protein skimmers is it must????

Ive said this before, in this hobby opinions are like butt holes, everybody has one, and most disagree with each other.

I know what works for me, and other people I have help setup saltwater tanks.

Me personally, I wouldnt bother getting one UNLESS it was a GREAT deal.

What a lot of people dont realize is skimmers pull iodine out of the water. Iodine is in the salt, iodine promotes healthy growth in soft corals and LPS corals.

 

Sure You Have To Clean You Have To Chang It Is Must. But Bio Ball Yam Not Agree Whith You Dont Cleen It Whith Fresh Water Only By Same Tank Water >>>>>

 

Anybody who knows anything about bio balls will tell you they need to be changed regularly, if not your nitrates will go thru the roof.

 

No nothing is a must all depends on what you want to keep in a given volume of water.. In the 60's we ran natural marine tanks with just air pumps and corner type internal box filters with a bit of carbon and floss worked very well but we only kept a fish or two to a what would be considered a mid size tank by to days standard and a huge tank back then.. say a 55 gallon with 4 large box filters and 2 fish and plants.
Skimmers do far more then remove toxins and waste from the water.. Thats why in nature we have huge sea storms and ocean beach foam. Its natures skimmer.
As for large public Aquariums they have huge skimmers larger then may people homes like a trailer home on its end And most use water from the ocean and its being replaced hourly so that its totally exchanged every few days and those that are land locked use huge pools or Vats AKA sumps to spray the water like a sewer treatment plant to remove gasses and replace them with Oxygen.

But to answer you question is a skimmer necessary ? the flat out answer is a No a skimmer is not a gotta have or is a cannister filter either..all you have to have is a air pump.. Thats all you Have to have..and the tank and water of course

 

The whole debate over if it is important and necessary, IMO is going to be with us for some time! Their are ways of getting by without using a skimmer, however, I feel it is more difficult and comes with more risk involved! Without a skimmer, you will want to perform more water changes to avoid too much waste, DOM, etc. from collecting in your tank. You will also want to increase water circulation to help rid your tank of excess CO2 and continually add O2.
Their are risks involved with not usuing a skimmer, and since I am not a gambling man, I wouldn't want to play against those odds! It holds true more so for someone who is new to the hobby!
I would read about skimmers(their are many articles out their to help you make your decision)...
You could also get by without using an air filter on a car for a while as well, but why would you and eventually you will end up paying for it!

 

Hey, in the 1970's, I had a 55g SW tank which was over stocked and all I had was a DSB, air driven undergravel filter and a Dynaflow and AquaKing HOT box filters. I had no algae problems and never had any diseases or fish loss for 5 yrs. In fact, I had better success then, than I do now. Only did water changes every 3 months mostly with Ocean water from the rockaway area in NY. All I did was vacuum tha tank once a month and run vortex diatom filter at the same time. So I agree, a skimmer is not a must.

 

Had my tank since 93'. Never used a skimmer. Used to do H2O changes based on the fish, however, found only recently to do reefs takes more readings that one can't see visually. Probably depends on how much time you have to devote to your tank.

kwc

 

thanks kwc and raven for this replys its realy better than tangstar reply who think him self professional in this matter put i dont think so.

 

Think about what Tangster said??? When you go to the beach and the oceans tides are coming in, what do you see????? Foam!! Foam being filtered by the sand. Do you think that is just a freek of nature or do you think there is something happening there. After you or if you run a skimmer for a while and see all the dirty junk it pulls out you will see why people use them. I just visited the Newport Aquarium and their shark tank alone has 3 skimmer that are the 2/3 the size of my home. The only other thing they use is fluidize sand bed filters for the hole aquarium. If you don't want to use one then don't. Run your tank for a while and see what happens. Your bio load may not be big enough to warrant one. If it is you will only be paying money out for chemicals to fix probems as they arrise later on.

 

Get a skimmer dude, save any hassles down the track