refugium plants

[jammerz]

what are the preffered plants for a ref. Iam thinking mangrove and caulerpa. is this ok? isn't there one i should stay away from and what is that?

 

[1979camaro]

chaeto is the big one everyone wants now...caulerpa is good, the only reported problem is that it tends to "go sexual" and so it spreads all over the place...halimeda is also good ive heard, but i dont run a refugium

 

[KahluaZzZ]

If you have an tang or herbivore fish..don't worry if the caulerpa gets sometimes in the main tank. It's a fish candy. I had a drilled rubbermaid basket hooked near the waterline..my tang bashed it when i was away...no more caulerpa..i had 2 handfull. His belly was so huge.

If you check some sump/refugium on the net...you'll see that almost everytime, people use huge load of caulerpa in their sump, often with no super lighting. Cheap, efficient to eliminate nitrates/phosphates and doesn't require calcium..unlike halimeda. It's a wanted pest that reproduce so fast.
I find a guy who sells mangrove...very cheap and they look great. I'll test it.
It looks more difficult to handle, due to the size/head out of water matters..
Mangroves are endangered by hotel chains in Florida..so why not help to save those precious plants/trees. Oh yeah..and if they are endangered..so are many fishes and creatures that look for protection behind the mangrove's roots.

 

[jammerz]

i tend to "go sexual" to and spread myself all over the place.....

 

[1979camaro]

thanks...im sure we all needed to know that

 

[S.Reef]

Hmmm...interesting.

 

[jammerz]

camaro: you dont run a ref.? why have you chose not to? what do you use for a filter? what are yer parameters? mainly nitrates? do you have a sump/overflow?
Thanks man....

 

[1979camaro]

no refugium for me...its not that I don't want one, just didn't have the resources (cash) for setting one up when I did the tank. With my current setup I would have to install the refugium outside of the stand due to the sump and I do not want to do that. I will definitely set up a refugium on my next tank. As far as filtration I have no mechanical filtration, the LR is my biological filtration and I run a skimmer. Nitrates are under 5ppm