Bryopsis Cure: My Battle With Bryopsis Using Fluconazole

Atrumblood · Mar 25, 2022

Smite said:
I'd be down to see how it goes. I have GHA as well and also in the past when dosing flux I've never noticed my GHA really die off.

Cool tip on the dissolving. What worked for me was a clean coffee cup, filled with RODI and then microwaved for 1 minute. Poured that into an empty and clean water bottle and added my flux RX. It took about 1-2 minutes of shaking and it was completely dissolved.

How hot would you say the water was when you added the fluconazole? I'm always nervous about heating up organic compounds as they can decompose a lot more readily than inorganic with relatively mild heating.

Edit: incase anyone is curious, fluconazole In water has a solubility of ~4,363 mg/L (4.4 grams in 1 Liter of water) at 25 °C

Smite · Mar 25, 2022

Atrumblood said:
How hot would you say the water was when you added the fluconazole? I'm always nervous about heating up organic compounds as they can decompose a lot more readily than inorganic with relatively mild heating.

Edit: incase anyone is curious, fluconazole In water has a solubility of ~4,363 mg/L (4.4 grams in 1 Liter of water) at 25 °C

Warm-Hot to the touch, around 120F if I had to guess.

Hopefully it didn't degrade it at all, we will see. I waited for it to cool to room temp, checked for clarity and added it to the tank.

Ross Petersen · Mar 28, 2022

DeniseAndy said:
That does not have the normal appearance of briopsis. No feathers/fern structure. I would try hand removal, peroxide, and good nutrient export. If still struggling, Vibrant. Then fluconazole.

Hey there - any tips on the spot dosing of hydrogen peroxide for the problematic wire-like algae I shared pictures of previously? Aside from turning the pumps off... I'm thinking perhaps 1-2 mL of 3% peroxide max for my 40 gallon every other day or so? Thx

DeniseAndy · Mar 28, 2022

I tried h2o2 in the pat and my corals were not happy, so stopped doing that method. That sounds about right though.
Vibrant never worked for me either. Sorry to recommend it. This was while I was trying.
Now, fluconazole got rid of all my algae problems, but now I am fighting a bit to get a balance back.

Good luck!

Ross Petersen · Mar 28, 2022

DeniseAndy said:
I tried h2o2 in the pat and my corals were not happy, so stopped doing that method. That sounds about right though.
Vibrant never worked for me either. Sorry to recommend it. This was while I was trying.
Now, fluconazole got rid of all my algae problems, but now I am fighting a bit to get a balance back.

Good luck!

Thanks - yeah, my friend tried H2O2 spot dosing and he saw early stress and mild bleaching of his SPS.

This wire algae is a headache

ScottB · Mar 28, 2022

Ross Petersen said:
Thanks - yeah, my friend tried H2O2 spot dosing and he saw early stress and mild bleaching of his SPS.

This wire algae is a headache

Do you have room for a juvenile one spot foxface? They are my go-to for almost everything now. Best utility fish there is hands down. Orange shoulder a close second -- but they get big fast.

drawman · Mar 28, 2022

ScottB said:
Do you have room for a juvenile one spot foxface? They are my go-to for almost everything now. Best utility fish there is hands down. Orange shoulder a close second -- but they get big fast.

I may have to try one of these in the future Scott.

Ross Petersen · Mar 28, 2022

ScottB said:
Do you have room for a juvenile one spot foxface? They are my go-to for almost everything now. Best utility fish there is hands down. Orange shoulder a close second -- but they get big fast.

I could probably swap out my Tomini (to a friends tank). Thanks for the tip. Going to probably give trimming, a refugium, and possibly low-dose fluconazole a go. Although fluconazole didn't do much last time - sort of at a loss for this vicious-growing wire-appearing algae that is stripping nutrients and causing all sorts of white-out parties with the SPS frags. Such is reefing in a closed system I guess

Atrumblood · Apr 4, 2022

For anyone interested. Here is my thread on using fluconazole against GHA.

Thread 'Fluconazole vs GHA' https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/fluconazole-vs-gha.901884/

Atrumblood · Apr 8, 2022

How stable is fluconazole in the water column? I am asking because I was thinking about doing another smaller dose if it looked like the algae starts dying slower or stops dying after a time.

Garf · Apr 8, 2022

You folks think addin poisons to your tank is good, cheeesh

Mr_Knightley · Apr 8, 2022

I'm very curious, has anyone experienced any adverse effects when using this with starfish in the tank? I have both a Linckia and Iconaster, and I would hate to lose either. However, bryopsis has become a carpet much like in the OP's ld pics. It sucks.

ScottB · Apr 8, 2022

Mr_Knightley said:
I'm very curious, has anyone experienced any adverse effects when using this with starfish in the tank? I have both a Linckia and Iconaster, and I would hate to lose either. However, bryopsis has become a carpet much like in the OP's ld pics. It sucks.

A confirmed ID of bryopsis leaves you with no choices, sadly. Risks to other organisms are material but not a given. Sorry to be so vague. Odds are you will be okay. Again you don't really have a choice. Be sure to kill all of it. No shading allowed.

Blake423 · Apr 20, 2022

Can I dose Red Sea NoPoX during the treatment in order to keep the nutrient down?

Atrumblood · Apr 20, 2022

Blake423 said:
Can I dose Red Sea NoPoX during the treatment in order to keep the nutrient down?

I don't see why not.

Jakewareham · Apr 22, 2022

Does anyone have any experience with using this life brand? I've attached the ingredients, just wondering if it's reef safe, kind of worried dosing vaginal yeast infection meds in my tank lol, would this be the same as say reef flux or are the ingredients different

Atrumblood · Apr 22, 2022

Isn't colloidal silicone dioxide just silicates?

Jakewareham · Apr 22, 2022

Atrumblood said:
Isn't colloidal silicone dioxide just silicates?

I have no idea! I'm just curious if this is same as say reef flux or if the human drug has different binders

Wolf89 · May 4, 2022

Sorry, I can't read all 300 pages, but is there ANY risk at all? I'm reading the reviews on Reef Flux on BRS and some people claimed it crashed their tanks.

ScottB · May 5, 2022

Wolf89 said:
Sorry, I can't read all 300 pages, but is there ANY risk at all? I'm reading the reviews on Reef Flux on BRS and some people claimed it crashed their tanks.

The short answer is YES, there is some risk for corals. I haven't read about any troubles with fish. We have not determined WHY -- for a small portion of users -- it wipes out stony corals. But it certainly can.

I would not suggest using it to treat anything other than bryopsis. People use it to kill off algae sometimes. To me, that is being lazy or impatient.

For those with bryopsis, well, you don't have any choice really.