Algae, Lighting, flow questions

[Scurvy]

Thanks! As a fellow newbie good luck! It's a lot of fun.



Yes, the patience part is probably the best learning lesson for me in this hobby . I think I'm going to get a single turbo snail to start in the spirit of going slow, see how it looks, and then get a second if needed. I think I'll get an emerald crab along with the mexican turbo snail so the emerald can tackle the bubble algae. With that said I would still appreciate any first hand experience with emeralds in case I should stay away since I would prefer not to put any destructive cleaners in my tanks.

With regard to the light, my schedule is currently on a simple timer from 2pm-10pm. Do you think I should shorten this to limit algae growth? I would prefer not to do anything that would also limit my coral growth. Or would it be smart to turn the white light off towards the end of my light cycle, like at 8pm or 9pm? Realistically I don't think I would do this consistently since I would have to manually turn off the white light as the two lights run on a single electrical plug but just want to get your thoughts. Thanks!

Toning down the whites or shortening their on time is advisable. As an example heres the schedule from my 32g biocube. Very low intensity on the white channel which is the blue line. In regards to coral growth, yes some white is good but too much I feel is worse than none at all. Many a big name aquaculturist use only blue or just a few hours of white in the mix

 

[mwm5461]

Toning down the whites or shortening their on time is advisable. As an example heres the schedule from my 32g biocube. Very low intensity on the white channel which is the blue line. In regards to coral growth, yes some white is good but too much I feel is worse than none at all. Many a big name aquaculturist use only blue or just a few hours of white in the mix

Awesome thank you! Is that a tool/product I can utilize or is it specific to your lights? I'm guessing there is no way for me to control the intensity with my wavepoint 9" LED.

 

[Scurvy]

Awesome thank you! Is that a tool/product I can utilize or is it specific to your lights? I'm guessing there is no way for me to control the intensity with my wavepoint 9" LED.

Your welcome. Thats a snap shot from my led controller.
Im not familar with the wavepoint but will do a quick search for you amd see what I find.

 

[Scurvy]

Was this it?

https://www.marinedepot.com/Wave_Po...WavePoint_Technology-ZP01407-FILTFILD-vi.html

 

[mwm5461]

Was this it?

https://www.marinedepot.com/Wave_Po...WavePoint_Technology-ZP01407-FILTFILD-vi.html

Yes!

 

[Scurvy]

Yes!

Ok. Tricky with the way its built. I think your best bet is to stick to the way your running them now.

Try moving the corals closer to the light and into a good flow area. Looks like flow may be blocked a bit by the rock structure. Try midway up and see how they do. Somewhere around the zoas. They look pretty happy there.

 

[mwm5461]

Ok. Tricky with the way its built. I think your best bet is to stick to the way your running them now.

Try moving the corals closer to the light and into a good flow area. Looks like flow may be blocked a bit by the rock structure. Try midway up and see how they do. Somewhere around the zoas. They look pretty happy there.

Thanks for the advice. Since my original post I got my second powerhead so I re-positioned the original powerhead to go towards the front glass instead of towards the rock structure. Current set-up pictured below. I also moved around the corals like you suggested. Let me know your thoughts. I'm still not sure where the favia in the bottom right and acan should go.

In hindsight I guess I would've preferred to just pull the trigger on a more expensive light like the AI Prime HD, based on your input and my additional research it seems like my lights aren't helping growth too much. Maybe I'll ask for the AI Prime HD for Christmas .

 

[Scurvy]

Looks good! Give em a week or so in those spots to see how they respond. Does the Duncan open up at all? The couple of shots youve shared its been closed up.

The AI Prime would be a nice upgrade down the line.

 

[mwm5461]

Looks good! Give em a week or so in those spots to see how they respond. Does the Duncan open up at all? The couple of shots youve shared its been closed up.

The AI Prime would be a nice upgrade down the line.

Thanks! It hasn't really opened up much, hopefully it will in its new spot.

 

[mwm5461]

Just wanted to followup whether anyone has advice on where I should put my acan lord and favia from the last picture.

Also, is something wrong with my zoa? What are the tentacle looking things coming out of the left side? Is it growing?

 

[mwm5461]

Bump

 

[mwm5461]

... Anyone?

 

[mwm5461]

Just wanted to followup whether anyone has advice on where I should put my acan lord and favia from the last picture.

Also, is something wrong with my zoa? What are the tentacle looking things coming out of the left side? Is it growing?

Figured I'd give it one more shot, if anyone can help me out with my last post questions

 

[lapin]

I do not know what that is. It is something that has 6 arms equally spaced. Normally new heads start out small on zoas.

 

[mwm5461]

I do not know what that is. It is something that has 6 arms equally spaced. Normally new heads start out small on zoas.

Okay then I guess that means it's growing and not something bad. Thanks!

 

[Reefin Ryan]

i cant see the center of it good. It might actually be an annoying hitchhiker you want to remove like a pest anenome. maybe do a google image search of "aptasia" and "majano" and make sure it's not one of those. if it is kill it by scraping it out and covering the spot with superglue or epoxy to make sure it doesnt grow back. they can grow back after being cut down to virtually no remaining tissue so the glue/epoxy prevents that from happening. They can spring up all over the tank rapidly if not dealt with soon. Not trying to alarm you and I hope it isn't one of those.

 

[rkpetersen]

It's an aiptasia anemone. It's brownish and has multiple tapering tentacles. It also looks to be annoying the zoa closest to it. You can destroy it as above, or feed it Aiptasia X or Joe's Juice to kill it. There are other ways as well.

Edit: Sorry I didn't see this sooner. Hopefully you don't now have a tankful of them.