HiddenUser
Valuable Member
I recently stopped using my bio-pellet reactor because I couldn't get my alkalinity down near natural sea water levels and I started noticing some burnt tips on some SPS. My high alkalinity is due to the Red Sea Coral Pro salt that I use which has high levels of Cal, Alk, and Mag to promote coral growth.
Anyway, shortly after taking the reactor offline I noticed a brown slimely looking algae starting to show up everywhere...It almost looked like Cyano, but when you blasted it off rocks it didn't come off in giant sheets / chunks like Cyano. Also once the stuff was in the water column it looked like someone blew their snotty nose all over, inside my tank. Last Friday, after a weeks worth of blasting off rocks, SPS, LPS, I decided it was time to do something because my corals were no longer opening and it seemed like an uphill battle to keep this junk off my corals, rocks, and sand. I want to also note that I tested my water last Wednesday, 0 Phosphates (I brought my GFO back online after stopping pellets), and 5 Nitrates...(Salifert Kits)
Skeptical of my water parameters, I did a 20 gallon water change anyway thinking 'dilution is the key to solving issues with pollution.' Thursday morning my SPS was coated again and my LPS were all closed up. I blasted off all the rocks and corals and turned up my 2x MP40's to 80% thinking the increased flow might help. I had last Thursday and Friday off so I was able to check on my tank throughout the day more than usual, and every time everything would be coated in this stuff. Numerous times throughout the day I was blasting this crap off my rocks and corals and an hour or two later it would be back...I read some threads on another forums as well as R2R, and I also read a few articles and decided I would try 3 Days, Lights Out...Friday night I did a 50% water change, replaced my carbon and gfo, shut off my lights, and prayed that I wasn't going to lose any livestock. I know many people have done this before, but I was still nervous as some of my corals hadn't extended a single polyp in over a week.
I had read that some people had wrapped their tanks in blankets or towels to minimize the light exposure during their lights out periods, but I opted not to do this. There is a fair amount of ambient light that gets into the room my tank is in, but no direct light and I tried to keep the blinds shut to make things as dark as possible...There was still enough light in the tank for the fish to see food when it was feeding time.
First day into Lights Out (Saturday), I blasted off some remnants of the algae off some corals and rocks in the morning, but that was it, nothing was spreading like wildfire as I previously saw. My fish really didn't do much this day, they pretty much stayed in the same areas which they normally sleep.
Second day (Sunday), my fish were swimming around acting normal and many of my LPS corals actually opened up a little and popped out their feeding tentacles. No signs of algae blooms taking over everything yet as well.
Third Day (Monday), Everything was looking the best I had seen it look in over a week, even with the lights out...Monday night, about a half hour before normal lights out, I fired up my lights again and set them into acclimation mode to start running at 50% of their normal intensity and ramping backup to their normal intensity within a week. Not sure if this makes any difference, but it seemed like a good idea not to shock your corals with light after a 3 day period without lights.
Anyway, sorry for the long winded story, probably more information than most of you wanted to know, but I wanted to share that the first full day after I did the 3 day lights out, I no longer see any nuisance algae anywhere. All my corals were opened up looking happy, my water looks crystal clear, and did I mention, no more slimey crap coating everything! :whoo:
We'll see how things go as the week progresses and the lighting intensity ramps up, but so far things are looking very promising. Anyway I wanted to make this post for anyone whom has considered or is considering turning out their lights for a few days to fight algae issues. Thus far it seems like it worked for me and I didn't lose a single piece of coral.
As an FYI, here is what the stuff looked like, these were the best pictures I could get, but it was coating everything...
http://s34.photobucket.com/user/Chukee_R/media/DSC_0231_zps01120b60.jpg.html
Anyway, shortly after taking the reactor offline I noticed a brown slimely looking algae starting to show up everywhere...It almost looked like Cyano, but when you blasted it off rocks it didn't come off in giant sheets / chunks like Cyano. Also once the stuff was in the water column it looked like someone blew their snotty nose all over, inside my tank. Last Friday, after a weeks worth of blasting off rocks, SPS, LPS, I decided it was time to do something because my corals were no longer opening and it seemed like an uphill battle to keep this junk off my corals, rocks, and sand. I want to also note that I tested my water last Wednesday, 0 Phosphates (I brought my GFO back online after stopping pellets), and 5 Nitrates...(Salifert Kits)
Skeptical of my water parameters, I did a 20 gallon water change anyway thinking 'dilution is the key to solving issues with pollution.' Thursday morning my SPS was coated again and my LPS were all closed up. I blasted off all the rocks and corals and turned up my 2x MP40's to 80% thinking the increased flow might help. I had last Thursday and Friday off so I was able to check on my tank throughout the day more than usual, and every time everything would be coated in this stuff. Numerous times throughout the day I was blasting this crap off my rocks and corals and an hour or two later it would be back...I read some threads on another forums as well as R2R, and I also read a few articles and decided I would try 3 Days, Lights Out...Friday night I did a 50% water change, replaced my carbon and gfo, shut off my lights, and prayed that I wasn't going to lose any livestock. I know many people have done this before, but I was still nervous as some of my corals hadn't extended a single polyp in over a week.
I had read that some people had wrapped their tanks in blankets or towels to minimize the light exposure during their lights out periods, but I opted not to do this. There is a fair amount of ambient light that gets into the room my tank is in, but no direct light and I tried to keep the blinds shut to make things as dark as possible...There was still enough light in the tank for the fish to see food when it was feeding time.
First day into Lights Out (Saturday), I blasted off some remnants of the algae off some corals and rocks in the morning, but that was it, nothing was spreading like wildfire as I previously saw. My fish really didn't do much this day, they pretty much stayed in the same areas which they normally sleep.
Second day (Sunday), my fish were swimming around acting normal and many of my LPS corals actually opened up a little and popped out their feeding tentacles. No signs of algae blooms taking over everything yet as well.
Third Day (Monday), Everything was looking the best I had seen it look in over a week, even with the lights out...Monday night, about a half hour before normal lights out, I fired up my lights again and set them into acclimation mode to start running at 50% of their normal intensity and ramping backup to their normal intensity within a week. Not sure if this makes any difference, but it seemed like a good idea not to shock your corals with light after a 3 day period without lights.
Anyway, sorry for the long winded story, probably more information than most of you wanted to know, but I wanted to share that the first full day after I did the 3 day lights out, I no longer see any nuisance algae anywhere. All my corals were opened up looking happy, my water looks crystal clear, and did I mention, no more slimey crap coating everything! :whoo:
We'll see how things go as the week progresses and the lighting intensity ramps up, but so far things are looking very promising. Anyway I wanted to make this post for anyone whom has considered or is considering turning out their lights for a few days to fight algae issues. Thus far it seems like it worked for me and I didn't lose a single piece of coral.
As an FYI, here is what the stuff looked like, these were the best pictures I could get, but it was coating everything...
http://s34.photobucket.com/user/Chukee_R/media/DSC_0231_zps01120b60.jpg.html
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