I am thoroughly confused now. I started a tank and let the cycle for 2 months before turning on the lights. Added some Chemipure to reduce the risk of algae and dosing microbarcter7. Now I have a dino outbreak due to my tank being too clean. So I will be removing the Chemi-pure and upping my coral feeding since it is a coral only take to help raise the n and p. However, if I do this, won't green hair algae grow instead. If I treat that by removing n and p won't dino return and cause a vicious cycle between the two? Any help is appreciated.
Confused over nutrients
- Thread starter Daredwar
- Start date
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Hemmdog
10K Club member
Green hair algae doesn’t just grow if there is excess nutrients. I don’t have any and my nutrients have been as high as 50 nitrate 1.0 phosphate. Get a balanced clean up crew and you shouldn’t have anything to worry about.
Remember that will be a couple of ugly stages where you will get some dino and algae but that will show you that the system is maturing. Don't get crazy trying to avoid those stages. Let the tank seat and get stable. A good CUC will help.
This thread will be a very handy reference thread for new reefers, good job posting this.
your instinct is leading you to an early conclusion, far before your first lost reef due to an invasion.
new tankers are routinely told to let a reef self invade with uglies and they're also told that phosphate management is required in order to control algae. Not the case at all, both can be applied fully oppositely for better success.
nutrients that you can measure do not matter in keeping a tank free of algae. keeping your tank low to zero on stored detritus, cloudy waste, is what matters.
remove all nitrate and po4 targeting media, continue without them.
deal with minor expected algae early, by lifting out rocks and killing it, setting rocks back. simple.
managing surfaces so they'll grow coralline helps you
letting surfaces get taken over prevents coralline, manually clear the space, its the price of starting with white rock/being busy for a year.
once surfaces support coral flesh, it repels all algae attachment. coralline repels algae nicely
be physical, hand gardening changing water and removing cloud occasionally, vs test-based and always searching nitrate and phosphate. I dont even own the test kits/keep packed nano.
the statement goes against all reef rules, but we have application threads running a hundred pages showing the work being applied in home reefs, this is a summary to save you the two hour bulk read and show you the newest tank cycling info.
your instinct is leading you to an early conclusion, far before your first lost reef due to an invasion.
new tankers are routinely told to let a reef self invade with uglies and they're also told that phosphate management is required in order to control algae. Not the case at all, both can be applied fully oppositely for better success.
nutrients that you can measure do not matter in keeping a tank free of algae. keeping your tank low to zero on stored detritus, cloudy waste, is what matters.
remove all nitrate and po4 targeting media, continue without them.
deal with minor expected algae early, by lifting out rocks and killing it, setting rocks back. simple.
managing surfaces so they'll grow coralline helps you
letting surfaces get taken over prevents coralline, manually clear the space, its the price of starting with white rock/being busy for a year.
once surfaces support coral flesh, it repels all algae attachment. coralline repels algae nicely
be physical, hand gardening changing water and removing cloud occasionally, vs test-based and always searching nitrate and phosphate. I dont even own the test kits/keep packed nano.
the statement goes against all reef rules, but we have application threads running a hundred pages showing the work being applied in home reefs, this is a summary to save you the two hour bulk read and show you the newest tank cycling info.
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