Refugium Help Please

I am currently running a 55g reef tank, i am looking into setting up a refugium as i have a green mandarin dragonet. If anyone could give me some advice as to how to build one or how to get the supplies or an already built one for cheap it woul be much appreciated

 

Building one would difinetly be alot cheaper than buying one. Either Google refugiums or PM either Tangster, Otty or CoralReefer.

 

thanks again luna

 

You can just buy a 10g aquarium and T off your OF to feed the fuge. Have a hole drilled in the side of it and set it next to your sump and let it drain back to your sump so you can return water to the display tank. Put a T-valve in the line so you can slow the flow down to 1/10 the size of the display tank. Example 100g = 10gph, 55g = 5.5gph across the fuge.

 

We have something in common. I have a 55 gal tank too. Using a 10 gallon tank, I made one. The link is here.

Here's a pic. It was pretty easy to make.

 

check out this thread

 

I am using a 5 gallon bucket for a fuge. However, your decision to have a mandarin is yours, but I would recommend that if you plan on keeping him alive that in addition to a fuge you have a large rubble pile of rock somewhere in your system to help boost your pod population... Dragonets are notorious pod eaters and will quickly decimate the pod population in your tank. I wouldn't even recommend them for any tank smaller than a 90 gallon due to this fact. I tried a mandarin in my 55 gallon once and it starved after a few months.. Some get lucky and they will eat prepared foods, but thats rare...

 

I built my own as well, but I wanted to have a sump in mine as well as a refugium. Mine consists of:

20g long from petsmart
plexiglass from home depot
ViaAqua 2600 from MarineDepot
Dosing pump to pull air from the overflow
Overflow from Aquatraders

Mine is setup where the left side of the 20g is the fuge and the right side is the sump, they both drain in to the middle where it's returned to the main tank. I just split the line coming from the overflow into each side of the tank. Using 2 ball valves I can adjust the flow exactly how I want it.