Red Mangroves

[wpspfan]

Does anyone have any experence with them? I am thinking about buying some and putting them in my refugium. Any input will be apperciated.

[dakar]

Sure, we had about a dozen or so that we'd started in the refugium on the 180, prety much just stuck them into the sand and left them alone and they did very well for us. Just be certain you have a pretty deep sandbed for them to take root. In 6 month's time the root system was crazy long. They'll require a lot of vertical room to grow after a while as well.

They are really pretty slow growers and don't remove a lot of nutrients from your system, but they are cool to watch grow. If you are looking for maxium nutrient export there are better choices.

[wpspfan]

The better choices are?

[dakar]

.............Any of the fast growing macro algaes. Chaetomorpha is one of the more popular, but any of the calurpa types will do well too, they are just higher maintenance requiring more frequent pruning as they can grow very quickly and get out of hand.

Just a logical deduction on my part, if it grows faster then it must be taking up more nutirients to sustain that growth. I don't really have a shred of solid evidence to back that theory up.

But don't take this the wrong as I mentioned Mangroves are really cool to look at, so maybe BOTH would be a good choice

[wpspfan]

Thanks, alot

[playa0069u]

I dont know about that I was doing some research on them, and found a page full of graphs and whatnot, stating the reduction of nitrates in HOURS!!! I will try to find it for you if you are still interested.???

[playa0069u]

pm if you do it's no problem just incase I forget lol

[seahorsedreams]

I would love to see the information you found about them being excellent nutrient exporters. Everything I have ever read and heard has been quite the contrary. It is said they can indeed lower nitrates.... in numbers. The numbers usually found in your average sump does little for nitrate removal. But I really would like to hear what you found :-)

[JustDavidP]

FYI... this article mirrors my findings (in a non scientific method) in that your "typical" macro algae is more efficient in nutrient reduction.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2005/3/lines

After planting many mangroves in my system, I saw very little reduction in nitrate levels. After switching back to a more traditional macro program in my fuge, the nitrates did, in fact, drop.

Don't get me wrong, I LOVE mangroves. They are interesting, a nice looking addition to a biological system, and just plain "cool", but did little for my upkeep but reduce my magnesium levels.

D

[JustDavidP]

If you are interested in keeping them as a mere "specimen" in your system(s), I really enjoyed Sir Calfo's article here:

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-1...ture/index.php

D