algea questions before it gets out of control.

[hpi_jeep]

From my brief research on the web the algea i am seeing on my live rock and on my substrate is a form of red algea. i have redirected flow to try and delete and dead spots i may have had. it is also my understanding that i need some critters to stir the sand up.
i have 10 very small hermit crabs,1 med size sally light foot crab,1 med size sally light foot, 6 turbo snails, also a brittle star (not sure if they aid in stirring sand?)
all my crabs are too concerned about hanging out on my live rock and nothing is stirring up substrate. i am going to either order or visit LFS to get a critter.

i do have a button polyp. can i leave my lights off and tank completely dark for a couple days without killing coral?

[tkeracer619]

Yes I have left tanks without lights on for 7 days in total darkness. Full of sps, lps, and polyps.

Cerith and nassarius snails will help with the sandbed.

Trocus is one of the best reef snails you can buy but they will hang out on the rocks. They are more pricey though.

Don't by onyx nassarius or margarita snails. They are not for reef tanks and I would not purchase from a store that sells them.

Your algae is coming from excess nutrients. Just adding clean up crew will not solve the problem.

You need to reduce nitrates and phosphates. GFO is one of the easiest methods for reducing algae.

Chances are your algae isn't actually algae but is cyano bacteria. Post a pic so you can get a real identification.

Tell us about the tank. Size, livestock, feeding, lighting, and filtration. We will be able to help you out a lot more if you do.

[Rylan]

Will keeping the lights out for several days hurt the coral though? and get rid of cyano? Im having the same issue as you.

[john_blaze]

corals will do fine without light for a few days. You will notice the algae will start to recede but like tk said its the fact that you have excess nutrients that is fueling the algae in the first place. A big water change will help, consider a macroalgae to compete for nutrients, watch how much you are feeding (lots of uneaten food = algae).

for a CUC I highly recommend you think about astrea snails, they are VORACIOUS algae eaters. I have been reading hermits are not as herbivorous as we may think. And I would say nassarius snails are a must just because its so cool how they "pop" out of the sand when food hits the water.

HTH

:beer:

[hpi_jeep]

Yes I have left tanks without lights on for 7 days in total darkness. Full of sps, lps, and polyps.

Cerith and nassarius snails will help with the sandbed.

Trocus is one of the best reef snails you can buy but they will hang out on the rocks. They are more pricey though.

Don't by onyx nassarius or margarita snails. They are not for reef tanks and I would not purchase from a store that sells them.

Your algae is coming from excess nutrients. Just adding clean up crew will not solve the problem.

You need to reduce nitrates and phosphates. GFO is one of the easiest methods for reducing algae.

Chances are your algae isn't actually algae but is cyano bacteria. Post a pic so you can get a real identification.

Tell us about the tank. Size, livestock, feeding, lighting, and filtration. We will be able to help you out a lot more if you do.


i will try to get some pictures of. I vacumed most of the problem off of my sand, and brushed it off my rocks and done a 50% water change last night. already traces of it on the rock this evening.
Tank size is 30 gallon. i have 30 lbs of sand, 20lbs of fiji lr, 1 clown, 1 tang (i know tank too small), 10 hermits, 6 turbo snails, sally light foot, brittle star, merald crab, and a skunk shrimp.
a heater 1 378gal/hr power head. a protein skimmer that is also ran with a 378/gal power head. 150watt compact florescent(sp?). I am thinking that describes it. water temp is always 78-79
Ammonia/nitrate/nitrite have never been detected during any testing.
i do at minimum 20% WC weekly.

can you explain GFO?

[tkeracer619]

GFO is a media that absorbs phosphates.

You run it in a bag or a media reactor. Check bulkreefsupply.com for a great price on it. It will exhaust really quickly at first as it sucks up the phosphates (within hours). Once you suck up the free floating it will start to allow the phosphates to leach back out of the rock which takes longer. Once phosphates are no longer an issue it can last a good long while.

Skim more as well. Set it wetter.

What are you using for water?

[hpi_jeep]

GFO is a media that absorbs phosphates.

You run it in a bag or a media reactor. Check bulkreefsupply.com for a great price on it. It will exhaust really quickly at first as it sucks up the phosphates (within hours). Once you suck up the free floating it will start to allow the phosphates to leach back out of the rock which takes longer. Once phosphates are no longer an issue it can last a good long while.

Skim more as well. Set it wetter.

What are you using for water?

premixed saltwater from petco. came in 5gal boxes. for the top off's i have been using "purified drinking water" from the grocery store. it is not de ionized but it is reverse osmosys and ozonated. and that's what i have been rinsing my hydrometer, brush, skimmer cup. anything that go's in or comes out of my tank gets rinsed with it. so not one drop of tap water has came in contact with my fish tank.

[tkeracer619]

Get a hand held TDS meter. Test that water. You might be surprised.

I think the NSW from petco it catalina water if I recall correctly. Should be good to go there.

Tap water is not like anthrax for fish tanks. Enough of it is bad but it is much easier to use tap to clean the skimmer. It won't hurt anything.

[hpi_jeep]

Get a hand held TDS meter. Test that water. You might be surprised.

I think the NSW from petco it catalina water if I recall correctly. Should be good to go there.

Tap water is not like anthrax for fish tanks. Enough of it is bad but it is much easier to use tap to clean the skimmer. It won't hurt anything.

i'll order some gfo today. I would like to avoid a reactor if at all possible. So I just take the media place a small amount in a bag, wait till it disolves rinse and repeat?
i Do not have any way of testing posphate. can too much of this media be a bad thing?

[HowieB]

Every couple of months I completely cover my tank with black plastic I made out of garbage bags. I leave it on for 3 full days. When it comes off there isn't a sign of algae and all fish & corals are doing fine. Between that and a GFO reactor, I've eliminated my algae problem. I also have a couple of sand sifting starfish that keep the top of my sandbed clean.

[dublo8]

you need a reactor to run GFO. bulk reef supply sells them for a good price as well as the GFO. Another option is chemi-pure elite. it has a little gfo in it already and comes pre packaged in filter bag, but you need to run it in a high flow area or with a HOB filter to get the most use out of it. this will not solve all your problems though, you need to find the root cause and I'm pretty positive it's over feeding. If you dont want to go lights out for a couple of days then I would start feeding every other day vs. every day. Remember though, lights out won't solve the problem either. It may get rid of the algae for a little while but it will come back. So start by feeding less and cutting your photoperiod back 2 hours. Good luck.

[hpi_jeep]

Looks like a reactor is no more than a device that forces water through the gfi media?

[njudson]

Looks like a reactor is no more than a device that forces water through the gfi media?

Yup that is more or less what reactor means in the hobby.

[hpi_jeep]

I seen that I keep calling gfo gfi. Most of my replies are from my phone and it has a spell check with a mind of it's own

[hpi_jeep]

went to the LFS got some GFO media, a bag to put it in. a calcium test kit and a phosphate test kit. will report back with phosphate results. and some chemiclean just in case i can't get things under control with other methods.

[hpi_jeep]

the test results were kind of iffy between 0 and .25 seems like it was a color in between. i have read that ideally phosphates should be 0. it doesnt seem like mine is so out of control i should be having problem though? im going to start taking pictures with a few different camera's and get the best picture of the problem.

[dublo8]

If you have algae in your tank the phosphate test is next to useless. Most of the phosphate is bound up in the algae. I had hair algae out the wazoo and my phosphate kit was reading dang near zero. So take it with a grain of salt. Another thing to look at is the type of food you are feeding. Flake and pellets will have some sort of phosphate in them. Stick with a quality frozen food instead and definetly stay away from the gel food. Gel food is what caused my algae issues in the first place. I know you bought the gfo already but I would highly suggest using it in a reactor or a HOB filter you can take off later.

[hpi_jeep]

If you have algae in your tank the phosphate test is next to useless. Most of the phosphate is bound up in the algae. I had hair algae out the wazoo and my phosphate kit was reading dang near zero. So take it with a grain of salt. Another thing to look at is the type of food you are feeding. Flake and pellets will have some sort of phosphate in them. Stick with a quality frozen food instead and definetly stay away from the gel food. Gel food is what caused my algae issues in the first place. I know you bought the gfo already but I would highly suggest using it in a reactor or a HOB filter you can take off later.

I do plan on making a reactor. i dont have a spare power head at the moment. My idea was to put the bag of GFO in front of my power head until i have a reactor.

Even better yet could i drop a bag of it in my protein skimmer?

[hpi_jeep]

http://www.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/65705f9b38.jpg (http://www.freeimagehosting.net/)

[subpotentjoe]

i wouldn't put anythingin your skimmer. do you have a sump?

[Neptune_Fan]

went to the LFS got some GFO media, a bag to put it in. a calcium test kit and a phosphate test kit. will report back with phosphate results. and some chemiclean just in case i can't get things under control with other methods.

For just a little more money then the "chemiclean just in case" you could have bought a reactor. I think they are well worth the money. Think of it as an investment that will help to protect anymore money you spend on livestock.

[hpi_jeep]

http://www.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/294984d062.jpg (http://www.freeimagehosting.net/)
http://www.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/ef9047326a.jpg (http://www.freeimagehosting.net/)

[hpi_jeep]

For just a little more money then the "chemiclean just in case" you could have bought a reactor. I think they are well worth the money. Think of it as an investment that will help to protect anymore money you spend on livestock.

they require a powerhead to operate. i spent $16 on the chemiclean. that is no where near the price of a powerhead.

I am not trying to skip an important piece and i do plan on having a reactor. i absolutely do not want my tank to fail. I am just trying to get the problem under control untill i have a reactor.
at best it would be a week with shipping to get my reactor up and running.
My LFS didnt have a reactor and he is a little bit over priced on his power heads.

No sump :(


I really do appreciate the advice everyone gives. I dont want anyone to think I am ignoring the advice I receive. I know it takes time out of everyone's day to read and respond to my post. I try to be as descriptive as possible. I always search before I post.
Please do not take my reply's as disregarding any information. Although I do not have unlimited funds I would not ignore a $30-$40 piece of hardware just to skimp by. Thank you everyone for your advice

[subpotentjoe]

EVERYONE goes through these issues and eveyone has an opinion. try stirring up your sand bed a bit and the skimmer will take care of some of it. get some different sand sifting critters they will help. try what you have now and see what it does for you. if it works great! if not then come up with your next plan. report back either way so someone else might use your experience.

[philosophile]

looks like Cyano to me from the pictures...