Algae id...plz

[Christopher Davis]

I would not be in a hurry to do that. It's quite possible that phosphates are accumulating/not being used due to nitrogen limitation, for example, which is an easily solvable problem....but not with PO4-media.

More data! (I know...waiting patiently.)

Okay okay more data!

 

[Sallstrom]

I agree, the cleanup crew needs work. The old tank had been obliterated lol. The coraline is however starting to overtake as you can see on the back overflow. I am not letting the coraline grow on this tanks back glass.
Rabbit fish are great grazers, also considering a Kole tang or Nassau. I lost 2 out of my 4 tangs so I am sure that is not helping my situation! I will get an accurate read on nitrate tonight when I get off of work!
Will also be adding urchins and more snails!
This should
Be a fun battle, not so much worried about phosphates at all I recently saw an article on here that high phosphates can be benifical, kinda toying around with that idea, I will be adding more phosphate media for removal! Of the PO4.
Maybe she’s sill running through her new tank uglies so to speak.

Ctenochaetus tangs are great grazers! Can't promise they'll eat all algae but they are always on my list of CUC. Rabbitfish sometimes graze even harder algae like Valonia (bubble) algae, so those can also be very useful.

As for phosphate, IMO 0,4 ppm is a bit high, so I like the idea of some new remover. I don't think it'll help you get rid of algae, but you might get better conditions for corals. But try not to lower it too fast. Just make sure the value decreases. I would aim for a value around 0,1 ppm but in a month or three.

Why I'm curious about the nitrate is the slime algae on the second picture, and the brown "powder" on the green algae. Sometimes dinoflagellates and/or Cyanobacteria can come when the nitrate gets very low. And like @mcarroll wrote, if the nitrate gets depleted the phosphate might increase.

/ David

 

[Christopher Davis]

Ctenochaetus tangs are great grazers! Can't promise they'll eat all algae but they are always on my list of CUC. Rabbitfish sometimes graze even harder algae like Valonia (bubble) algae, so those can also be very useful.

As for phosphate, IMO 0,4 ppm is a bit high, so I like the idea of some new remover. I don't think it'll help you get rid of algae, but you might get better conditions for corals. But try not to lower it too fast. Just make sure the value decreases. I would aim for a value around 0,1 ppm but in a month or three.

Why I'm curious about the nitrate is the slime algae on the second picture, and the brown "powder" on the green algae. Sometimes dinoflagellates and/or Cyanobacteria can come when the nitrate gets very low. And like @mcarroll wrote, if the nitrate gets depleted the phosphate might increase.

/ David

Tank could be in low nutrient mode after being fishless for 7 weeks good discussion!

 

[Christopher Davis]

Okay okay more data!

Looks to be reading 0 to me.

 

[Sallstrom]

Looks to be reading 0 to me.

Great! Now we know more about the situation.
Have a look at the "fuel" and if if contains carbon source or if anything else does. At this point you should be careful with dosing carbon source. You could drive the NO3 too low and corals will start to suffer and you might get a cyano problem.

Easiest way to adjust nitrate IMO is to add KNO3. It's a common ingredient in PMDD(nutrients mix for planted tanks). It's cheap. I don't have the numbers in my head, but I think you can find the recipe if you search for KNO3 at R2R.
I would aim for nitrate 5-10 ppm.

/ David

 

[Christopher Davis]

Great! Now we know more about the situation.
Have a look at the "fuel" and if if contains carbon source or if anything else does. At this point you should be careful with dosing carbon source. You could drive the NO3 too low and corals will start to suffer and you might get a cyano problem.

Easiest way to adjust nitrate IMO is to add KNO3. It's a common ingredient in PMDD(nutrients mix for planted tanks). It's cheap. I don't have the numbers in my head, but I think you can find the recipe if you search for KNO3 at R2R.
I would aim for nitrate 5-10 ppm.

/ David

Not seeing any carbon in the fuel ingredients, I did just switch to fuel from Acro power, I will be switching back to that.

 

[Christopher Davis]

Great! Now we know more about the situation.
Have a look at the "fuel" and if if contains carbon source or if anything else does. At this point you should be careful with dosing carbon source. You could drive the NO3 too low and corals will start to suffer and you might get a cyano problem.

Easiest way to adjust nitrate IMO is to add KNO3. It's a common ingredient in PMDD(nutrients mix for planted tanks). It's cheap. I don't have the numbers in my head, but I think you can find the recipe if you search for KNO3 at R2R.
I would aim for nitrate 5-10 ppm.

/ David

What exactly are the benefits of running your KNO3 in these ranges?

 

[Sallstrom]

What exactly are the benefits of running your KNO3 in these ranges?

There's no exact number, but if you aim for say 5ppm you have some margin(which is nice to have if don't like to measure every day ).

 

[cracker]

Thanks for this thread Christopher . All good info.

 

[Christopher Davis]

There's no exact number, but if you aim for say 5ppm you have some margin(which is nice to have if don't like to measure every day ).

I will shoot for 5ppm, going to have to research more about it. Are we shooting for these numbers to color coral up? Or to keep the phosphates at bay

 

[Sallstrom]

I will shoot for 5ppm, going to have to research more about it. Are we shooting for these numbers to color coral up? Or to keep the phosphates at bay

No. Colours has more to do with type of lights and PAR, at least what I have seen. Maybe you could get lighter colours if you keep nutrient very low, but that's a bit risky way to go. A bit imbalance or too low values and the corals will suffer or you might get cyano.
Yes, you need both N and P to get growth. And if you want to lower the PO4 the biological way you need NO3. If you dose carbon source or have a algae refugium for example.

 

[Christopher Davis]

No. Colours has more to do with type of lights and PAR, at least what I have seen. Maybe you could get lighter colours if you keep nutrient very low, but that's a bit risky way to go. A bit imbalance or too low values and the corals will suffer or you might get cyano.
Yes, you need both N and P to get growth. And if you want to lower the PO4 the biological way you need NO3. If you dose carbon source or have a algae refugium for example.

Added PO4 remover, and more carbon. Working on clean up crew. I’m going to test for NO3 for a couple of days and see what my results are

 

[mcarroll]

What exactly are the benefits of running your KNO3 in these ranges?

A Nitrate Dosing Calculator For Better Tank Health (And Better Coral Color!) has a good KNO3 formula and calculator. Using Seachem or Brightwell Nitrate and Phosphate products (or anything else similar) is also fine, as long as you have proper directions to follow.

Any amino acid supplement is partly a carbon dosing scheme, so I'd back off any of them.

From the fuel website:

Comprehensive carbohydrate, vitamin, amino acid, and polyunsaturated fatty acid supplement for corals

Similar to Acropower, so switching is no better IMO.

 

[cracker]

I will shoot for 5ppm, going to have to research more about it. Are we shooting for these numbers to color coral up?

Please be careful dosing . I learned it's real easy to over do it & BAM Algae all over the place.

 

[Christopher Davis]

Things are looking better I manually removed the thickest Chunks and the tangs and urchins appetite finally kicked in!

 

[Jason Schwend]

I have the same stuff in my biocube and my levels are good (weekly water changes of atleast 30%). But my phosphates were pretty high, and I can tell you that my corals seem to grow really fast with this higher phosphate. Ex. Frog spawn went from 1 head and split to 3. Bought a 3headed acan a 1.5 months ago it now has 7 heads. My sunny d's went from 6heads to about 15. My tank is only 3.5 Mabey 4 months old.

 

[mcarroll]

I think I have a tagline somewhere on my profile that says "Algae are not your enemy. Nutrients are not the problem."

 

[chewy tabacca]

HOW DO YOU KILL IT!

I disagree, that it is because of new tanks, this is the first time I have seen this algae in my tank. Mine has been set up for 2 years. I switched something up in my tank that cost me a lot of money, killed a lot of my sps, and sprung all this algae up. In my case it was dosing trace elements. It not so much of how do you kill it, it's what is causing it. It took me three months to figure out what was causing it.

Killing it, I started water changes and stopped the cause of it in the first place. In my case it was dosing trace elements.

 

[Dana Riddle]

I see references to coral color and nutrient levels. My two cents worth - I assisted the Sea Grant agent in Kona Hawaii with coastal monitoring for a number of years. Testing found nitrate and phosphate were elevated in near shore water, due to a limited sewerage system (nutrients from thousands of cesspools and septic tanks migrated to the ocean) and nitrate leaching from geologically young lava rock. In spite of this, corals still showed good coloration (chromoproteins - those that merely reflect light - ranging from blue to red & fluorescent proteins glowing green, blue-green, and yellow) were observed.