I have a 125 gal tank. i have live sand as my substrate and i have 150lbs of live rock. i want to have fish and some soft corals like mushrooms but nothing that requires high high lighting so just soft corals. with all the live rock and i will have a skimmer, is a canister filter ok to use? or do I HAVE to have a sump??
canister filter....
- Thread starter cak119
- Start date
Civicdemon
Go Big Or Go Home !
You dont need to have a sump, But trust me it has more benefits. First of if you do have a canister filter and run it with pads a cleaninf media you will need to Turn it off every 2 or 3 days and clean it replace media and what not. Now you can use one if you just want to use it to run carbon and Phosfate stuff in it and it should be fine.
In A Saltwater tank You live rock is your mains sorce of Filtration.
If you plan on having Corals and stuff like that i would really get a sump and bigger would be better. The Sump is going to add water volume to your system. remember the Solution to Polution is Dilution. LOL Heard that before and its very true. Anothe rgood thing about the sump would be that you can add more live rock in it you can put your heaters in it and skimmer. So your tank looks cleaner. You can also add Reactors in the Sump that way you can still run your carbon and other media. Plus If you do run filter socks like i do. There quick and easy to replace and clean.
When i first started out i used 2 Canister filters and i was able to keep nitrates and everything down. My only thing was i had to clean them every 2 to 3 days and if i did not my nitrates would rise really fast. So i switched to a sump/ Refugium and will never look back.
In A Saltwater tank You live rock is your mains sorce of Filtration.
If you plan on having Corals and stuff like that i would really get a sump and bigger would be better. The Sump is going to add water volume to your system. remember the Solution to Polution is Dilution. LOL Heard that before and its very true. Anothe rgood thing about the sump would be that you can add more live rock in it you can put your heaters in it and skimmer. So your tank looks cleaner. You can also add Reactors in the Sump that way you can still run your carbon and other media. Plus If you do run filter socks like i do. There quick and easy to replace and clean.
When i first started out i used 2 Canister filters and i was able to keep nitrates and everything down. My only thing was i had to clean them every 2 to 3 days and if i did not my nitrates would rise really fast. So i switched to a sump/ Refugium and will never look back.
2XAl
Salt Addict
I ran a canister filter also and couldn't get my nitrates down. I followed the advice of everyone on here and ditched the canister. That tank didn't have a sump either- it had plenty of live rock and a well established substrate. My newish tank (9 months now) has a sump filled with LR rubble and a 4" sand bed. My nitrates rarely get above 20 now.
