protein skimmer for fresh water
- Thread starter catfishmike
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my idea to use it would just be overkill filtration.i'm just interested in seeing if anyone else has used one with even minor success.i occasonaly find a oily sheen on the top of the water and sometimes it will have too many bubbles at the surface which leads me to belive that there is too much dissolved organic compounds and what such in the water.i just want to maintain optimum water quality inbetween water changes.
Catfish: if thats the case, just do more water changes 
From what I understand they are pretty much useless in FW due to the water chemistry (lower ph and gh/kh than your average SW tank). I suppose you could try one in a african cichlid tank or something along those lines, but I don't see the point.
Andy
From what I understand they are pretty much useless in FW due to the water chemistry (lower ph and gh/kh than your average SW tank). I suppose you could try one in a african cichlid tank or something along those lines, but I don't see the point.
Andy
The only people who use skimmers on a regular basis for freshawater are some public aquariums and people with large koi ponds. You can buy koi pond skimmers, I don't remember the brand names though. The reason people use them is that they can pull out large amounts of undegraded biological waste before it starts being filtered out. This is good for koi in particular as they are big messy fish that are fussy about water conditions. Their volumes of waste typically overrun many filtration systems, and a skimmer is one way round this, along with vegetative filters, mechanical filters and so on. Doing a weekly 10 % water change on a 15000 gallon pond is not very practical.
You can make freshwater protein skimmer but you need high air pressure to generate very small bubbles, or a very high pressure water pump to power a venturi. It can be done, but isn't usually because freshwater waterchanges are so much easier for the small volume of water in most tanks. You can try it yourself though.
Catfish mike - what cats do you like - I find to get most cats to breed or grow I need to do many more changes than 10 % once a week.
You can make freshwater protein skimmer but you need high air pressure to generate very small bubbles, or a very high pressure water pump to power a venturi. It can be done, but isn't usually because freshwater waterchanges are so much easier for the small volume of water in most tanks. You can try it yourself though.
Catfish mike - what cats do you like - I find to get most cats to breed or grow I need to do many more changes than 10 % once a week.
using a normal protein skimmer is almost totally useless, it is used in saltwater because the water density is greater i think so the skimmer is able to produce vast amounts of tiny bubbles to stick to proteins and wastes. Using one on fw would be about 5% as efficient so totally useless basicly, better off buying another filter lol
Jawz is right about the mechanics of skimmers....the water density is higher so smaller bubbles are formed in very high numbers, and they ascend slightly slower too.
BUT....I remember reading about this subject in one of my mags....I believe what they said was the biggest problem with using it in freshwater was the contact time. DOC's (dissolved organic compounds) have both a negative and positive charge. Now, I get confused as to which is which, but one side let's say the negative is attracted to air, and the positive side is attracted to water. This is why you get a scum on the surface of the water. In order for the skimmer to work in freshwater you have to give the DOC's time to adhere to the bubbles. Since you have fewer, larger bubbles you have to slow down their ascent. You would have to build the skimmer yourself, and the tube would have to be close to twice the size of a regular skimmer (for your size tank) and it would have to be a strong counter-current type to give a "drag" to the bubbles. I believe someone wrote in saying that they had built one, but that even though it worked, it wasn't removing that much from the water.
I do wonder though if you couldn't use an overflow (like used in saltwater) hooked up to a large canister filter. The overflow would in effect skim the surface water taking it to the canister where it could be removed.....
BUT....I remember reading about this subject in one of my mags....I believe what they said was the biggest problem with using it in freshwater was the contact time. DOC's (dissolved organic compounds) have both a negative and positive charge. Now, I get confused as to which is which, but one side let's say the negative is attracted to air, and the positive side is attracted to water. This is why you get a scum on the surface of the water. In order for the skimmer to work in freshwater you have to give the DOC's time to adhere to the bubbles. Since you have fewer, larger bubbles you have to slow down their ascent. You would have to build the skimmer yourself, and the tube would have to be close to twice the size of a regular skimmer (for your size tank) and it would have to be a strong counter-current type to give a "drag" to the bubbles. I believe someone wrote in saying that they had built one, but that even though it worked, it wasn't removing that much from the water.
I do wonder though if you couldn't use an overflow (like used in saltwater) hooked up to a large canister filter. The overflow would in effect skim the surface water taking it to the canister where it could be removed.....
Dutch company Estrad produce a skimmer for koi ponds - it has a normal foam production area powered by a venturi and water pump, and the unstable foam goes up into a series of fine pipes that reform one large collection area at the top. Apparently it's quite good, and they're gaining in popularity as koi are as messy as heck, and normal pond methods are really high maintenance.
You would need a big (1000's) of gallons of waer to make this worthwhile for freshwater
You would need a big (1000's) of gallons of waer to make this worthwhile for freshwater
I think mechanical filtration is the most important
We all have plenty of biological filtration just by having a current that pushes water around...there is plenty in your gravel bed, ur walls of ur tank, ur plants, u name it...
Chemical filtration I think is crazy so I dont even wanna mention it.
And mechanical is decent cuz it clears up ur water...
If you want to go overboard u could get a uv light inline with ur plumbing if its a big tank, or get a Hang on Tank UV light...
they go for about 30-60$ used. and you only would use it like 4 hours a week or so, depending on flow/size of tank, its not something u leave on 24/7
We all have plenty of biological filtration just by having a current that pushes water around...there is plenty in your gravel bed, ur walls of ur tank, ur plants, u name it...
Chemical filtration I think is crazy so I dont even wanna mention it.
And mechanical is decent cuz it clears up ur water...
If you want to go overboard u could get a uv light inline with ur plumbing if its a big tank, or get a Hang on Tank UV light...
they go for about 30-60$ used. and you only would use it like 4 hours a week or so, depending on flow/size of tank, its not something u leave on 24/7
Mechanical filtration - depends on the fish, tank. I don't use it myself, it's only for looks, or at least I don't really deliberately plan it.
Back to koi ponds. Here mech filtration i a big deal as there's usually so much debris it overwhelms and clogs the biofilters. Usually there's some kind of flushable settling pool before the biofilters, skimmers, whatever.
But really , unless you're talking 100's of gallons plus for water changes, a skimmer is overkill for freshwater.
Back to koi ponds. Here mech filtration i a big deal as there's usually so much debris it overwhelms and clogs the biofilters. Usually there's some kind of flushable settling pool before the biofilters, skimmers, whatever.
But really , unless you're talking 100's of gallons plus for water changes, a skimmer is overkill for freshwater.
right on thisis what i wanted to know.thanks everyone.i have been curious about this subject for a while and had read somewhere that the film that causes excess bubbles and the oil slick on top of water was proteins and other compounds in the water,so i though to myself "i wonder if it would work just a little" i'm not super concerned about the bubbles at the top of my tank as it's less than what you would find in a smll stream with dead spots of current.i just am a nut for filtration.i suppose if i used a filter media that wasn't that cheap blue floss it would to the job for catching any extra stuff.i did buy a new filter anyways.i just picked up a via aqua 750 to handle my bofiltration so i can use my magnum h.o.t.for micron polishing.right now i have bio media in the h.o.t. and i don;t want to switch it out and cause a spike.
wayne i keep plecos and corys for now but once i find a place to settle in i'd love to set up a large tank for either on of the real large synos or an asian bagrid of sorts,but none of the super huge cats like the 6 foot kind.i have been trying to build a small pond that i can knock down if needed and put some bullheads or channel cats.i like the locals as well as the exotics.i usualy do 30-50%water changes in my tank.i keep my cats in an 84 gallon tank so usualy about 25 to 40 gallons a water change.so wayne are you a big koi fan? cause i love koi and knowing about that skimmer for koi should be good if i ever get the chance to build the pond me and my friends started last summer.so far all we have is a big hole in the back yard lol.
wayne i keep plecos and corys for now but once i find a place to settle in i'd love to set up a large tank for either on of the real large synos or an asian bagrid of sorts,but none of the super huge cats like the 6 foot kind.i have been trying to build a small pond that i can knock down if needed and put some bullheads or channel cats.i like the locals as well as the exotics.i usualy do 30-50%water changes in my tank.i keep my cats in an 84 gallon tank so usualy about 25 to 40 gallons a water change.so wayne are you a big koi fan? cause i love koi and knowing about that skimmer for koi should be good if i ever get the chance to build the pond me and my friends started last summer.so far all we have is a big hole in the back yard lol.
yea we use vegitation filters and whatnot.thankfuly the u.s. is cathcing up in filtration methods.in a lot of koi magazines these days the only designs they show are full on leave no method behind set-ups.often it will show more on plumbing so that you can efficently run a settling chamber,mechanical filter,bio-filter and then a vegitation filter.but the people that do this also have big wallets.i have considered looking into a pressurived pond filter mysely as i just read an article in practical fishkeeping and it reveiwed some and the features offered.i like what i see.my one complant was that the filters were rated in a gallons method i.e. good for ponds up to 3000 gallons etc... and i don't see how something so small could work on such a big pond.how big is your dads pond ?does he have any jumbo koi or show quality?or is it all just for relaxation.
It's just for relaxation - they'r cheap fish, but they're getting quite big, 14, 15 inches. I'd guesstimate about 700 gallons or so which is too small really for them now. We're going to dig out a hole, and put in a plastic drum to act as a settling tank, then overflow it via buried pipe to a pretty long shallow marsh plant zone - he needs to research a few good plants. This will work I think but he needs to think about hisplants else it will have problems in the atumn winter when there's not much growth. Hopefully if it has a gravel substrate it should still work as a biofilter.
He's also going to return/get rid of a load of goldfish as well, which should help. They've just bred over the years
He's also going to return/get rid of a load of goldfish as well, which should help. They've just bred over the years
i'm not sure what plants are legal were you live but i hear that duckweed is very good as a natural filter.yes it could be tough to use a veg.filter in the winter seeing as how norway has some real cold winters.how about a simple hothouse built around the marsh?hothouses do preety good at saving plants in gardens during new england winters so it might work.then again it wouldn't work without enough sun either.
well actually he lives in E England but the weather is the same. I use floating plants as 'filtersi n most of my tanks, but I don'tt think it would make a good filter, esp. as the koi will slurp it down, I was more thinking of a rooted plants that can root in gravel. It has to be pretty simple and quick growing - ven with a sed tank prefilter the gravel will still silt up and need maybe a 1/3 pr 1/2 it's lengh removing and cleaning each year. I've seen people do a good job with cress (!) as it grows so fst.
I guess the grvel will act as a biofilter for the slower growth parts of the year along with plants and bacteria in the main pond - this will get rid of greenwater in the main growth period tho'.
I guess the grvel will act as a biofilter for the slower growth parts of the year along with plants and bacteria in the main pond - this will get rid of greenwater in the main growth period tho'.