[fishgeeksrus]

We are in the process of setting up a 180g reef and I decided to try putting some mangroves in our refugium with the lr and calurpa. I have never used these. Does anyone have any suggestions?

[Ninong]

I have always found them interesting but I don't have any place to put them. They certainly look nice in all the public exhibits but to really do well they would need a lot of space. The hobbyists that I know who use them in their refugia all have large refugia with unlimited overhead clearance. One guy has a 100-gal Rubbermaid stock tank refugium in his basement that has a 6" DSB and about a dozen mangroves.

John Rice has pictures of his mangroves on his website: http://www.globaldialog.com/~jrice/m.../mang_sump.htm Those pictures are of his original 55-gal mangrove refugium but he switched to a 300-gal Rubbermaid stock tank refugium later on and I think there are pictures of that setup somewhere on his site. I'll see if I can find them. OK, here are the pictures of the 300-gal stock tank under construction but I don't see the pictures of the finished product with the mangroves: http://www.globaldialog.com/~jrice/f...fauna_sump.htm He definitely added mangroves to that 300-gal stock tank because I have seen the pictures online. OK, I just found them under "sump update:" http://www.globaldialog.com/~jrice/f...mp/update1.htm Unfortunately he hasn't updated his website in the past three or four years.

I believe mangroves are nice if you have the room for them. I believe fast growing macroalgae that you can harvest are much, much better at exporting nutrients. If I ever have a large tank with a large separate refugium, I will want to add some mangroves just because I think they look cool, especially if you have natural sunlight over your refugium.

[fishgeeksrus]

Thanks for the info. I did buy 10 of them for our refugium. I don't know how they will do, but we're going to take a shot at it. Unfortunately we have don't have the option for the natural sunlight. I guess trial and error is our only option.

[Ninong]

They will do fine under artificial light, too. The biggest obstacle is trying to afford them enough headroom to grow. I remember seeing a European setup where the guy had large windows and a skylight in his equipment room behind the main tank. All of that natural light in the equipment room is what he used for his really nice, very large refugium that included some mangroves that appeared to be about three or four feet tall.

[fishgeeksrus]

Thanks, I did read somewhere that if you keep them cut back they will stay smaller. We will see.

[Penguin]

Just a heads up: Julian Sprung has an article about mangroves in the March issue of Aquarium Fish magazine. There may be some good ideas there for you, if you want to pick it up.

[fishgeeksrus]

Originally Posted by Penguin

Just a heads up: Julian Sprung has an article about mangroves in the March issue of Aquarium Fish magazine. There may be some good ideas there for you, if you want to pick it up.

Thanks I will check that out!