refugium.
http://i44.photobucket.com/albums/f42/Sambucus1/Saltwatertank049.jpg

As far as light goes I use this 6500k bulb from home depot, I have to trim the chaeto once aweek it grows so fast. http://www.nvisioncfl.com/images/products/781-790.jpg

I agree with skippin the sand just seems like it would be that much more messy and potentially problematic and with out the sand you can see all the gunk floating around and easily siphon it out. I just threw some Live rock rubble in the fuge so the Copepods have places to hangout.

Good luck

[ksj88]

Wow, very interesting... I've always thought, or at least always read that sand in refugium is the norm, and it can benefit the overall system... or is that just DSB?

At any rate, I guess I can just leave it bare for now and when time comes add some in, right?

Great pic Sammy, I really like how your sump is so clean looking and spacious. :biggthumpup: How many gallons in volume is in the tank? if you don't mind me asking. Also, is your Copepods population enough to sustain as food for your fishes, maybe even a Dragonet? or they are for filter feeding purposes?

Thank you all for sharing, I'm defiantly going to use the 75 -100w rang for the bulb. Keep the comments coming! Any one used a deep sand bed before? in a refug or the main display?

[SammytheBull]

Wow, very interesting... I've always thought, or at least always read that sand in refugium is the norm, and it can benefit the overall system... or is that just DSB?

At any rate, I guess I can just leave it bare for now and when time comes add some in, right?

Great pic Sammy, I really like how your sump is so clean looking and spacious. :biggthumpup: How many gallons in volume is in the tank? if you don't mind me asking. Also, is your Copepods population enough to sustain as food for your fishes, maybe even a Dragonet? or they are for filter feeding purposes?

Thank you all for sharing, I'm defiantly going to use the 75 -100w rang for the bulb. Keep the comments coming! Any one used a deep sand bed before? in a refug or the main display? The bulb is actually a PC light and is 16w, the 65w you see is a comparision to other non PC lights.

Yeah looks nice and clean in that pic, that was the 2nd day it had been up and running(you should see it now :coolmad:). My main tank is 55g and the sump/fuge is at about 20g total between the 2 of them. I don't have any dragonet type fishes, so not sure if I could sustain them or not. I more or less keep copepods to feed on detrius thats making it's way to the sump/fuge.

I know lots keep sand bed fuge systems, I just haven't yet.

[kerks01]

Here's a picture of my sump/refugium, working great so far, it's a 20g long sump and a 10g refugium.


I like the way you have your fuge/sump set up.

I am thinking I want to do something very similar. I am wondering how you have it plumbed. It looks like you pump water into the fuge from the sump, is that correct? What do you use to pump it? Then water is gravity fed from the fuge to the sump. How high above the sump do you have your fuge? What size bulkhead did you use in the 10 gallon? Is the 20 gallon drilled at all?

Thanks!

[condiman]

Looks like a good setup. I did something similar to that with the 440 gallon I setup.