Water Circulation
In any aquarium, water circulation is a very important factor. The pumps driving the filtration system must be powerful enough to circulate the water through the entire aquarium, drawing water from the main tank into the filter and then pumping it out again.
If you observe a shoreline, as the wave retreats, it takes all the water back into the sea, and with the next waves that rolls in, water comes back to the shore. The turnover rate of the water is instanateous. There is no stagnant water. If you take a reference point as a piece of rock, it is flushed by water action constantly. This is what we hope to achieve in a marine aquarium, to have a high water circulation rate.
In the ocean because of the large volume of water, the a water molecule might never ever return to the same point it was at, or perhaps only after a very long time. This is not the case in aquariums, especially in small aquariums termed as nano tanks. Although water in an aquarium is re-cycled just like in nature's water cycle, the aquarium's water cycle is limited to the volume of water in it. Water circulation is very important, it prevents waste from accumulating in one spot, transporting it to deeper water to dilute its harmfulness and when the waves come in again, they bring 'fresh' water loaded with deep sea nutrients to feed corals and what not.
All pumps come with a flowrate say 1050L/H or 350L/H and in my case those are the flow rates of my filter canisters making a total of 1400L/H and i have a aquarium volume of approximately 100L. Intuitively the water in my tank is cycled 14 times an hour.
Besides the rate of water circulation, the other factor is the way water flows in the entire system. Because its not like in the ocean, water input and output are usually done through pipes so water movement may only be isolated to certain parts of the aquarium depending on how the filter's input and output are positioned. Parts with stagnant water are called dead spots at which waste will accumulate and not be removed by the filter. It is also possible to generate a 'cyclone' effect causing a vortex to draw all waste to the centre. It'd be wise to centre the filter's input at that center but if not, the water flow will draw all waste away form the filter and the filter will not be effective. It is very important to arrange and position filter inlets and outlets to produce maximum water movement eliminating dead spots as well as to make sure that waste are not counter actively hindered from being taken in by the filter.
If you observe a shoreline, as the wave retreats, it takes all the water back into the sea, and with the next waves that rolls in, water comes back to the shore. The turnover rate of the water is instanateous. There is no stagnant water. If you take a reference point as a piece of rock, it is flushed by water action constantly. This is what we hope to achieve in a marine aquarium, to have a high water circulation rate.
In the ocean because of the large volume of water, the a water molecule might never ever return to the same point it was at, or perhaps only after a very long time. This is not the case in aquariums, especially in small aquariums termed as nano tanks. Although water in an aquarium is re-cycled just like in nature's water cycle, the aquarium's water cycle is limited to the volume of water in it. Water circulation is very important, it prevents waste from accumulating in one spot, transporting it to deeper water to dilute its harmfulness and when the waves come in again, they bring 'fresh' water loaded with deep sea nutrients to feed corals and what not.
All pumps come with a flowrate say 1050L/H or 350L/H and in my case those are the flow rates of my filter canisters making a total of 1400L/H and i have a aquarium volume of approximately 100L. Intuitively the water in my tank is cycled 14 times an hour.
Besides the rate of water circulation, the other factor is the way water flows in the entire system. Because its not like in the ocean, water input and output are usually done through pipes so water movement may only be isolated to certain parts of the aquarium depending on how the filter's input and output are positioned. Parts with stagnant water are called dead spots at which waste will accumulate and not be removed by the filter. It is also possible to generate a 'cyclone' effect causing a vortex to draw all waste to the centre. It'd be wise to centre the filter's input at that center but if not, the water flow will draw all waste away form the filter and the filter will not be effective. It is very important to arrange and position filter inlets and outlets to produce maximum water movement eliminating dead spots as well as to make sure that waste are not counter actively hindered from being taken in by the filter.
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