auto feeder/auto-top off drip?

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pspiegel

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
Sep 25, 2006
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I am going away and for 10 days this month my tank will be unattended. I was wondering if anyone had a recommendation on how to feed my fish in my 14gallon nano cube while I am away.. I already have timers on the lights and hopefully my cleanup crew will keep things under control when I am gone, but I was wondering if there was a way to automatically feed the fish?

or if they will be fine just living off the rock? there are only two clowns in the tank
 
10 days I would say they need to be fed in that time. You can just get whoever adds the FW top off to your tank. It wont survive 10 days of no top off water. In a tank that size your salinity will double without it.
 
I would say leave a premeasured ammount of food when top offs are done they can feed the ammount you have set aside......Medicine cups work well for this ... they probably will only need fed 3 times while you are gone... Or you could feed them right before you leave and right when you get back .. Some of my guys get fed only 1 x a week ....
In a tank that size your salinity will double without it.
Absolutely
 
well small problem.. for those 10 days, no one at all will be with the tank.. i personally won't be there for three weeks and i have someone who is going to take care of the tank for the whole time excluding 10 days where they will be gone for the holidays.. can i get an auto top off device and put that with a jug of fresh water and then also get some form of auto feeder for that time period?

i am going to have my friend do a PWC right before they leave for the 10 days (a week after I leave) and then when they get back from the 10 days away I will have them do another PWC.

I will also have them feed a mixture of frozen mysis/garlic that I will prepare and pre-freeze for them in the medicine cups and also put some flake food in the medicine cup and label them for every other or two days.. (except right now I feed them a small amount daily, it might be too much to ask my friend though to go by daily.. every two days should be ok right?)

However, for those 10 days that no one will be tending to the tank, is there an auto feeding device that might work? along with an auto top off device that is drawing from a jug of distilled water? is there a particular brand of a fairly inexpensive/effective top off device i should look at?

i have two turbo snails and a bunch of the smaller ones/hermit crabs that i figure will help with the algae buildup, i will keep the blinds closed all the time and the lights will be on a timer for about 8 hours of light a day. any other ways to cut down algae?

does this sound like a good plan? i need some advice though on the auto-top off and the auto-feeder though for those 10 days..
 
Yes if you had both of those you should be OK. But to me your top off is more important even though I cant fathom not eating for 10 days. But I do agree if you had the top off and auto feeder you should be OK. Might run into a little money. Good Luck.
 
melosu58 said:
Yes if you had both of those you should be OK. But to me your top off is more important even though I cant fathom not eating for 10 days. But I do agree if you had the top off and auto feeder you should be OK. Might run into a little money. Good Luck.

just got back from my LFS, got an auto feeder and they told me i could use a water bottle with a tube and valve to control the drip for an auto top off.. does that sound like a reasonable idea?
 
As long as you are getting some FW in there to keep from getting high salinity then you`ll be OK.
 
melosu58 said:
As long as you are getting some FW in there to keep from getting high salinity then you`ll be OK.

thanks, in your experience do you think that one drop per second will be enough to a. keep the salinity down, and b. not use up the entire water bottle over the course of three weeks or so?
 
I have seen ATOs made by using an airpump hooked up to a timer that pressurizes the bottle and forces the water out another tube into the tank... I would recommend running it for a day or two so that you can tweek the ammount of time that the timer is on also use a check valve turned around so that it wont empty your tank out
 
i was thinking of just doing a drip into the tank of about one drop per second from a water bottle... do you think that would be enough to keep up with evaporation?
 
to risky for over flowing you system IMHHO
1gtt/sec=4cc/min=240cc/hr=5760=24/hr=3/4 gallon per day I would say an ATO is in your safest intrest depending on what your evap rate is
 
That was my concern when I first saw that I was wondering if you even had that much of an evaporation rate.
 
Just another thought that may help you is to use a glass top I knwo it isnt the best idea but will help with the evap you could use an air pump to help keep the airation going with it....
 
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