Sump Advice?

[MOdiscus]

I have an old 75 gallon tank with about a 20-25 gallon sumpbought from my dad- needless to say, I want to put discus in the tank.
I want to make it planted, too. Plans:
4" fine black sand in the back, fading to 2 1/2" in the front, lots of tall plants, a large piece of driftwood, also with plants growing on it around mid to rear of tank, for tons of safe hiding places. I'll be using black tetras and cory cats as tankmates. Any thoughts/opinions on malaysian trumpet snails as a helper clean-up crew?
I'll be making use of the already installed and drilled sump system, which is the primary cause for my need of advice...
I have managed a planted aquarium for a while with great success, so I need, more than anything else, advice on how to set the sump up. Can anyone help in that regard?
Or in any others? thanks!

[Chicago Discus]

well plants really don't like sumps and discus really don't like plants so I don't know......just kidding welcome to our Forum someone with more experience will come in and help ya out I don't really do the whole planted thing.........Josie

[MOdiscus]

Haha, thanks! I'm looking forward to getting set up!

[ericatdallas]

I'm trying to do the same as you without the top planted tank. Take a look at some of the reef sites, they are full of info on setting up sumps.

I plan to do a moss refugium with shrimp and algae scrubbers. Just see how it works.

Is the 75G already drilled? COuldn't tell if you bought the sump from your dad or if you bought the 75G and the sump. If it was already setup, then wouldn't your dad be the best POC? :) Either way, I imagine he knows how to do it?

Anyway, I blindly took this advice only because it made sense and it's something similar to other species of fish, but a black substrate may not be ideal if you are looking at getting pigeon-based discus. Apparently dark backgrounds will make them pepper more, so if you insist on black substrate, you should consider a non-PB. Also, I wouldn't recommend albino discus b/c tehy have light sensitivity so they're not the most compatible with a planted tank, so you're going to blind/torture them. I have three albinos and I keep them in low light tanks. All my tanks are BB with light blue, but even then my PBs (I have seven of these) have some peppering.

There's plenty of advice on discus and planted tanks already so I won't regurgitate them, but the above might be the most pertinent to consider for your particular setup.

[MOdiscus]

Thankyou very much! I bought the whole thing, and it IS pre-drilled. My dad has always kept saltwater aquariums, so he has tons of GREAT advice on those, but I wanted to know more about what to do with a discus tank's sump. What kind of shrimp, etc. are you looking at for your refugium?

[ericatdallas]

I currently keep red cherry shrimp in the 40G refugium to be. It's full of moss and I"m hoping that will help with nitrates. I plan to do a WC on it anyway, but I wanted to run some 'experiments' to see if I can reduce WCs with this method. My only worry is the shrimp are going to generate their own nitrates (hence the algae scrubber as well). Not sure if this is a good idea, but it sure is fun learning about it.

Also, I imagine some of the smaller particulate matter from my Discus tank will help feed the shrimp (i.e. dissolved BH/SF mix).

I think sumps are pretty much the same best for salt water and freshwater, but again, not speaking from experience but more from what I've read. Refugiums are slightly different, but not completely.

I eventually want to start a saltwater tank, but I thought doing this with FW would help get me started.

[MOdiscus]

Wow, that sounds cool! Keep me posted on how it turns out! My dad's got a 210 that he has a similar refugium in. I wa thinking I couldn't do that with freshwater... But I like the idea a lot!

[ericatdallas]

well, moss, frogbit and algae are great at sucking in nitrogen... the nice thing I read about java moss is it doesn't need a lot of nitrogen to grow/survive. So if you maintain water changes you might be able to have nice moss and discus tank. Also, people buy moss ... <shrug> so you can recoup the cost a little.

[DerekFF]

A sump is a sump salt or fresh. Adding moss/shrimp makes it a whole lot less efficient as a filter and more of just an interestingly designed tank

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

[MOdiscus]

Thanks for the input! I don't know much about sumps- what kind of mechanical filtration should I use in it?

[spiffyfish]

Ceramic bio rings

[cjr8420]

check this out http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?84357-lets-see-your-diy-sump-setups&highlight=show+sump
hth compiments of spiff

[lipadj46]

For fresh water most just use a filter sock for mech then have a bio chamber and that's it. some have a chamber of stem plants also

[ericatdallas]

A sump is a sump salt or fresh. Adding moss/shrimp makes it a whole lot less efficient as a filter and more of just an interestingly designed tank


Well, I'm still in the learning phase, but less efficient how? They're two different "animals". My understanding is a sump works to increase water volume and extra surface area for bio-filtration. There are additional benefits if you care about aesthetics, medication dosing, changing water without disturbingother tank.

A refugium does provide some benefit in all the above, but it's goal is to 'protect' fragile species (aka shrimp) and as a nitrogen export (nitrates in, plant matter out).

So a refugium is almost the same concept as an algae scrubber. Adding shrimp or other slower growing plants makes it less efficient than an algae scrubber, but if you already have maximum utilizeable surface area for beneficial bacteria, a sump would serve no purpose.

What else happens in a sump that inherently can't happen in a refugium (w/ fast growing plants) other than providing more surface area?

I suppose the other negative to refugium is it does require additional volume and it requires lighting. Maybe some additional work.

As with everything, there are some trade-offs. But sumps can't remove nitrates right?

[DerekFF]

I use a rack with 3 different sized filter pads then below into some bio balls and gravel/fluorite bags on the bottom. Works great. Ill post a pic when I get home

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

[DerekFF]

Well, I'm still in the learning phase, but less efficient how? They're two different "animals". My understanding is a sump works to increase water volume and extra surface area for bio-filtration. There are additional benefits if you care about aesthetics, medication dosing, changing water without disturbingother tank.

A refugium does provide some benefit in all the above, but it's goal is to 'protect' fragile species (aka shrimp) and as a nitrogen export (nitrates in, plant matter out).

So a refugium is almost the same concept as an algae scrubber. Adding shrimp or other slower growing plants makes it less efficient than an algae scrubber, but if you already have maximum utilizeable surface area for beneficial bacteria, a sump would serve no purpose.

What else happens in a sump that inherently can't happen in a refugium (w/ fast growing plants) other than providing more surface area?

I suppose the other negative to refugium is it does require additional volume and it requires lighting. Maybe some additional work.

As with everything, there are some trade-offs. But sumps can't remove nitrates right?

Long post to respond to lol. To clarify im not saying that a refugium style sump is bad, just not as efficient. When you turn a sump into a refugium you can't run the same gph through there as you would a normal sump (the slow flow and plants may help offset the low gph flow in terms of denitrification, but you lose lots in mechanical filtration that way).

In terms of increasing volume and filtration surface area yeah that are great for that. However for medicating you also now have to medicate that extra water too which means more meds(really depends how big your sump is) shrimp are also more sensitive to certain medications and they will increase your bioload.

As you mentioned the refugium will need light and depending on what kind of plants you put down there (moss is just a crap trap) it will stack more junk than you want. It can help with water changes if its a decent sized sump(but you may have to suck from the tank anyways if there's a detrius build up)

I guess in summary your taking a sump (designed for pure filtration and volume purposes) and making it into a jack of all trades but master of none kind of situation. It might look cool if you design it well ans maintain it but really your just adding another semi efficient tank.

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

[MOdiscus]

Thanks, guys! I'm really starting to get excited about this! Keep the thoughts comin'!

[spiffyfish]

i have filter socks but i dont run them, i have 2 pre filter sponges in my overflow, and just run mainly ceramic rings in my sump.

[MOdiscus]

I'm leaning toward a couple baggies of rock, then baggies of fine gravel, followed by a sponge as a last, fine mechanical filter, then the Refugium, with a fast-growing moss to suck up nitrates, and cherry shrimp to keep it from getting gunked up... Anyone have any tweaks to suggest for that?