Algae and finally breaking down to get it figured out

Deltec
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Tham121988

Tham121988

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So I've been battling algae in my aquarium for about 2 years now. GHA and cyano almost non stop. Nothing I have done has helped including repeatedly removing the rocks and giving them a good scrub, cleaning with chemi clean, changing to the triton method, H2O2, etc. The parameters of my system always come back within whats considered normal reef keeping range. Though, I still have algae issues. I am thinking it has to be from the rocks used and not doing a cure before placing them in. Does this sound about right? So I decided to break down my tank and start a new. I want to nip this is the bud before it takes off again. I bought a new tank, new equipment, a new RO/DI unit etc to make sure everything is 100% this time to avoid the constant headache I've had the last several years. That being said, I never cycled/cured my pukanji rock in the first place. I just placed it within the tank which I'm wondering if that is where the original issue arose from. So now, I have removed all the rocks and have placed the ones riddled in algae in a bucket with bleach, and the other ones that were un used or not in that condition, I have placed them in a 5 gallon bucket with flow etc for the curing process. I should mention that these rocks were dried out during the move so they had been air drying for a couple of weeks. When I am done with the bleaching and priming and the various steps, Do I then proceeded to cure them after that or do they go directly into the tank after being cleaned multiple times from the RO/DI and start cycling the tank immediately? Thank you for any assistance.

Sincerely,

Thomas
 
Hi Thomas

What gives you impression that the rocks could be at fault? I mean they certainly could be. I am of the line of thought that a tank that can't grow algae also can't grow coral. If you test the bucket that the rock is currently cycling in what are the results of the NO3/PO4?

Thanks
 
If the test results come out at an acceptable value then I would rinse in fresh RO water for a week then start cycling.
 
Deltec
It sure about it. I took every precaution except for not curing my live rock. RO/DI was 0 tds. I ran the triton system so I should have a report somewhere. It was all fine though. Some weird not really important elements were mildly high. The tank had been established for about 2 years at least. It was a nano 15 with an overflow for the sump with all the necessary items in there (skimmer reef octopus ss110) and Refuguim. It was run on an apex system. Coral
we’re always okay until the algae would re appear quickly taking over the corals and they would hide until I cleaned them again. So I can’t think of any other reason other than I just threw in dirty rock that’s releasing nutrients into the tank. I dip all coral before they went into my tank. What are your thoughts?
 
I quite like to run a “dirty system” but I do have herbivores that munch down on any and all algae that pops up in the display. I just accept that I don’t need to battle algae. I would suggest you add some herbivore but honestly in something so small I don’t honestly know of one that wouldn’t starve to death.

You could be completely correct about the rock being a major source of nutrients but we won’t know for sure until you run a test and give us the numbers. There is a great thread going on now about nutrient control vs algae.

It may help put thing into perspective. I will try find it and link it now.
 
Deltec
Yeah, to just say that number are normal or in the acceptable range for a reef tank doesn't really help anyone diagnose your problem. What are your nitrates and phosphates? What type of CUC did you have? What type of lighting did you use and how long of a photo period did you use?

Algae will always be present in some form in a tank. It is just a matter of keeping it under control. If you didn't have any algae, I don't think you would have enough nutrients to keep any coral alive.
 
You need to provide the algae a better place to live other than the display. A refugiam or a algae scrubber.
 
Why not do this and change your entire reefing outcome:

No dry rock to cure, spend money and install purple coralline real live rock, lfs can procure already cured purple lr with animals and coralline all over it while still being aquarium cured and not uncured ocean rock, they'll have a source.

Allow zero uglies phase, there is no phase in which we allow a buildup of an unwanted organism and then work slowly for months through the water only, hoping it will abate. The methods you used for peroxide for example had totally different ways to be applied vs what was used, rarely should peroxide be dosed into the water.

Start the new tank with no sandbed

Add one after six months if you must


Don't pack walls of rock. Start with perfect aged live rock that is skip cycle, you just bring it home into a running tank and add a couple easy corals. The amount of live rock to use initially has nothing to do with how you want your reef to look in ten years, you use the amount and positioning of live rock that can simply be lifted out of the tank at anytime for hand guiding, outside your reef this time vs solely in tank work + waiting. You increase your rock mass over years of guiding, not as the typical initial full dump which makes external access impossible (all invaded reef tanks share the opposite of this build approach)


Wait to add fish for six months this time (we're doing opposites here vs invasion assembly practice)

Lastly, seek out ways the 100% uninvaded with any reef tank they'll ever own kill the algae during the uglies phase

Your new reef is now guaranteed to work based on opposite assembly and care biology.

Most reefers have their own plan which is opposite than some of the steps above, so that increases not decreases the chance for invasion again. The above steps are what we use in large threads to continually crank out uninvaded reefs for the willing.

The resolve you should bring to your new build has absolutely nothing to do with any test parameters other than known clean topoff water and temp and salinity, the resolve needs to be in finding different assembly and care procedures, you never ever had a chemistry or nutrient issue, even if your rocks emitted high phosphate. If you had rocks like that, then they must be even more accessible for external cleaning than cured purple live rock will require.
 
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Nutramar Foods
If you learn how to control algae without ever using a nitrate and phosphate test kit, you change your entire reefing outcome forever

Following the rules that many use= invasion as soon as the tank wills it, then we take partial reaction steps there on out

following the assembly and control techniques the 1% uninvaded use is really worth trying, because at any time you can stop what the 1% do and revert back to cloudy sandbeds, full on instant production level light intensity vs months ramp up, high initial fish bioloading, constant testing and reaction, and uglies phasing if that's the desired technique.

The only thing you can't change above into the common technique where we wait and see what the tank decides to grow is the live rock portion, to change it back to all white rock with no coralline and coral and high early fish bioloading and an extended algae phasing timeframe means you'd just resell that rock to someone who wants to do the invasion opt out method


The only nutrient requirement is good top off water. I use simple distilled water so I don't have to test, others use ro di

Other than that, we don't use tank nutrient levels in our algae restoration threads, we use the steps above.
 
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before you start over, why not just re arrange your current tank to be compliant vs the redo... Let's run your tank through a custom cure #14,567 we can use your current rock regardless of its phosphate, since we don't need to know that too be algae free.

Post full tank shot I'm curious how much arrangement detail can be pre discerned only from a description of the invader and duration
 
Thanks for all of the replies. I am sorry it takes me some time to get back as I'm studying for med school finals. Relocation for medical school was one of the reason I broke my tank down and am making sure I cure my rock correctly. My phosphates and nitrates were 0-5ppm. I tested them on a daily basis. Apparently they can still ready 0 but be high due to the algae using it faster than its leached out into the system. As far as H2O2, it has been shown time and time again that small dosing of H2O2 directly into the tank is harmless to the coral and actually kills cyano very well. This can be found under a fellow reefer twillard who has done some really good research and writeups on it. Like I mentioned above, I was running the triton method in the end and for quite awhile. I had regular testing done and it was hooked up to a sump with a refugium. I had a kessil H80 for my refugium lighting and an kessil a-160 for my main tank lighting. I had the light cycle ramping up and down during the day for about a 10 hour light cycle. I don't believe the intensity went above 50% at the mid point of the cycle. I also had a phosban reactor running GFO.
 
Nutramar Foods
agreed on the safety of peroxide, was commenting on why it didn't work for you, dumping it in the tank isn't the best way it actually only seldom works

BUT

peroxide is the key, just used in a 180 degree different way.

got the tank pic/wanted to see sandbed/location of algae/coralline loading and fish bioload and white/blue light balance...all those nondisclosed details (we need to know everything but the actual nutrient readings)

nutrients only affect expression of algae, not if it takes over, you have a way to be algae free in the current setup, however a new one using actual cured purple rock w require less guiding. nutrients have no bearing at all in 95% of algae infestation issues, which is why people who run giant aquarium fix up threads see presenters with the entire range of nutrients, before the actual invasion manifested.

its been a giant massive misnomer in the hobby about the impact of nutrients on tank invasions.

post the pic if poss it helps to cement it all together as a big picture

am aware of TW's thread I did post in it many times. a very good thread to continue works in large tanks that aren't easily taken apart, to be made cloud free (since cyano issues are sandbed or detritus issues, cant wait to see your pics) the thread did lack actual after pics showing the fixes though, the before pics outnumbered them 10 to 1 since peroxide is only marginally helpful for cyano issues, sandbed cleaning is totally helpful a different thread shows (the sand rinse thread)

there are ways to be cyano free long before peroxide is needed in remediation

with pics you'll make the biggest stride so far in the battle or the prep for the redo without the same battle coming back
 
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another thing to discern from pics is the size of the tank, no nano or even a reef under 50 gallons needs to be invaded due to easy access, that's for large tankers.

If you track invasion threads, you'll see the trend of people with 4 gallon reefs tolerating the same duration and density of invader mass that a 180 gallon/inaccessible tank would support, they never knew you could just take it apart, apply a rasping (debriding and deplaquing from medical industry applies to our toothy rocks housing anchored invaders and reef grazers like parrotfish are the mimic for this) technique, clean the sandbed, and be done with the invasion. its literally shocking to see that 95% of algae invasions can be opted out of by the reefer using no form of chemistry or testing at all, they just make the tank cloud free.
 
Here are some pics of the old tank before it was broken down. The sump picture was pre triton method. The first chamber was converted into the cheato chamber.

image1.png


IMG_5302.PNG


IMG_5301.PNG
 
Nutramar Foods
New tank and rock. Waiting on the stand to show up and rock to cure before I start cycling it. Probably after finals.

IMG_5282.jpg


IMG_5280.jpg
 
nice
and that looked great it wasn't near as bad as Id envisioned, it really did look ok to me I can hardly see any invader, that means you were really discerning and detailed :)

the new rock meets all the conditions where hand guiding will be required, moreso than your curing or your nutrient technique, in order to prevent recurrence.

check this big work thread out at least in prep when you have time, its fun to envision what would be the opposite set of circumstances available to these entrants vs how they presented originally? (we turned them out in the opposite condition, uninvaded)

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/t...ead-aka-one-against-many.230281/#post-2681445
 
Top Shelf Aquatics
that makes sense, the pic above was the intercept point for action, not the finality of the system.
 
Deltec

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