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01/31/2015, 10:12 AM | #226 | |
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Chris Kirkland Reef Nerd. Current Tank Info: Getting back into the hobby. |
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01/31/2015, 10:55 AM | #227 |
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I just want to pick up your spirits a little bit. I have also been battling a fierce algae outbreak of my own. I had to discipline myself to think long and act slowly in order to get it under control. I had a phosphate dump from some eggcrate I put into a new frag tank plumbed into the system. Have been fighting a nasty brown algae and green bubble and green hair. I read up,removed as much manually as possible and installed a reactor with 1/2 the recommended GFO and waited. The PO4 would drop and then creep back up, so I would add 10% more GFO and wait. Slowly the PO4 has gotten down to .08 and stable there. I have actually had to increase nitrates as they were less than 2ppm. It has taken 6 weeks but sand now stays clean and the snails can keep other surfaces clean. I have no tang in tank to eat algae as it's only a 40 breeder so I have to rely on the CUC of snails and hermits. Please make small changes . My acro colors are best they have ever been, cleaner and brighter, less muddy looking.I know it's hard to sit and wait but it will work, you will win and have the tank you want.Remember that the test numbers are going to be false for a while as the algae keeps consuming nutrients, you have to think long term in a stable number, stripping to zero will hurt corals. Anyway this approach is working for me, acting slowly, and I wish you the best.P.S. My PO4 had jumped to 30ppm in a week.
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01/31/2015, 02:30 PM | #228 | |
Acros & wieners, oh my!
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The all-in-one pellets utilize a chemical phosphate remover(may be a form of GFO actually) and will lower the phosphates slowly on their own, they just need time to work. I have heard the "Phosphate swing" theory quite a lot, it is one of the big mantras from the Zeovit folks. In one time period I had a bunch of STN and the experts kept saying it was from "drastic changes" in parameters - lowered too fast, raised too fast, etc. In my tank at the time the phosphate value was largely unchanged. If parameter swings are so dangerous then why do Acros not immediately die when placed in customer's tanks? Going from the dealer's water to the customer's water represents drastic swings in Alkalinity, Calcium, Phosphate, and Nitrate. Yet in many cases the acros do better switching. I am currently saving a portion of a table coral that was dissolving in my dealers tank but stopped immediately upon going into mine. Food for thought. I do, however think that the real cause for a lot of these issues is excess Iron. People overdo the GFO or add GFO to Zeovit for example and both give off Iron. Iron is limiting nutrient for bacteria and algae and adding a bunch of it at once can trigger blooms of bacteria that already live on the corals surface. These blooms turn against the host coral. I have inadvertently done this myself by overdosing Iron, and have seen the same thing happen with additions of too much GFO or overuse of Zeovit stones. In some cases I was able to stop the STN using antibiotics. Just give one method time to work, the system needs a chance to balance out.
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- Matt I call the big one "Bitey" - Homer Simpson See my tank thread here: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2468548 Current Tank Info: 120 Gallon Rimless Starphire Shallow Reef. Reef Octopus Diablo EXT-200 skimmer, Chaeto Reactor, Lighting: ATI Sunpower 8X39W, 6X39W Sunpower |
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01/31/2015, 03:25 PM | #229 | ||||
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Probably not the best spot to debate this, but I'll reply with my thoughts and how it may apply to reefmutt's current situation. No offense taken on my end, this is based on my personal experience.
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In terms of your dealers tank lol, maybe his nutrients are way too high, and yours are lower, hence the recovery. May be the flow, lighting, etc. etc. etc. Could be any number of factors. Quote:
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01/31/2015, 03:26 PM | #230 | |
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01/31/2015, 04:10 PM | #231 |
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From my humble 1 year experience and 1165 gallons of saltwater. It seems nobody has infused science and many factors which are not always accounted for have some kind of influence. I'm pretty sure we are all trying our best and continuously improving from these varied experiences. Lots of love.
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01/31/2015, 04:46 PM | #232 | ||||
Acros & wieners, oh my!
Join Date: Jan 2001
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- Matt I call the big one "Bitey" - Homer Simpson See my tank thread here: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2468548 Current Tank Info: 120 Gallon Rimless Starphire Shallow Reef. Reef Octopus Diablo EXT-200 skimmer, Chaeto Reactor, Lighting: ATI Sunpower 8X39W, 6X39W Sunpower |
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01/31/2015, 07:24 PM | #233 | |
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Chris Kirkland Reef Nerd. Current Tank Info: Getting back into the hobby. |
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01/31/2015, 07:34 PM | #234 |
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Does anyone know of someone who might have a white worm culture in Montreal?
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01/31/2015, 08:26 PM | #235 |
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It seems the Hannah phosphorus test does the job. At least for me.
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01/31/2015, 09:57 PM | #236 |
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wow! i like the debate going on here.
I'm going to try to clarify my situation and then explain my actions first, tripdad, thanks for the encouragement and attempt to get me to go slow- it is very good advice but advice that is very difficult to take! chris, jordan, matt, i think that ultimately, you guys are pretty much in agreement... believe it or not.. Rene, i put my valve on the intake- makes sense. also, i believe that the Elos high resolution po4 test kit is as accurate and maybe more reliable than the hanna ulr tester. i have and use both to confirm my readings.. Mike, i actually DID start carbon dosing a small amount of my vsv/cano3 mix when i saw nutrients jump after removing the pellets.. ok.. here goes.. i had been running aio pellets for several months along with a small dsb. i was originally using vsv and cano3 to control n and p keeping them at around 1-3 ppm n and .04 ish p. when i introduced the aio pellets, nutrients started to drop, so i stopped the vsv/cano3 and nutrients remained around the same.. then i did 3 things at pretty much the same time: i added cheato on reverse daylight, added some ecobac+pellets to my aio pellets and began adding fish and corals. As soon as i began adding more food for the fish, nutrients began to drop dramatically- like non detectible. it was though the food was an extra carbon source for the bacteria in the system and it put the pellets into overdrive... there was also a corresponding uptick in all sorts of algae as feedings went up and nutrients went down. slime algae in my sumps, bubble algae, bryopsis etc. my corals began to pale out significantly. why did this happen? not sure... to try to help the corals, I increased feedings and began adding AAs. this did not help anything but the algeas. Nutrients stayed at 0. along with the corals getting pale, i did have some stn and rtn. So i removed the pellets, 3 days later, the anemone got shredded and the tank went cloudy. for another week nutrients stayed undetectable. i assumed the algea bloom in the water, as well as the dsb and cheato had begun to consume to nutrients. Then i turned off the lights for a couple of days to try to reduce the algae bloom and when i turned them back on and tested, nutrients had jumped way up.. so what caused the jump? not sure.. but probably, imo, since the water is still a bit cloudy (meaning the algea bloom is still around), that the removal of the pellets is what caused the jump. its been only about 5 days that nutrients have been up.. in those 5 days i have begun a small amount of vsv/cano3 dosing to compensate for the lack of pellets and just yesterday, i have reintroduced the pellets in a recirculation reactor which i can control better. tomorrow, i will test again and see where the numbers are. so the way i see it, the only significant swing in nutrients has been very recent and due to the removal of that big carbon source- the aio/ecobac+ pellets. Jordan, i hate gfo..... I've used it to death in the past and as tripdad mentioned, it only made levels go up and down.. using a carbon source to pull n down and then using a little n along side a carbon source has been very good for me at bringing down p. the aio pellets seem to have shown themselves effective at bringing down p along with n and that is why i began using them in the first place... so that i could stop dosing the cano3 to reduce p.. my recent addition of the vsv/cano3 mix was an attempt to turn the upswing in nutrients back into a downswing without resorting to gfo.. tomorrow i will see where i stand on that front when i test. my testing is more (so i tell myself) to see where the numbers are than to try to chase them, but i guess i do have targets in mind for n and p. close to where jordan mentioned n of 3-5 ish, p somewhere below .05. i believe that once the pellets are properly dialed in, i will be able to keep n and p stable.. OH!! AND.. remember i also had a funky high mag reading which i began to bring down by keeping the ca reactor under performing while i dosed small amounts of buffer. doing this allowed me to keep alk steady at around 7 while mag and ca dropped a bit. tomorrow i will stop that extra alk dosing and turn up the reactor just enough so that it will begin to maintain alk on its own again. just to be clear, i was dosing enough alk booster to raise my system volume by only a half dkh... so i wasn't dosing a lot.. to sum it up, there has been plenty of chemical changes going on (sorry trip dad, i have tried to make the changes small...) but i am really trying to maintain parameters at where they have been for most of last summer.. i'll post some numbers tomorrow.. and please keep on giving your opinions.. opinions and knowledge is what drives this forum and makes it so great.. now i need a drink!!!
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Matt. Current Tank Info: 53x32.5x26 190g dt 60g of sumps 3 tank-100 gal frag system 6xAI prime 8xt5. 4x maxspect gyre. Skimz Dual internal sicce pump skimmer Deltec PF601s ca rx+Kalk stirrer |
01/31/2015, 11:15 PM | #237 |
Acros & wieners, oh my!
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Isn't this hobby fun?
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- Matt I call the big one "Bitey" - Homer Simpson See my tank thread here: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2468548 Current Tank Info: 120 Gallon Rimless Starphire Shallow Reef. Reef Octopus Diablo EXT-200 skimmer, Chaeto Reactor, Lighting: ATI Sunpower 8X39W, 6X39W Sunpower |
02/01/2015, 06:03 AM | #238 |
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If you want to save them you can bring them to me until your system get stable....
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02/01/2015, 08:45 PM | #239 | |
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Thank you but I think things look a bit better in the tank. Still cloudy but not as bad. Early this morning I did a 10% wc and as I said, I have been dosing some vsv/cano3 since my last tests from the 29th when I got 8ppm n and .13 p. Today I noticed some polyp extension on a few corals.. They don't seem to be too bad right now. I'm not sure about a couple of very faded out corals but many of them look ok- not super fantastic but ok. My readings tonight showed 3ppm n and .09 p. So the carbon dosing has had a small effect. This is what I as hoping for.. Just a small effect. I will probably do another WC in a couple of days and maybe consider increasing the amount of cano3 in my dosing mix to try to keep n up and pull p down just a touch.. I will begin testing twice a week just to keep an eye on things... I have stopped adding AAs now that I have n and p in the system. So I am hopeful at the moment. Funny how different corals can be when reacting to changing conditions. I have a a few deep waters that have been perfectly fine through all of this and my red dragon has actually grown a tiny bit.. I now have my aio pellets running with a very slow flow- I'm sure they aren't doing anything yet but when they do start to work, I don't want them to hit the system hard.. That's why I have them running very slow and why I will test bi weekly for a while.. I really apreciate all of your comments and suggestions! I'll do an update on Wednesday.
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Matt. Current Tank Info: 53x32.5x26 190g dt 60g of sumps 3 tank-100 gal frag system 6xAI prime 8xt5. 4x maxspect gyre. Skimz Dual internal sicce pump skimmer Deltec PF601s ca rx+Kalk stirrer |
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02/01/2015, 09:32 PM | #240 |
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Which Wednesday,just in case..
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02/02/2015, 05:42 AM | #241 |
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Every Wednesday!!! Wether you like it or not!!
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Matt. Current Tank Info: 53x32.5x26 190g dt 60g of sumps 3 tank-100 gal frag system 6xAI prime 8xt5. 4x maxspect gyre. Skimz Dual internal sicce pump skimmer Deltec PF601s ca rx+Kalk stirrer |
02/02/2015, 06:50 AM | #242 |
Frustrated Stick Gardener
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Just to be clear, I was not advocating GFO as a cure, there are several approaches that may yield a solution, only that forced patience usually produced results in time. It is clear your doing what is best for you and your tank. Best of everything to you.
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02/02/2015, 08:00 AM | #243 |
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Ok so I can say that after almost a month of this my sps have some really good color and my algea problems are almost gone >>>> http://glassbox-design.com/2008/achi...perimentation/
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Life is to short to buy frags ! But for FREE I'LL take them ><((((º>`·.¸¸.·´¯`·.¸.·´¯`·...¸><((((º> ·´¯`·.¸. , . .·´¯`·.. >((((º> LIVE SAND ITS THE CURE........® Current Tank Info: 120 CUBE Live sand Mitras lx6100hv MRC MR 2 single becket MP40 power head Aquamedic dosing pump using B-ionic |
02/02/2015, 10:08 AM | #244 |
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Interesting link Michael, there is one line in there that sounds like a clue."This occurs from overdosing a carbon source which then clouds the water milky white. Unfortunately this can cause systems to crash from oxygen depletion as the bacteria utilize what available oxygen there is, suffocating your fish and corals". Not saying this has happened but is an interesting bit of info I had not heard before.
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02/02/2015, 10:44 AM | #245 | |
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Life is to short to buy frags ! But for FREE I'LL take them ><((((º>`·.¸¸.·´¯`·.¸.·´¯`·...¸><((((º> ·´¯`·.¸. , . .·´¯`·.. >((((º> LIVE SAND ITS THE CURE........® Current Tank Info: 120 CUBE Live sand Mitras lx6100hv MRC MR 2 single becket MP40 power head Aquamedic dosing pump using B-ionic |
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02/02/2015, 06:11 PM | #246 | |
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The corals are doing fairly well but please I ably will take several weeks to recover.. So, I'll have to watch and wait. Gfo has its applications, but I don't think my p is off enough to need it..
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02/02/2015, 06:21 PM | #247 |
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Mike, you are preaching to the quire. I've been vsv dosing for a long time and it has been very effective for me.
They say, in that article, how good the results they got were but they don't say what their target numbers are/were.... I don't think- maybe I missed it. I'm not sure the bottled bacteria is really necessary as most of the strains are probably naturally occurring in most aquariums... But I'm no biologist. I have seen biopellets almost crash a tank when the tank went milky. They were removed and the tank went back to normal within a day. The n and p were extremely high in that tank, though. Maybe in my case, it was the pellets (I had stopped vsv at that point) combined with the fistfuls of food I was adding to try to raise nutrients that caused the cloudiness-combined also with the shredded anemone. Maybe it was the zooanthellea from the anemone that were released from the anemone that went into a bloom... Again, I'm no biologist.. Not sure if that's even possible..
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Matt. Current Tank Info: 53x32.5x26 190g dt 60g of sumps 3 tank-100 gal frag system 6xAI prime 8xt5. 4x maxspect gyre. Skimz Dual internal sicce pump skimmer Deltec PF601s ca rx+Kalk stirrer |
02/02/2015, 06:29 PM | #248 |
Acros & wieners, oh my!
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Shredded anemones are big time bad news, even if you can't see them, tons of un-fired nematocysts float around the tank waiting to bump into your corals. That is in addition to the large amount of decaying matter that is suddenly introduced to your tank. I've heard some real horror stories on here before...
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- Matt I call the big one "Bitey" - Homer Simpson See my tank thread here: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2468548 Current Tank Info: 120 Gallon Rimless Starphire Shallow Reef. Reef Octopus Diablo EXT-200 skimmer, Chaeto Reactor, Lighting: ATI Sunpower 8X39W, 6X39W Sunpower |
02/02/2015, 06:50 PM | #249 |
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Well.. The corals were not happy for the few days directly after the shredding- when it was very cloudy. I also added a lot of carbon which may or may not have helped remove some of the anemone poison but I'm sure it stripped out some beneficial nutrients..
Actually, the corals responded quite favorably to the waterchange I did.. I may do another tonight...10%..
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Matt. Current Tank Info: 53x32.5x26 190g dt 60g of sumps 3 tank-100 gal frag system 6xAI prime 8xt5. 4x maxspect gyre. Skimz Dual internal sicce pump skimmer Deltec PF601s ca rx+Kalk stirrer |
02/02/2015, 07:26 PM | #250 |
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this is why I'm terrified of keeping nems!
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