fresh water refuguim.

[down2earth]

is this something i should look into ? i was thinking about building this in a 20 gallon aquarium that i already have set up as a sump. but there is no dividers or anything in this tank. i do have a plastic container that holds a lot of bio rings.


i plan to put in 3 dividers. one big slot for the plants. one smaller one for the pump. and the rest will be used to put in the bio rings.

this tank is about 24" wide. and 12" long height is 16" i think. so i figure 9x12 for the plants 9x12 for 6x12 for bio rings.

i have not gotten a tank to do this with yet. the one under my tank now i will not be able to remove for a long period of time since its the active filter. but once i get a spare one i will be able to build it and install it once its dry and ready to go .


also can i use duckweed in this ?

[discussmith]

Refugium is perhaps the wrong conotation. A sump is a very useful thing in freshwater. A refugium is more geared towards saltwater as they are indeed trying to propogate various copepods etc. for gravel feeders and such. If you need to remove nitrate and don't want to deal with plants I would go with an algae scrubber as opposed to duckweed.

[Trier20]

For my 30g sump/refugium I have two parts. I have probably an 8g space for bio media and the remaining I put a layer of refugium mud topped with black sand with a few different kinds of plants in it. One the very far left side I put some pea gravel to set the return pump on so it would suck sand into it. This way let's good water flow for the plants to get the nutrients they need to live. There are MILLIONS of ways to build a sump/refugium you just have to make it however simple or complex you want it. If you'd like I can get a picture of mine for you.


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[down2earth]

i thought refugium mud was for salt water?

[Niblet]

We are just now setting up a 40 gallon sump on a 120 gallon DT. I saw this on youtube and thought it was interesting. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqdrtVYBQDY We are using a sump divided into 3 sections with plants (water sprite recommended by Walter) in the larger central area. I was not convinced that the expensive Miracle Mud was a necessity in the system so I am using Pond matrix as a substrate in the central area. Could upload pics if you want. I also doubt that 2 annual water changes are realistic, and not even sure if after a period of time we will want to keep the plants. But for now it is where we are starting. Still planning on 2 weekly water changes....I only have 6 discus in the 120.

[Trier20]

I asked the guy at my LFS and he said it was ok for freshwater. Only thing I didnt like about it is that it has snails in the mix


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[DerekFF]

Refugium is perhaps the wrong conotation. A sump is a very useful thing in freshwater. A refugium is more geared towards saltwater as they are indeed trying to propogate various copepods etc. for gravel feeders and such. If you need to remove nitrate and don't want to deal with plants I would go with an algae scrubber as opposed to duckweed.

The only reason its more "geared" towards salt in a lot of peoples minds is because they really dont know what the definition of refugium is. Really its just another tank that uses the same water as the aquarium. A "sump" and refugium are the same thing but with different uses. One is chosen more for housing extra fish, plants, inverts or delicate things while the other is used for filtration. There are a lot of people who use refugiums on freshwater tanks to grow plants, pull ammo/nitrites/ates from the water, house angry fish as a species tank or simply as a time out tank, grow shrimp/copepods. There are a lot of uses for fresh water

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[down2earth]

i been looking into making my own refuguim for a while now. but i think what im going to do is have 2 20 gal tanks side by side. one over flowing into the other. the first tank will have 2 socks and the plants. the 2nd will have my filtering sponges and bio rings with the pump. i have a 60 gal tank this will be added to. so i have a quiet one 1200 pump. ment to handle 300 GPH.

figure ill try to make a small scale one and get it to work then build the one i really want for a 240 gal tank. out of a 50 gal tank for the plants and a 20 gallon for bio rings and pump

[DerekFF]

Not sure how you plan on getting 1 tank to overflow into the other. Siphon overflow?

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[down2earth]

i have invested in a glass hole saw. so i plan to put 2 1" pipes that will go right into the 2nd tank. plus i will add some red brick below the first tank to make it taller then the 2nd. so it will be taller to over flow into the 2nd one.

[Niblet]

Hi.....I just posted this to another thread, but am not savvy enough to know how to direct you there. We just plumbed our sump yesterday using a modified version of this: http://beananimal.com/projects/silent-and-fail-safe-aquarium-overflow-system.aspx . Our tank was reef ready, drilled with 2 holes in the bottom. We ended up using a modification similar to this: http://marine-engineers.org/2011/07/05/the-herbie-overflow/ . We are both really happy with the results....it is absolutely silent. The water flows into a 4" 200 micron sock, then into a center artea with pond matrix and plants, then into a 3rd area with the pump. There are 2 baffles between the 3 areas. HTH Fran