Basic Refigium Questions

[Subskipper]

Hello all and thanks for reading and responding in advance.

I am running a 65G SW and decided to put in a refigium. My questions are really basic and probably foolish but you know how you get when you see something and say I want it without really thinking about if you "need" it? Well today was my day.

I just purchased a Refigium, the proper sand and I am thinking about what the heck I am supposed to do. Some questions:

Is there some standard setup for the refigium (it is a hang on back of aquarium type) and I was wondering what I should put in it? Live rock? Crush coral sand? Plants?

I am trying to avoid a few things like excessive algae growth, nitrites/nitrates etc, will the refigium help with this? What are the benefits now that I spent the money?

Thanks

Bernard

[Reefland]

Hi Subskipper, Welcome to Reefland!

A refugium is technically a "Safe-haven" for invertebrates that would typically fall prey to other inhabitants to grow and reporduce safely. Mainly for various infauna to thrive without worries of falling prey. Over the past years however, refugiums have also become places for people to safely grow macro-algaes and emply DSB for their benefits without cluttering up the display with them.

You mention that your goal is to help with nutrient export so you'll be setting up one of the multi-functional system additions like many others. What do you need to make it sucessful? Well some fine sand seeded with live sand and some rock rubble is a good start. These will help facilitate the growth and reproduction of the infuana. For nutrient export, you should look at a small mix of macro algaes; there are many available, some more favorable than others. Obviously for these you'll need a bit of light too.

Hope that helps,
Scott Z.

[squintypanda]

How big is your refugium? if it's a small H.O.B refugium like I have then having a DSB wouldn't really help you much if at all since it's not enough surface area.... If I were you I'd just scoop couple cups of sand from your display tank and create a ~2" sandbed in the fuge and add some live rock rubbles/macro in there... most popular choice of macro seems to be chaetomorpha since it doesn't go sexual... and like Reefland said.. refugiums are basically low flow area used for 1. nutrient export, 2. safe haven for pods (useful to feed mandarins), and maybe 3. place for banished hitchhikers that could be harmful in the display tank.... or you could maybe even add a few seahorses in there (depending on how big your fuge is)

[Subskipper]

Thanks for the responses! I appreciate the feedback

Thanks

Bernard