That Fish Blog – Aquarium Advice and Information

A customer recently asked me a question about using a canister filter on their saltwater aquarium. The customer had read on Reef Central that you should not use a canister filter on a saltwater aquarium, especially on a reef aquarium. That they do not work well, and will cause high nitrates.

This is a topic that you will see differing opinions on. The problem with canister filters is not that they don’t work on saltwater or reef aquariums, they work very well. Any biological filter is going to produce nitrate on a closed aquarium system, it is the natural end product of the nitrogen cycle.

This is why many reef tank owners will remove the bio balls from their wet dry filters, or run their systems on a sump only set up, in an effort to reduce nitrate production. This is why some people are of the opinion that canister filters should not be used on a reef tank. You can get away with this approach if you have a sufficient amount of live rock and substrate in your aquarium to act as your biological filter. In fact, live rock is an excellent source of nitrifying bacteria, and will function as a very efficient biological filter in an aquarium with enough rock. Most reef set ups will work well without a dedicated biological filter, so long as the biological load is not too high, and you are using a good protein skimmer. This method is often referred to as a “Berlin” style aquarium (lots of live rock, good water movement, heavy protein skimming, and no biological filter). Canister filters can still be used on reef tanks, they can be used as additional biological filters in heavily stocked tanks, and can easily be used for whatever chemical filtration media you may want to use.

Saltwater fish only tanks are a different story; in most cases you will need a biological filter to handle the fish waste and biological load, even if your tank has live rock in it. You will also want to have a mechanical filter on a saltwater fish tank, especially if you have large fish in your tank. Most canister filters give you the ability to operate them in different ways. You can use them for biological, mechanical or chemical filtration as needed.

Nitrate is going to be produced in any set up, some more than others. My best advice is to use as much filtration as your aquarium demands. Ammonia and Nitrite should be near zero in an established aquarium, if you are detecting either, chances are your aquariums biological filter is insufficient. Nitrate levels will creep up slowly over time in any system, so whatever filtration method you employ, you still need to monitor your water chemistry. Water changes will remove nitrate from your aquarium, so as long as you are testing your water, and performing regular water changes, nitrates should not be a problem.

Speaking canister filters, here’s a video my staff created to help aquarists set up a canister filter on their aquarium. Canister Filter Video

Thanks,
Dave

So your thinking about upgrading from your fish bowl, and are looking at your options for your next aquarium. You start looking at the live plant aquariums or the saltwater reef aquariums and what the requirements are. Quickly you realize that there is a wide range of specialty lighting available, and you have no idea what you are looking at. This is a common problem faced by many aquarium hobbyist.

One of the questions about specialty lighting that I am most often asked from customers in our store is what spectrum, or type, of light do I need for my aquarium. To really understand the answer to this question, you need to understand the universal rating system that is used to describe the spectral out of aquarium light bulbs; The Kelvin Scale.

For those of you who paid attention in science class, you know that Kelvin is a temperature scale in which zero occurs at absolute zero and each degree equals one kelvin. Water freezes at 273.15 K and boils at 373.15 K. Just thought I would throw that in there to confuse you, obviously that does not help describe the spectrum of a light bulb.

Kelvin Rating, or simply K. Without getting too technical, is a numeric scale that describes the color of an object at a given temperature. For aquarium lighting purposes Kelvin rating describes the color, or spectrum, of sunlight in a given environment. Most aquarium light bulbs will have a Kelvin rating between 5000K-20,000K. For example, the approximate Rating of natural sunlight at sea level is 5500K, this is a very warm white light that includes all the colors of visible light(red,orange,yellow,green,indigo,violet) This is the ideal spectrum of light for shallow water aquarium plants and fish. The deeper you go into the water column the higher the Kelvin Rating becomes. 20,000K light bulbs are designed to mimic deep water environments. Red, yellow, and orange light are short wavelengths and get filtered out of the water column very quickly. Blue and green light can pentrate much deeper. The result is that the deeper you get in the ocean the more blue the environment becomes. Animals that live in these deeper water environments have adapted to the light spectrum at these depths.

Now all you have to decide on is what you want to put in your aquarium, sorry I can not help you with that one. Here is a general guide for deciding what Kelvin rating bulb you should choose for your aquarium.

Daylight spectrum (5000K-10000k) bulbs are ideal for freshwater aquariums with live plants and Saltwater fish aquariums, higher Kelvin bulbs (6700K-20000K) are ideal for saltwater reef aquariums.

Hopefully that has shed some light(pun intended)on the different aquarium light bulbs available.

Until next blog,

Dave

This blog entry was inspired by another one of the interesting seminars that I attended during this years MACNA conference, a seminar by Author and Hobbyist Mike Paletta “Pharmaceuticals & Marine Aquaria”. Mike’s presentation was based upon medications and treatments that have origins in other disciplines that have found their way into use for the marine aquarium.

Some of the medications and treatments that Mike spoke about have been used in the aquarium trade for many years, such as Metronidazole and Erythromycin.
Metronidazole was developed for use in human and veterinary medicine, and is used to treat a wide range of bacterial and parasitical diseases. Metronidazole is available in the aquarium hobby from a number of manufacturers, as either a lone agent (like Thomas Lab’s Fish-Zole, Aquarium System’s Hex-Out, or Seachem’s Metronidazole), or as an ingredient in more broad spectrum medications (like API’s General Cure, Jungle Lab’s Hole-N-Head Guard and Parasite Clear) Paletta focused upon the use of Metronidazole as a method for removing intestinal parasites in newly acquired fish. Intestinal parasites are a common problem in wild caught fish. Fish are not usually fed very much as they are moved from collector, to holding station, to export, to your local store, in order to reduce waste and maintain water quality. During this time fish will start to eat feces of other fish that they are being held with, so if any of the wild fish have internal parasites, then they spread rapidly.
Feeding new fish with Metronidazole soaked foods during quarantine is the best way to rid your new fish of internal pests, and to prevent infecting the fish in your display. Jungle Labs Anti-Parasite Medicated Food and Blue Lagoon Anti-Parasite Marine Gel Food are commercially available food that is pre-treated with Metronidazole and well work well with fish that will eat these forms of food. For finicky eaters, soak the food of choice with medication prior to feeding. This works well with most food types, including fresh, frozen and prepared foods. Internal parasites may have no outward symptoms. Long term problems such a reduced growth and inability to gain weight with heavy feeding may be the only signs of infestation.
Erythromycin is an antibiotic that has been used for many years in many medical disciplines for the treatment of bacterial infections. Erythromycin has been used successfully for the treatment of bacterial infections in the aquarium trade as well, and is available from several sources ( like Mardel’s Maracyn and API’s E.M. Erythromycin)
Paletta talked about a less common use for Erythromycin (EM) is to aid in the combat of Slime algae in the marine aquarium, one which I have used successfully many times. Slime algae is a rapid growing, and potentially dangerous problem in the aquarium. Severe outbreaks can grow quickly and smother everything in your aquarium. Slime Algae is a simple life form, a bacterial algae complex, which thrives in high nutrient conditions like overfed, overstocked, or dirty aquariums. Small outbreaks should be taken care of by improving water quality, increasing water flow, and physical removal by siphoning. In severe cases the use of EM can be really helpful. EM will rapidly kill slime algae in the aquarium, and help get your aquarium free from the problem. EM is not a miracle cure for slime algae, if measures are not taken to improve water quality, then the slime will return. EM should only be used in conjunction with improved husbandry habits.

The portion of Mike’s presentation that I found most interesting was the somewhat experimental use of some Veterinary drugs to combat pests in the reef aquarium. With the proliferation of the reef aquarium hobby, and the abundance coral propagating hobbyists over the last several years, a number of previously obscure pests are becoming more and more common within the trade.

Red Bugs (Tegastes acroporanus) have become alarmingly common in the propagated coral industry. These barely visible little crustaceans can rapidly reproduce, and decimate many species of Acropora corals very quickly. Treatments have been developed using Interceptor (Milbemycin oxime), a prescription de-worming medication for dogs and cats, which you have to get from your veterinarian. Several different protocols have been developed for treatment with interceptor, if you do a web search on the topic you can find a treatment plan that best suits your situation. Before consulting with your veterinarian about obtaining Interceptor, it may be a good idea to print out some articles about this new alternative use of the drug. This is not a well known alternative use for the drug, and you may get some resistance if your Vet has not come accross other requests for this use in the past.

Another reef pest that is becoming more prevalent in the hobby is the Acropora Eating Flat Worm (AEFW). These nearly invisible, translucent, flatworms attack only Acropora species corals, and are very difficult to detect (other than dead acropora). A good method that Mike uses for detection is to use a turkey baster to shoot a jet of water in and around colonies that are suspected to have AEFW, if they are present, you will dislodge some of them and see tiny translucent discs fly off the coral. There are several commercially available flat worm treatments available to the hobby, such as Salifert’s Flat Worm Exit, and Tropic Marin’s Pro-Coral Cure.
Mike Paletta spoke about a relatively new treatment for AEFW that has been developed using Levamisol, a drug commonly used as a pig de-wormer that is available through farm supply stores, or your veterinarian. Again, several protocols have been developed for the use of Levamisol against AEFW, so do some research and choose a method that best suits your situation.

An interesting side story of Mike’s presentation was one of his natural approaches to limiting parasites in his display aquariums. He actually trains fish to eat parasites from coral. He accomplishes this while he is quarantining his fish for introduction into his aquarium. The fish he chooses are natural predators of the parasites, in this case I believe they were 6-line wrasses, which he trains to select for the parasites and actively hunt them. While in quarantine he introduces corals that he knows have flatworms, and frees the worms from the coral using a turkey baster, at the same time he limits the fishes other options for food, so that they are forced to eat the flatworms. After “training” the wrasses this way for several weeks the fish start to aggressively hunt out the flatworms for a meal. Once the fish have finished quarantine, they are introduced into the display aquarium and continue to actively hunt for parasites. Pretty neat trick!

Hope that you found this as interesting as I did, until next time

Dave

Just got back from MACNA XIX in Pittsburgh, and I would like to congratulate the Pittsburgh Marine Aquarium Society for hosting and outstanding conference.
The next few Blog topics will be about some of the Seminars and Events that I attended at this years MACNA conference.

One of the seminars that I found really interesting was the Giant Clam presentation by James Fatherree. James is the author of the book “Giant Clams in The Sea And The Aquarium”and gave a presentation based upon some of the most common questions that he is asked about Giant Clams, and the Answers to those questions.

How much light do I need to keep a Tridacna Clam? This is a question that I am commonly asked about clams from our customers here at TFP, and one of the questions that James Fatherree addressed during his presentation. How much light is needed is probably the most important question to be answered, in regard to keeping giant clams in the aquarium. Giant clams receive as much as 100 percent of their nutrition from light that provides energy for photosynthesis for their symbiotic algae (zooxanthellae). How much light depends much upon the species of clam that you are trying to keep. Clams are found in the oceans throughout a wide range of depths in the tropical Pacific Ocean, from near the oceans surface, down to more than 25 meters (83 feet). Some species are only found in fairly shallow water, like the Tridacna crocea, which require very intense lighting. Others Giant Clam species such as T. maximaand T. squamosa, are found at depths of up to 15 meters (50 feet) and required strong lighting. Another species of Giant Clam that is commonly kept in the aquarium trade, T. derasa, is found at depths of up to 25 meters (83 feet) and require moderate lighting. All these depths are extreme maximums, under ideal conditions. The vast majority of clams found in the wild are found at much shallower depths than these maximum. All species of Clams that are grown in commercial farms are typically grown in shallow pools or raceways under intense lighting.

The best answer to this question is that there is no such thing as too much light for Clams in the aquarium. Deeper water species, like Tridacna derasa and Hippopus hippopus, will tolerate fluorescent lighting in very shallow aquariums, or high output T-5, VHO, or Compact Fluorescent lighting in aquariums up to about 24” deep. All other clams should only be kept under the intensity of Metal Halide lighting. The deeper the aquarium the higher wattage metal halide light should be used, in general the more light you can provide, the higher your chances for long term health and growth.

For more great information on Giant Clams check out James Fatherree’s book “Giant Clams in The Sea And The Aquarium”

Hope this sheds some light on questions that you may have had about clams, until next time.

Dave