Latest Tank Problems

[strout]

Well, it seems like it never ends as is the case most all the time when it comes to my tank, when things are starting to go good in my tank, I should know to get ready for something bad to happen, and it has I am thinking I am on the way to turning it around though, we will see what ya'll say. Every since I set this tank up, I can never get the sand bed to look white, white, the sand bed always gets brown specks in it, not real bad, not enough to make me think I had a problem, didn't know I had a problem, just figured that's the way it was in this tank. What I have is a Stringy Brown Algae problem, seemly it got really bad over night, I know now that it didn't, the tank just got to the tipping point where it wasn't just brown specks in the sand bed, and the Brown Algae exploded. First lesson learned was that when I had Brown Specks in the sand bed that I couldn't get rid of, was an indication that I might have had a flow problem in the tank. Second lesson learned was, that you need a TDS meter on your RO/DI unit, I didn't, I was making bad water and putting it into the tank, that was when the tank reached the tipping point and couldn't take anymore, went from Brown Specks to a full blown Algae problem. Third lesson learned, it does you know good to have water test kits sitting next to the tank if you don't use them, I tested the tank water with a Phosphate Hanna Checker 0.31 Well, that's all the bad, now for what I am doing to correct the problem. First off, I replaced all the RO/DI filters, I removed the 18g of water from the top off tank and replaced it with good water, made 30g of water for a water change in the 150g tank. I removed 3 or 4 pieces of Live Rock from the tank and moved it to the sump, did this to maybe help increase the flow in the tank some. I took my MP40s off Reef Crest mode and reset them to a continuous flow setting, not sure what that setting is called. I then did the water change, also replaced the Carbon in the Carbon Reactor and changed out the Export PO4X4 Phosphate Media. I was tempted, but didn't over do it with the PO4X4 media, maybe I should have, I used just a tad under a half of a 350g bag. Since I did all of this, I have since done another water change and retested the Phosphates, down to 0.22 and have water made for another water change today and will retest Phosphates after that. The only other thing I have done, which I did this morning is to turn down the settings on the LED lights during the brightest part of the day. Pretty much lost all of my corals or at least the ones I care most about. I have one nice Chalice left that was just starting to grow good. Its now starting to fade in color, am hoping turning things around in the tank will help turn the coral around. Feel free to Chime in with any advice that you might have, as I am not sure that what I am doing is really helping anything.

 

[KcMopar]

You just need to control the nutrients and light. IMO your po4 is not awful unless you are trying to keep the HARD TO KEEP SPS Corals. With this amount of po4 you will likely always have a little algae growth. You could have po4 leaching from your rock, do you have any growth on them? Also I like the constant flow as it keeps my sand bed cleaner. Even with readings near zero you can have algae still. The reason is that the algae will consume what little is there and the tests will show very low or zero-ish. So just having low readings does not guarantee no algae, this is where nutrient control comes into play. If you have po4 its coming from food more then likely if its not leaching out of the Live Rock. Try cutting back on your feeding by about 1/2 for a couple weeks and see if this puts a dent in it but dont change the amount of po4 removal media you do so you can tell if food makes the difference. This is where I would start just because this is the cause in most cases. So just keep your maintence about the same and do 1/2 the food.

 

[strout]

I am not keeping any SPS Corals they all died, most likely due to the Phosphate levels of the tank. I feed Mysis Shrimp to the fish, not something I really want to do, but my Marine Beta causes me to go this route, he just won't eat pellet food, all the other fish will, just not the Beta. I used to feed two pellets in the morning and two in the evening, I reduced this about 8 months ago to one pellet in the morning and one in the evening. I thaw the pellets in a small jar of RO water, then pour them thru a strainer, pour another cup of RO water over them, then I sit the strainer in another cup of RO water and swish the strainer around a bit, then into the tank the Mysis shrimp go, trying to clean as much of the Phosphates out of them as I can. All that being said, do you still suggest reducing the amount of food, my wife would kill me if I starved the fish ? When it comes to the Live Rock, I do have Coralline Algae growing on them, but am guessing that you are talking about algae growth. Up to this point I really had no algae growth on them, what little may have been there the Rock Blenny would take care of. The rock is rock that I had in the old 125g tank that I bleached a year or so before I sit up the new tank, I then seasoned the rock in Brute containers for 5 or 6 months before they went into the new tank. I just figured the bad RO water is what was feeding the brown algae, and was hoping that water changes along with the Phosphate Media would bring down the po4 levels in the tank and pretty much starve the algae, at least to a level where it wasn't as bad as it is, that appears at this stage not to be happening. I did a 30g water change 1 1/2 hours ago, pretty much sucked up the top layer of sand in the tank, the stringy Algae is already coming back.

 

[strout]

I retested the Phosphates last night before bed 0.17 After the water change yesterday I turned down all three colors of the LEDs, the algae all but disappeared. Along with the high Phosphates the LEDs were set way to high and I am sure didn't help with the algae. I have reset the LEDs during the brightest part of the day today and we will see what that does. I have a really nice Flower Pot Montipora in the tank, or at least it is in other peoples tanks It Green with a Blue rim and Blue specks all in it. In my tank you see none of the Blue just the Green. I had asked the LFS owner what I could do to bring out these colors, he suggested I crank the LEDs up and that was the start of my problems. I have the Whites set at 20% and both Blues at 8%, we will see what that setting does with the algae today.

 

[KcMopar]

Its a balance between light and nutrients to control algae growth. Its not an easy balance to maintain all the time. The more you feed the more water change and po4 media you will need. If you dont want to let up on the feeding you can increase the water change and po4 media. Its going to end up being one or the other, its just depends on how you choose to run the tank. Either way will work along with regulating the lights as well. When I changed to LED I had to change the hour schedule and intensity until I found a happy medium that didnt encourage algae growth. I dealt with this for decades and its no easy solution beside trial and error until you come up with routine that works for you. Are you still considering a scrubber? This will take a lot of this problem away.

 

[strout]

I told the wife yesterday we are going to drop the Mysis shrimp down to one cube a day, half a cube in the morning and the other half in the evening, and then keep an eye on the fish to make sure they are good with that. I have watched the LFS feed their fish in the store, they feed very little, if they are feeding Mysis Shrimp, they use a syringe, and only put a few, like three Mysis shrimp per fish in each tank, a little more for the bigger fish, compaired to that, my fish are getting Thanksgiving dinner everyday To be honest, I was hoping to find the balance you are talking about without having to buy the Scrubber. I have put off getting the scrubber, for two reasons; Cost of the Scrubber - they aren't cheap and I really just didn't want to put another piece of equipment on my system, due to space, mostly the cost of the Scrubber though. That being said though, I think I am going to have to invest the money on the Scrubber as, at some point, not anytime soon after all of this, I would like to get a Clown Fish pair an Anemone for the tank and that's not going to help with the problems I am having with the tank. I tried to put some Chetto (sp) in my sump to try and help with the problem, I have read that it really takes a lot of Chetto to really make any kind of dent when it comes to Nutrient export out of a system, but the Chetto was free so why not put it in the sump. The Chetto was growing good in my system which I guess, is really not a good thing, I ended up taking it out of the sump though. It started to have, not sure what you call these, I will call them, little white Feather Duster's looking things growing in the Chetto, a bunch of them, they in turn were making it into the display tank. Its all really disappointing though, I really thought I had my new system figured out, and was at the point of getting the Anemone for the tank, letting it grow a bit than getting a nice looking pair of Clown Fish from Alpha Corals. Instead, I lost most of my corals, and have a algae problem, Oh well, it is what it is, will get it all figured out.

 

[strout]

KC sent you a PM, going to work on the Algae Scrubber

 

[KcMopar]

I to fought this fight just being on the edge of disaster as well. I find with the scrubber is much more forgiving and as a bonus I can feed more to my pets. Not that its a huge bunch more really but its nice to be able to feed a bit when company comes over and then not have to skip a meal for them because I fed them early for company to see. The scrubber is not the end all be all of filter systems but it is a HUGE tool that I lean on very HEAVILY and it supports me and my tanks just fine. I still do about 10% water changes every 2-5 months or so just to be sure and of course it does not hurt anything. Let me know and post some pics of Bud's scrubber!!!