Can I get away with not using a protein skimmer on my JBJ RL-45?

[TortillaMan]

So I have a JBJ RL-45 and it has two intake spots that cleaned by filter floss—-> sponge—-> chemical media on one die and the same for the other intake. I have the coral life 65g skimmer that came with my used tank. I set everything up as a dry run. Without water. Turns out it looks very ugly and slightly dysfunctional due to some of the tubing, blocking the return nozzle. So, I was thinking to put a Tunze 9004 skimmer in one of the baffle areas. I’ve seen someone do it before somewhere else, and it worked perfectly fine for them without removing the intake filtration area.

Could I get away with only having a fuge and not a skimmer? I plan to have a pair of clowns, pistol shrimp and goby, fire goby, clean up crew of a skunk cleaner, conch, hermits and various snails. My main concern is nutrient export and having to do larger water changes. Like BRS says if it’s easy you are likely to do it. I also plan to have some very basic beginner corals. No SPS corals or anything crazy. Beginner lighting to no way I’m going to do 350 par L O L. That fuge would be nice because of sucking up extra phosphates and nitrates. Or should I just get the skimmer and have an intake fuge in a box by one of the return nozzles?

The tank is in a high visibility area so of course it’s going to be stocked to the maximum on corals and fish. The fish I mentioned will be my minimum of the fish I want. Mainly the shrimp goby pair and the clown fish. Can’t have a reef tank with out clown fish lol. I will of course have a lid because I can’t take any chances. Might not get the fire goby but we will see . I want to get my equipment all lined up first before I start to cycle.

 

[MarineandReef Jaron]

No tank "Needs" a skimmer. I have a 75-gallon tank at home with no skimmer, a 12 gallon tank with no skimmer, and many public aquariums have no skimmer. When I toured the 5.7 million gallon exhibit at Disney World they had no skimmer.

The bigger question is, "Is a skimmer worth using?".

Using a skimmer requires buying one putting it in the tank and cleaning and maintaining it. You get improved water clarity, improved aeration, and a reduced bioload through the removal of DOCs before they decompose into nitrate and phosphate.

As someone who has 2 tanks without a skimmer, the main thing I notice is I get a distinct tint to the water that necessitates regularly using activated carbon. On my tanks with a skimmer, I may only add carbon every several months but I get a noticeable brown tint to the tanks that are skimmerless so I continually run carbon to make up for this.

 

[Nano_Man]

I don’t use skimmers only regular water changes

 

[exnisstech]

I have skimmers running now but went several years without them with no issues. I don't really pull a lot so I probably don't need them but I like them for aeration and I have the bedroom tank skimmer pulling air from the attic to help the pH drop I was getting at night.