UV WORTH IT?

[andywg]

yes they are well worth the money white spot fungus or any kind of parasites i havnt had any of them in my tank since the late 80s dont knock it until you have tryed it millions of salt tank keepers cant be wrong

I can back this up from experience, had an outbreak of Ich on my 180. The meds weren't really doing a lot, added the UV and it was gone in days never to return.

The upkeep is not as bad as people will say, and it can often be thrown on a sump or cannister return.

Strangely the only real scientific paper I can find on using it against Ich is that it is great in a multi tank centralised sytstem to prevent the outbreak, but they were concerned that in a single tankt he life cycle can move from substrate to fish without having to go through the UV.

But it works fantastic for me. Use it on every tank over 40 gallons.

Andy

 

[messiner]

im frickin goin for it, the store hired me on the spot last week so i can get a good deal on one. im sick of the yellow green hue in my tank!!!

 

[Nic]

UV is excellent imo...but get as big a unit as you can afford, less than 25 watts is almost redundant....

what about 18watts on a 90 ill get 25 but 18 is pretty sweet deal

 

[DeLgAdO]

I think there is also such a thing as having your tank 'too sterile'. I have no personal experience with this but have heard from a few people that UV sterilisation can reduce the fishes natural immune system. By destroying all harmful organic components in the water, the fishes immune system has nothing to fight against and therefore weakens because its not needed. It only takes exposure to a harmful organism again and your fishes immune system cant cope?

ive always thought about that if water was always disenfected

you could look at it the other way

healthier fish

but thinking about this some more, i dont think a uv could do this.

perhaps an ozonizer though.......

but the benifits do out weigh the risks

 

[DeLgAdO]

definitely better than nopthing, it just needs a slow flow rate to ensure maximum exposure time.
UV doesn't eradicate everything...it controls it...it can only 'zap' what passes through it...so a sterile environment is not really possible

now if you talking ozonizers....

they pretty much toast EVERYTHING!!

 

[messiner]

so if i get one im lookin at clearer water, and healthier fish right? sounds good to me

 

[rkc772]

I think there is also such a thing as having your tank 'too sterile'. I have no personal experience with this but have heard from a few people that UV sterilisation can reduce the fishes natural immune system. By destroying all harmful organic components in the water, the fishes immune system has nothing to fight against and therefore weakens because its not needed. It only takes exposure to a harmful organism again and your fishes immune system cant cope?

i agree with hardb0iled, fish is like humans... as we were studying... too clean is not the way of life. we need some dirt. we won't get immune if were not expose to certain organisms (ex. is chiken pox). the more bacterial we are expose to the more immune our body is and actually stronger. I say it's the same with all animals. they don't have UV in rivers. regular water change, water chemistry check, and temp. you'll do fine, that's my opinion.
if the water is to clean and suddenly it becomes dirty you might end up loosing fish

 

[hardb0iled]

I havent had a disease in my tanks for as long as I can remember, no UV, nothing special, the tank in questions was pretty stable though(ie. no new fish/plants introduced that often), no medications ever used. If a tank is free from infections, can it develop an infection without adding anything new to it(fish or plants)?

I could see that it might be advantageous to have it if your always adding to the tank or changing things around etc. or the green water thing, but a well maintained stable tank shouldnt really need it should it?

 

[rkc772]

i agree with hardB0iled.

 

[MarlboroMan]

I am going to get UV as soon as I can. It cant hurt. Plus all the tanks ive seen with UV looked clear and very healthy. There will always be dirt in the tank that the UV cannot sterylize.