santamonica
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Part 1 of 3
Micro-Small Algae Remover System for Nano's: Free!
It's called a Turf Algae Filter, and it works in salt or freshwater. Takes just a few minutes to install into your nano, and best of all, it's free! It starts reducing your nitrate and phosphate within the first week, and after a few weeks they usually hit zero. This of course means your algae in your tank starts melting away!
A Turf Algae Filter is simply a "screen" that you put into your nano's hood, where water will flow across it. You then add a bright light, and you are done. Here is the 5 gal nano that I used as the test (I did not care how ugly it was)...
Here is the screen:
You put the screen in the nano's hood, where water will flow across it:
You add a light that shines on the screen, and you're done!...
In case your nano's hood is closed on the top, you might have to cut open a small square hatch so you can get the light real close to the screen (strong light is the most important requirement for this filter.)
The most powerful feature of a Turf Algae Filter is that it leaves food particles in the tank so the corals can feed, yet it removes nitrates and phosphates (which cause algae), most of the time down to zero! This is the OPPOSITE of what a skimmer does; a skimmer removes food particles (so corals starve) and then leaves the nitrate and phosphate in the water so you have to use other methods to get the nitrate and phosphate out. And how about all that gunk that skimmers pull out? Well, half of it is food that you just fed, and your corals wanted to eat it. What about the other half, the waste? Well, that's food too! Of course with nano's, size is a huge concern, and skimmers are just too big. A Turf Algae Filter actually fits into the hood you already have.
The process of using turf algae to filter aquariums has been around for decades, but the contraptions were just too huge and expensive, and for some reason nobody thought to make a simple one in a nano hood. It's simple enough (and free) that you should try one on your system even if you have no intention of eliminating your skimmer, etc. The principal is very simple: You have a screen; light is aimed at the screen, and tank water is streamed over the screen. What happens is that algae starts growing on the screen, and this algae eats almost all the nitrate and phosphate in the water flowing over it (and so the algae in your tank will not have anything to eat!). However, the turf does NOT eat the food/pods/plankton in the water, so this food will stay in the water for the corals to eat. This is the OPPOSITE of a skimmer, which takes out the food/pods/plankton (so corals starve), but leaves in the nitrate and phosphate that you have to then get out using other means. What about fish waste that skimmers normally pull out? Well that's food too, for somebody! Only after waste decomposes completely into nitrate and phosphate is it no longer "food", and at that point the turf zaps it! After all, what do you think the green algae on your rocks and glass are eating? Food? No. Nitrate and phosphate!
You might ask why you have not heard of turf algae filters before. Well turf algae is actually used quite a bit in commercial/industrial areas to clean lakes and rivers, but the units that were built for aquariums were just too big (as big as a 200 gal tank) and expensive ($3,000+). So they never caught on. But all they do is move water across a screen, and have a light. So putting a turf screen directly in your nano hood works just fine.
The only thing you need to decide is how big your screen needs to be. The basic rule for a one-sided screen (like nano's use) is two square inches of screen for each gallon of tank water. Thus a 12 gal nano tank needs just 24 square inches (4 X 6 inches) in the hood! This small thing replaces the skimmer, refugium, phosphate removers, nitrate removers, carbon, filtersocks, and possibly even waterchanges, if the purpose these things is to reduce nitrate and phosphate.
My example 5 gal version took about 5 minutes to build. I can feed the tank as much food as I did before, and anything not eaten eventually ends up as algae on the screen. The difference is that the nitrate and phosphate are WAY WAY low! Here's how a turf algae filter compares to other nano filtering options:
Micro-Small Algae Remover System for Nano's: Free!
It's called a Turf Algae Filter, and it works in salt or freshwater. Takes just a few minutes to install into your nano, and best of all, it's free! It starts reducing your nitrate and phosphate within the first week, and after a few weeks they usually hit zero. This of course means your algae in your tank starts melting away!
A Turf Algae Filter is simply a "screen" that you put into your nano's hood, where water will flow across it. You then add a bright light, and you are done. Here is the 5 gal nano that I used as the test (I did not care how ugly it was)...
Here is the screen:
You put the screen in the nano's hood, where water will flow across it:
You add a light that shines on the screen, and you're done!...
In case your nano's hood is closed on the top, you might have to cut open a small square hatch so you can get the light real close to the screen (strong light is the most important requirement for this filter.)
The most powerful feature of a Turf Algae Filter is that it leaves food particles in the tank so the corals can feed, yet it removes nitrates and phosphates (which cause algae), most of the time down to zero! This is the OPPOSITE of what a skimmer does; a skimmer removes food particles (so corals starve) and then leaves the nitrate and phosphate in the water so you have to use other methods to get the nitrate and phosphate out. And how about all that gunk that skimmers pull out? Well, half of it is food that you just fed, and your corals wanted to eat it. What about the other half, the waste? Well, that's food too! Of course with nano's, size is a huge concern, and skimmers are just too big. A Turf Algae Filter actually fits into the hood you already have.
The process of using turf algae to filter aquariums has been around for decades, but the contraptions were just too huge and expensive, and for some reason nobody thought to make a simple one in a nano hood. It's simple enough (and free) that you should try one on your system even if you have no intention of eliminating your skimmer, etc. The principal is very simple: You have a screen; light is aimed at the screen, and tank water is streamed over the screen. What happens is that algae starts growing on the screen, and this algae eats almost all the nitrate and phosphate in the water flowing over it (and so the algae in your tank will not have anything to eat!). However, the turf does NOT eat the food/pods/plankton in the water, so this food will stay in the water for the corals to eat. This is the OPPOSITE of a skimmer, which takes out the food/pods/plankton (so corals starve), but leaves in the nitrate and phosphate that you have to then get out using other means. What about fish waste that skimmers normally pull out? Well that's food too, for somebody! Only after waste decomposes completely into nitrate and phosphate is it no longer "food", and at that point the turf zaps it! After all, what do you think the green algae on your rocks and glass are eating? Food? No. Nitrate and phosphate!
You might ask why you have not heard of turf algae filters before. Well turf algae is actually used quite a bit in commercial/industrial areas to clean lakes and rivers, but the units that were built for aquariums were just too big (as big as a 200 gal tank) and expensive ($3,000+). So they never caught on. But all they do is move water across a screen, and have a light. So putting a turf screen directly in your nano hood works just fine.
The only thing you need to decide is how big your screen needs to be. The basic rule for a one-sided screen (like nano's use) is two square inches of screen for each gallon of tank water. Thus a 12 gal nano tank needs just 24 square inches (4 X 6 inches) in the hood! This small thing replaces the skimmer, refugium, phosphate removers, nitrate removers, carbon, filtersocks, and possibly even waterchanges, if the purpose these things is to reduce nitrate and phosphate.
My example 5 gal version took about 5 minutes to build. I can feed the tank as much food as I did before, and anything not eaten eventually ends up as algae on the screen. The difference is that the nitrate and phosphate are WAY WAY low! Here's how a turf algae filter compares to other nano filtering options: