freshwater refugium

[kewlkatdady]

So I know alot of Salties use refugiums...

but why couldn't a freshwwater set up have one also...

stock it with plants and let the plants process the nitrates out of your water?

make sense?

thoughts?

[biggin]

I have been curious about this also....

[AndrewH]

Wet/Dry (sumps) are a good way to do this in the freshwater world.

Simply plant lots of plants (even terrarium plants) to help eat up the nitrates.

[Vivarium Concepts]

Pothos is a good 'cleaner' plant, they can suck up a lot!

[kewlkatdady]

I have a plant in mind...but I'll have to do some more research. Updates to come...

[kewlkatdady]

pothos is just your basic household ivy right?

doesn't that do better potted and lightly watered?

[Vivarium Concepts]

It is kind of 'ivy' looking.
Actually it will grow very well in water. Pothos is somewhat bullet proof. We use it in the froglet grow out tanks, where all it has to root in is sphagnum. Have you seen the betta vases? A lot of times these have pothos growing in them.

[kewlkatdady]

sphagnum
moss huh?

is the pothos a submersible plant? Fish safe?

[Vivarium Concepts]

Here ya go, everything you ever wanted to know about sphagnum......and them some!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sphagnum

[Vivarium Concepts]

In the Sept issue of National Geographic, there is a artical about finding bodies in peat bogs in Europe and Ireland, that were remarkable well preserved. Tales from the bog.

[kewlkatdady]

yeah sphagnum...won't work for me...

"Sphagnum and the peat formed from it do not decay readily because of the phenolic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phenolic) compounds embedded in the moss's cell walls. Peat moss can also acidify (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acid) its surroundings by taking up cations (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cations) such as calcium (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calcium) and magnesium (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnesium) and releasing hydrogen (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen) ions."

This will be on an African tank...

Could I just plant the pothos in a bed of crushed coral?

[Vivarium Concepts]

No, sphagnum will probably not work for your application. I mentioned the pothos growing in the sphagnum, just to give you an idea that it doesn't need much to grow in, and it will probably grow in crushed coral.

[kewlkatdady]

hmmm....

this might actually do well, as I think that pothos may be rigid enough not to get eaten up by the africans....

I may just try it in the tank and forget the refuguim.

[AndrewH]

Hmmm, tell me more about sphagnum. Is there a particular one you recommend for submersed, inside an aquarium?

[kewlkatdady]

this thread is about a refuguim...remember...:threadjack::whistle:



















j/k...by all means spread the knowledge...

[rolloffhill]

Isn't that the same stuff bear gryll's jumped in??

Sorry couldn't help myself....:threadjack:

[kewlkatdady]

lol...so skipp...you coming?

[Vivarium Concepts]

Andrew, sphagnum will probably not grow submersed. I don't think this is what you want for the refugium.
The pothos will work in the refugium, I pictured it growing out of the refugium, or partially submersed. I don't know if it will grow totally submerged.
Kewlkatdady, when you asked if it would grow in crushed coral, I didn't realize you were asking about it being planed in the tank, totally submerged.
If you think about it, there are a lot of terrestrial, and marginal plants that get labled and sold as 'aquarium' plants, but I can't say that I have ever seen pothos sold or labled ths way. On the flip side, there are a lot of 'aquarium' plants that are tradionally grown submerged that we can acclimate to grow terresterially, anubias is a good example.
And Rolloffhill, it's JELLO!

[kewlkatdady]

yeah in a refuguim any plant would be totally submersed...

I don't know enough about freshwater plants...so the ideal plant would be a plant that would consume high amounts of nitrates...
and the plant would need to be high Ph adaptible...

other than that...I would even care what they looked like...as the refuguim would likely be under the tank....

[AndrewH]

Andrew, sphagnum will probably not grow submersed. I don't think this is what you want for the refugium.
The pothos will work in the refugium, I pictured it growing out of the refugium, or partially submersed. I don't know if it will grow totally submerged.
Kewlkatdady, when you asked if it would grow in crushed coral, I didn't realize you were asking about it being planed in the tank, totally submerged.
If you think about it, there are a lot of terrestrial, and marginal plants that get labled and sold as 'aquarium' plants, but I can't say that I have ever seen pothos sold or labled ths way. On the flip side, there are a lot of 'aquarium' plants that are tradionally grown submerged that we can acclimate to grow terresterially, anubias is a good example.
And Rolloffhill, it's JELLO!

Ok, so we're talking about two different plants here: Pothos and Sphagnum.

The reason I'm so interested is due to the "hard to kill" factor. What about floating it on top of the water?

[Vivarium Concepts]

Yes, we are talkng about two different plants.
Probably would do ok floating.

[ElijahTurtle]

I'll kick in my 2 cents here. This got kicked around for a while on fishgeeks a couple of years ago. There were several members over there using a variety of houseplants to consume tank wastes since most will consume nutrients that aquatic plants won't. Most of them just hung Ivy down in the water.
One of the best ideas I saw was a planter box filled with coarse gravel that had an inlet in one in & an outlet in the other. It was feed from the tank by a powerhead/pump & the water returned to the tank via the overflow at the other end. I almost did this to my 55G but wife didn't like the idea of "water outside the tank"

A refugium would work in a FW simply because any increase in water capacity is a good thing in this hobby. The general concept behind the refugium is to provide a safe place for microscopic life & macro algae to thrive away from the predatory fish/inverts in the main tank.
In an african tank where plants are typically eaten along with everything else, it would be a great addition.

[rolloffhill]

I actually have one of those planter boxes, (if I can find it) I forgot about that until you just said something. I vaguely remember talking about this on the other site. I may put that thing to use on my discus tank. My brother gave it to me a while back.

[ElijahTurtle]

Yeah I think I mentioned it over there along time ago when the topic came up there.

[AndrewH]

I actually have one of those planter boxes, (if I can find it) I forgot about that until you just said something. I vaguely remember talking about this on the other site. I may put that thing to use on my discus tank. My brother gave it to me a while back.

Groovy, get us some pictures if you can. I'd be interested in seeing what one looks like and how it's constructed as all the scenarios I'm imaging involve water running over the top if the flow wasn't balanced just right.

[rolloffhill]

From memory it was just an acrylic rectangular box with a inlet and outlet. I'll get it and snap some shots if ya'll remind me.

[biggin]

I was to think how it would work....

[ElijahTurtle]

Water doesn't have to flow through it very fast & you don't want the box to stay full of water just enough to keep the bottom of the roots wet. So if you have a large outlet drain an inch or so high on one end, and just run a low flow pump to it you should be fine.

[greeneyed]

BAh, just hook it to your ebb and flow hydroponic systems.

[Did I say that out loud?]

[kewlkatdady]

I have a plant in mind...but I'll have to do some more research. Updates to come...

BAh, just hook it to your ebb and flow hydroponic systems.

[Did I say that out loud?]


Kinda what I was wondering about...

[China8USA]

The plants do not have to be submerged. Just the roots need contact. Now if you go with the wet-dry or sump option, the plants can grow out of the sump. You may need to keep them contained or trimmed. But growth and trimming is nutrient export at its finest!

[AndrewH]

Yeah, I was just thinking about growing some ivy in pots in the wet/dry. Or even some potatoes :D

[mike]

you could use one of those floating breeder things
you what im talking about you put fish in them and when they have babies they drop to the bottom ,, well if you put one of those in the sump tank it would only cover the roots with water then you would only have to trim then like stated before just a thought if you want to grow somthing that can not be sumerged

[China8USA]

Yeah, I was just thinking about growing some ivy in pots in the wet/dry. Or even some potatoes :D


Grow what you really want to grow.:Smoker:

[arnold]

http://www.goliadfarms.com/pages/about/plant_filters.htm