Red Seaweed in sump????

[Heineken]

I saw a tank today that had a bunch of red seaweed above live rock rubble in the sump. Not sure of the scientific name, but I've seen it being fed to tangs and stuff. Anyway he had a miniture PC light above his sump (I guess a mock refugium of some sort) to "grow" this red seaweed. And parts of it did actually look like it was alive and even growing.

How is this benificial for the tank? Or is he just "growing" this seaweed to feed his fish. Also, there were tons of these tiny insect looking things swimming around and between the seaweed in this sump. Are these pods? If they are, I always thought pods were only in the sand.

Lastly, I bought some of this stuff to test it out. But before I do, I would like to hear what you guys have to say about it. And if it is safe, should I pour the water that came with the seaweed. It has all of these swimming things in it. Beneficial or no?

Before I forget, I'm only on my 2-3 day of cycling. TIA!

 

[scuba_steve]

my guess would be tang heaven not sure the tech name right now and to tired to look it up ! you can see it at www.ipsf.com
its beneficial in two ways one it absorbs nutrients and also good for the fish
not pods they prob mysis shrimp if they were swimming
most algaes need to be acclimated just like inverts so my guess is that it might not fair well due to your tanks so young ! but worth a try ! if it dont live at least ya know were to get more when ya tanks stable !

 

[Heineken]

I do not know if there were shrimp or not, but they were almost microscopic. Tons of them swimming around. He said that the mandarins like to eat them. Anyway I dumped out the water and put the red algae in my sump in hopes of benificial bio-filtration and growing some with a mini pc light over it.

 

[indy]

Most likely your talking about this:
http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_Display.cfm?pCatId=1127
It's good stuff, don't know if it will survive your cycle.

 

[seaham358]

Seeing as your still going throught the cycle it may not live. Sounds like differnet kinds of pods your talking about. After the tanks cycles having clauerpa/micro algae in your sump will help out by controling nitrates. You will need a light on the sump to keep it alive.

 

[Heineken]

would a mini PC light be good enough? I've seen some with 13w to 18w. Would that be sufficient? Also, could you recommend a brand and website?