Appreciation post: Picking a refugium light over a new skimmer for my 40 gallon

I had about $80 to spend on my tank last month and I was stuck between a fancy new protein skimmer or a simple refugium light. I went with the light (a little clip-on one from Amazon) and put some chaeto in my back chamber. Two weeks later my nitrates dropped from 15ppm to like 5ppm, and the pods are going crazy in there. Has anyone else seen a bigger impact from a cheap refugium setup than they expected?

2 comments

2 Comments

paige_martin7d ago

My lfs guy was telling me about this exact thing actually... he runs a 75 gallon with just a cheap light over his fuge and says his skimmer barely pulls anything anymore. Said the chaeto outcompetes everything in the water column and the pods basically become a secondary food source for the fish... heard it's way more stable than relying on a skimmer that can crash or overflow too.

jake_walker7d ago

I had a buddy who went the same route on his 20 gallon, picked up a cheap light for his fuge instead of upgrading his skimmer. His tank was sitting at 20ppm nitrates for months and after a few weeks with chaeto he was down to under 10ppm. He swears the pods in his display tripled within a month.