algae algae algae

[kylepelk]

well ill start with my water test ph:7.9 kh:7 density:1.025 ammonia:0 nitrite:0 nitrate:0 phos.:0.25 calcium:320 using distilled water from the store. lights are on for about 8hrs a day.i have been using phosgaurd for a bit. seems like iv finally got the algae to slow down but not totally beating it. i have cyano that i cant seem to get rid of. picking up a algaehair tomorrow. had a algae blenny but died. found a small mantis shrimp the next day and removed him. thinking he was the culprit. any sugestions with the algae problem heres some pictures.

 

[Wiz]

Ph and calcium are both low imo. And it will be pretty hard to get an accurate reading on nitrate and phos with that much gha in tank.
I would manually remove as much as possible. Dont be lazy about it. (No offense intended) Get in there and pull it all. Maybe with a syphon going. Then try a hare or something while monitoring nutrient levels. Which I would venture to guess will rise without all that algae.
Do you syphon your sand at all?

 

[kylepelk]

about a month ago i took all the rock out and scrubbed the algae off with a tooth brush. well as much as possible. and yes i go threw the sand as good as i can when doing water changes. iv been thinking about scrubbing the rock again but idk if that would make dosing it with algaefix pointless. im on my second dose. about a week ago i totally removed the big filter pad i had to make the tank quiet. i notice it would hold alot of slug. thats no longer in there. thanks for ur thoughts by the way any ideas are appreciated

 

[brandon429]

Kyle check this thread in my signature we have a tank almost twin to this one above, algae dead about 4 days. we are chemical cheaters. theres 120 pages of examples because people like to cheat sometimes lol. it would take your tank right at 36 hours to lose about 90% of the algae, the rest by next week, that fast. What you have is the easiest of all algae to work with. It is ok to also wait months in this condition, starving it, awaiting clean up crews to attack, simply choose a mode. regarding nothing good coming fast in reefing, nah, it sure can or our examples wouldn't be as dense as they are. by simply lifting out the rocks and pouring peroxide across them, letting them sit 5 mins in the air, rinse and put back in, you lose 90% of algae in three days.


You already did this cleaning step, just left out the algaecide. with no cellular kill, it grows back like a lawn does, with no burning, the holdfasts stay in place. Starving it can kill the holdfasts agreed, but not by Friday heh

 

[Wiz]

I don't think using the algae fix while removing as much algae as possible is a bad idea. If anything it will just make the fix more effective. However I would not use the algae fix at all in my tank personally. It may or may not allow you to be rid of the GHA. But it will not fix the underlying problem that is causing it in the first places. So you will just wind up with another problem. And chemicals are almost never a good idea. There has to be an abundance of nutrients for that much hair algae to be growing. So I would find the source of that first. And it's my pleasure to help as much as I can.

 

[brandon429]

guided eutrophication reversal here is good part of the cure, unplugging that rock to let it void the waste. you'll be siphoning catch up a while after its unplugged. recommend fixing your biomass -before-changing nutrients, not after

 

[Wiz]

I also agree that peroxide will kill most of the algae if not all. However as I said without finding the problem you will have other problems.The LG is merely a symptom

 

[brandon429]

yep agreed need to check for topoff water, I always forget that. are we RO DI here!

 

[kylepelk]

Iv been using distilled water to do everything. And i might do the peroxide thing and then test the water after to see if anything spikes up from the algae not being there. Thanx everyone. Im learning a bit lol still new at this

 

[Dtackett]

are there any fish in the tank currently?

 

[kylepelk]

Nope no fish. I have 3 emerald crabs, a few tiny blue legged hermit crabs, a sand conch and 4 snails.

 

[brandon429]

Also we advise not doing more than a small test rock. No first go of any controversial method should be full on

It's nice because a small test rock is no full commit

 

[Wiz]

Nope no fish. I have 3 emerald crabs, a few tiny blue legged hermit crabs, a sand conch and 4 snails.

So you do not feed the tank at all right?

 

[kylepelk]

I havnt put any food in the tank. I figure they got all the food they could eat already lol.

 

[kylepelk]

What could be feeding the algae and how would i find out. Testing the water would show anything

 

[Dtackett]

if that's the case, no fish, i would do things a bit more harsh. drain the tank entirely, pull the rock and using a stiff bristle brush scrub the surface of the rock. while youre scrubbing you should be removing all the algae you can. once you've got most of the algae off mist h2o2 on it and let it sit to finish killing the rest of the algae then rinse it off with clean water.

you could be feeding the tank with your distilled water. the issue with using distilled water from the store is you don't know when the filters were changed and if youre getting clean water. i refuse to even drink the water from our walmart. buy yourself a RODI unit. you can get them for pretty cheap and save money in the long run.


EDIT: i understand distilled water doesn't use filters, but the machines placed inside of walmarts have a filter system in them.

 

[Wiz]

="kylepelk, post: 2662750, member: 62898"]I havnt put any food in the tank. I figure they got all the food they could eat already lol.

Thats exactly right. There is nothing in there that needs extra feeding imo.

 

[fishroomlady]

+1 ^^^ to dtackett - excellent advice!

 

[kylepelk]

what percentage of h202 do i use and how long do i keep the rock siting out of the water with the h202 on it.any way u can give me a step by step. thanks again for the help

 

[Dtackett]

you can use the basic 3% you get from walmart and i would let it sit on it for 5-8 minutes before rinsing. you may get a cycle after all of this, but the algae issues SHOULD be gone.