Coral dying, tank looks terrible, need help before the implode

[Geebs19]

Hey all,

I have an established tank that’s been running a little over 2 years now. Have always had luck with sps and lps. I have always struggled with the algea in the tank and it’s just getting worse.

within the last few months I have lost almost all my sps and a few heads on the hammers.

I have an auto feeder that feeds pellets every morning and none is left over. I feed frozen 2-3x a week.

I use filter socks and have a skimmer.

I have let the water changes slow as wenadded another to our family a few months ago.

pics below and any advice is greatly appreciated.

 

[Geebs19]

Failed to mention

salinity 35
Nitrate 0
Notrite 0
Ammonia 0
Ph 8
Phosphate .346
Mag 1140
Alk 7
Calcium 400

 

[Cell]

I'd rip clean or start Vibrant.

 

[HuduVudu]

I would water change and replace some of your rock with more cured rock.

How are you do you add Ca/Alk?

 

[tankstudy]

Failed to mention

salinity 35
Nitrate 0
Notrite 0
Ammonia 0
Ph 8
Phosphate .346
Mag 1140
Alk 7
Calcium 400

Bring up your magnesium to 1260-1350 ppm.

Bring your alk up to 8 dkh. This gives you a plus or minus 1 dkh room for error.

Bring your calcium up a bit to 420 or 440 ppm.

If it were me, I'd also dose vibrant for 9 weeks at the recommended dosage to deal with the algae issue.

 

[BlennyTime]

Are you sure your nitrate is 0? That’s out of balance with your phosphate, which is also high.

Is there something you are dosing or running in a reactor, that’s reducing it? Otherwise, there may be an issue with your test.

 

[PicassoClown04]

Hi! I assume you are using RODI water already? I would do a rip clean. How large is the tank? If 100 gallons or under rip clean is your best option.

HOW TO RIP-CLEAN SAFELY
Place all corals into buckets of tank water/sump and take all the rocks out. Place rocks into 5 gallon bucket(s).

Bring all buckets to patio/driveway. Lay towels over the top of buckets you’re not using. So if your rocks fill 3 buckets, cover 2 of them with a towel and work on the rocks from bucket 1. Scrub algae off with a toothbrush/bristle brush and dunk clean in bucket of SALTwater (fresh water will kill your bacteria and cause a cycle). Make sure to wear gloves or keep an eye out for nasties like bristleworms. Worth it to take a small container of salt water out there too so when you inevitably find CUC that snuck out on the rocks/ corals you can place them in there so they don’t die. Only use clean/new brushes and salt water!!!

Re-place your rocks and corals in the tank and dose vibrant at the recommended dosage for at least 2 months to make sure the algae is GONE. Ensure you properly temp acclimate the coral back to the tank water because the holding water will have gone cold during the rock-scrubbing process. Drip acclimation is not necessary because it’s the same water they came from/are in now.

I had to do this recently, it was a 45 gallon tank and it got done in 4-5 hours. Placed it back into my tank and returned all the corals to it. No coral casualties and no cycle. Rinsing in salt water is key and never never NEVER let your rocks dry out all the way. Rocks should be out of the water for 3 hours max and for very limited amounts of time in direct sunlight.

Good luck with your tank!!!

 

[Cell]

Just in case you decide to rip clean. @brandon429

 

[dvgyfresh]

nitrate at 0 isn’t essentially true, it’s probly all the algae sucking up all the nutrients in the tank (not allowing corals to receive ) I would recommend identifying the algae you do have and goin from there, I prefer the less chemicals or additives the better

 

[HuduVudu]

The algae is probably from nutrients "stuck" in the rock. This is common.

 

[brandon429]

highlights from this thread:

Reef2Reef Pest algae challenge thread hydrogen peroxide

What you are really in for: Hand cleaning, hard work siphon and rasp-removing of accumulations and invasions outside the tank and doing massive water changes is 90% of this thread, peroxide is 10%. We almost never dose peroxide into the tank water, this is a you-work-physically-hard as catch-up...

www.reef2reef.com

1. test model one rock before doing the whole tank. we know what works before you begin this way, test modeling is shown a hundred times there for reference.

2. the sandbed flora some consider ok, keep, and some want it gone. Its light enough it might self correct in time once the rocks have their waste dislodged/pores re opened up formerly plugged by gha


3. Just because you need to rip clean doesn't mean you have bad parameters. Right now on google scholar we can look up studies where they simply placed metal boxes with grating designed to reject rasping organisms onto perfect reefs, and in a month they looked like the above under the metal grating.

If you do a sandbed cleaning then that will look sharp too vs staggered correction


look at just the last three pages, that ulva takeover tank back to total new.
Our method is the only one that hits the source, which is all the pent up waste detritus fueling the gha. its in the rocks and sand. to prove its in the rocks, twist any rock there above midwater back and forth and night, shining a flashlight into the tank. it will look like a MS mud puddle, all from one single rock. if you use a doser, a sea hare, or fluconazole to rid your algae you compound that material, merely convert it from plant to poo.

our way is true export. get your work gloves ready. that work thread is nearly 37 pages all look the same after.

 

[snowhite]

Looks like a lot of maintenance is your biggest need.
If time and attention isn't available than I don't see how you're going to be able to progress toward improvement.

 

[Geebs19]

Not dosing anything. Mag, calc, and alk get replenished by my water changes.

Tank is 100 gallons. I’d hate to rip clean as if I did that I may just be done with it. May give me an excuse to move the tank to the basement.
Forgot to mention that tank is in direct sunlight all day.

 

[alysak6075]

Replenishing by water changes isnt exactly true, if all would be replenished by water changes you would be doing a 20 gallon change per day. I was in the same boat a while ago, lots of algae, corals looked bad or dying, weird fish issues.

After doing an ATI ICP test and seeing all that was out of spec:

What helped: Vibrant + Dr.Tims waste away (used together heavily) + big a** skimmer.
Water changes didnt really help corals, I was doing 5% per day, they started to look better but not great.
What helped was buying a cheap jebao 4 channel doser on amazon and dosing ATI essentials pro.

What i do now: Dose ATI Nutrients C and ATI Essentials, Change 5% water whenever i feel like it (automatic, so press a button) maybe once a week maybe less.

If you aren't rinsing the frozen food thats where the algae is coming from.

 

[tankstudy]

Not dosing anything. Mag, calc, and alk get replenished by my water changes.

Tank is 100 gallons. I’d hate to rip clean as if I did that I may just be done with it. May give me an excuse to move the tank to the basement.
Forgot to mention that tank is in direct sunlight all day.

You may want to dose those things individually. Water changes work when its replenishing faster than your tank is consuming but some tanks get to the point where water changes are not enough, specifically, once things really start growing in your tank.

If this was my tank, I'd get the big three parameters back within the recommended range. Some corals can tolerate the parameters outside recommended ranges which give you a false indicator that the water is okay when it really isn't. Once I get that back in sync, I'd wait atleast 1-2 months before doing anything. Corals when beaten up can take a long time to recover depending on species, like weeks to months.

I definitely wouldn't rip this tank clean, especially if those were my test results and I knew they were accurate.

 

[cool2burn]

I would get a lawnmower blenny bunch of snails and start dosing live photo plankton to out compete that stuff

 

[ReeferWarrant]

Vodka dosing worked for me, but I did not have near of what you have going on. What does your CUC look like as well?

 

[BackToTheReef]

Not dosing anything. Mag, calc, and alk get replenished by my water changes.

Tank is 100 gallons. I’d hate to rip clean as if I did that I may just be done with it. May give me an excuse to move the tank to the basement.
Forgot to mention that tank is in direct sunlight all day.

Do you have anyway to track the temp in your tank throughout the day? You might be getting some pretty big swings additionally all the light is going to do nothing but feed algae growth.

 

[nereefpat]

I would argue that it's a combo of this,

Phosphate .346

and this

Forgot to mention that tank is in direct sunlight all day.

I would use GFO or Phosguard to lower the P, and reduce the sunlight.

Of course, removing all the algae you can will help.

 

[Geebs19]

Vodka dosing worked for me, but I did not have near of what you have going on. What does your CUC look like as well?

foxface, reef hermits, snails, fighting conch.

Do you have anyway to track the temp in your tank throughout the day? You might be getting some pretty big swings additionally all the light is going to do nothing but feed algae growth.

Temp stays stable in the home. It sits always back from the windows but gets light.

I’ve never had an issue with the big 3 until lately when water changes became more of a monthly than a weekly. I do 25% when I do them.