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A few newbie questions I haven´t found an answer to on the forums

I´m a newbie and have been reading a lot about this all, and I have a plan for a small system in my garage under a grow light.

Few things I haven't found an answer to on the forums/internet (may its there, but I can't find it).

1. When thinking about size of system in terms of stability of it (pH/temp fluctuations etc) does one add the volumes of both the fish tank and the sump tank (that is - total volume of the system) ?

I´m just wondering because I have a hard time finding a big enough tote here in my city in Iceland (largest I´ve found is only about 90 liters), so I thought it would be a good idea to use two totes like that (180 litters) and use one as a sump tank.

2. In one of her videos, Sylvia said that with a sump tank you would put the pump in the sump tank and pump the water from it to the grow beds AND fish tank, for the all of it to make its way back to the sump tank. So my question is - why pump water to the fish tank if the overflow coming from the grow beds to the fish tank make their way over to the sump tank anyways ?

3. Related to question nr.2 ....... if pump is in Sump tank and pumps to grow media, then siphons to fish tank, and water flows by gravity from water surface of the fish tank to sump tank with overflow, will it not be harder to get the solids away from the fish and in to the grow beds? I´m thinking that they will sink to the bottom of the fish tank and build up there.

Kind regards :)

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Permalink Reply by Jon Nose on August 11, 2014 at 4:44pm

1) yes

2) If possible pump sump to fish tanks and gravity flow to gravel beds.. then to float beds then to to sump....