Dying Sunset Monti

[hllb]

I went on vacation for 2 weeks but my husband was home taking care of tank. All he did was feed them. He may have overfed them a little but probably not by much. I came home to cyano (mostly green but some red) on the rocks and hair algae. And my monti appears nearly dead. I did a 20% water change and these are my parameters which are right where they always are. Taken with a combo of Hanna, salifert and Red Sea. Pictures are after I removed most of the cyano and some of the hair algae from the rocks.

Ph 8.0

Nitrate: 5

Po4: .049

Alk: 8.5

Ca: 420

Mg: 1575

Sg: 1.026

Temp: 77.8

any ideas? I did finally install my icecap 1K gyre tonight to improve flow but there just aren’t a ton of nutrients to explain the algae. And no idea what happened to the monti. It was growing like a weed before.

 

[AllSignsPointToFish]

Looks bleached but not necessarily dead. Any changes to lighting? I'd also run some activated carbon to pull out any contaminants or poisons that may have entered the system.

 

[hllb]

Looks bleached but not necessarily dead. Any changes to lighting? I'd also run some activated carbon to pull out any contaminants or poisons that may have entered the system.

Thanks. It's a 32g biocube. In late October, I upgraded the lighting from the standard LEDs to nanobox reef, but it still was growing and doing well then. I did turn them down a little yesterday. I'm running them from 1:30 PM to 11 PM, with the full lights on from 3 PM to 8:30 PM. When full lights are on, my percentages are (after turning them down yesterday):

royal blue: 70%
white: 38%
violet: 55%
Blue/cyan: 58%
Mint: 75%

I am running both activated carbon and purigen in my media tower. The carbon shouldn't be exhausted yet, though my tracking app failed so I can't look up when I changed it last - I think less than a month ago.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I too would look at lighting and begin with reducing whites and increasing blue.
Moderate water flow and if you don't already, add a Little Lugols iodine, and potassium.
What are your CA and MAG levelk and also Salinity

 

[hllb]

I too would look at lighting and begin with reducing whites and increasing blue.
Moderate water flow and if you don't already, add a Little Lugols iodine, and potassium.
What are your CA and MAG levelk and also Salinity

All the parms are in my original post. I do weekly add a single drop of Nyos iodine, but obviously missed that while I was gone.

 

[AllSignsPointToFish]

It's probably the lighting. If you weren't able to match the PAR, it can take days or even a couple of weeks for the bleaching to become visible. I think keeping your parameters stable and turning the lights down a bit should help.

 

[hllb]

It's probably the lighting. If you weren't able to match the PAR, it can take days or even a couple of weeks for the bleaching to become visible. I think keeping your parameters stable and turning the lights down a bit should help.

OK, thanks. I had planned to up the lights slowly, but then my LPS looked so much happier right away that I didn't. But, they are much lower in the tank than the monti. I had not planned on putting any SPS in there, because the stock lights were weak, but they sent that frag as a freebie. Do my current settings look OK? I can turn the mint (which is pretty whiteish) down too.

 

[AllSignsPointToFish]

Depending on how much you've already reduced the lighting, you may be able to take them down a bit further. I can't really give you a concrete answer without PAR measurements.

The reason I think that lighting is the issue is when I look at the picture of your Monti, the shaded sides and areas that see lower lighting are still colored up and look okay.

 

[LARedstickreefer]

It would still be good to figure out what the heck happened.

Just food shouldn’t do all of this...Maybe something happened awhile back and is just now manifesting?

 

[hllb]

It would still be good to figure out what the heck happened.

Just food shouldn’t do all of this...Maybe something happened awhile back and is just now manifesting?

The tank is about 4 months old. I still don't get how I can have so much algae with such low nutrients.

 

[LARedstickreefer]

The tank is about 4 months old. I still don't get how I can have so much algae with such low nutrients.

The nutrients are there, just hiding inside the algae

Get some Turbo snails.

 

[Magellan]

The nutrients are there, just hiding inside the algae

Get some Turbo snails.

+1. You had a nutrient spike, but everything looks normal because the algae used it to grow

 

[hllb]

I have oodles of clean up crew, including a pitho crab, and emerald crab, a halloween urchin, and many snails and hermits (from reef cleaners). Can't really add more to it.

I've had algae issues from the start and have never had high nutrients.

 

[LARedstickreefer]

Algae needs very little to grow...At 4 months, your tank is still in its cocoon. There will be a lot of changes and a lot of learning.

I know it’s hard to hear, but Id take a step back and just wait it all out. At some point, your tank will find its happy place.

 

[jordan10]

I have oodles of clean up crew, including a pitho crab, and emerald crab, a halloween urchin, and many snails and hermits (from reef cleaners). Can't really add more to it.

I've had algae issues from the start and have never had high nutrients.

Sun light or how long is ur lights on?

 

[hllb]

Sun light or how long is ur lights on?

Posted this earlier:

I'm running them from 1:30 PM to 11 PM, with the full lights on from 3 PM to 8:30 PM. When full lights are on, my percentages are (after turning them down yesterday):

royal blue: 70%
white: 38%
violet: 55%
Blue/cyan: 58%
Mint: 75%

 

[jordan10]

Posted this earlier:

I'm running them from 1:30 PM to 11 PM, with the full lights on from 3 PM to 8:30 PM. When full lights are on, my percentages are (after turning them down yesterday):

royal blue: 70%
white: 38%
violet: 55%
Blue/cyan: 58%
Mint: 75%

My bad