nzkiwi80
Active Member
Yeah I’ve tried reef to, aqua forest phosphate minus, rowa phos nothing works
GHA - nitrate issue
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homer1475
Figuring out the hobby one coral at a time.
More then likely yes.
But, and this is a huge BUT. I would be wary of running rowa with testing 0 already. It;s a recipe for dino's.
If it were my tank.......
Manually remove all I can weekly, discontinue rowa, and probably put in a turf scrubber or chaeto, and depending on my coral load, I would be using vibrant. I've use it in the past to clear up GHA issues that just won't die out, and it worked well. Some people have reported issues with corals and vibrant, but that is not my experience. My corals didn't skip a beat when using it.
But, and this is a huge BUT. I would be wary of running rowa with testing 0 already. It;s a recipe for dino's.
If it were my tank.......
Manually remove all I can weekly, discontinue rowa, and probably put in a turf scrubber or chaeto, and depending on my coral load, I would be using vibrant. I've use it in the past to clear up GHA issues that just won't die out, and it worked well. Some people have reported issues with corals and vibrant, but that is not my experience. My corals didn't skip a beat when using it.
Manual removal, although a pain is probably necessary. Have you got some aquarium tweezers?
nzkiwi80
Active Member
Got Chaeto and vibrant no hoy. 5ml weekly in a 120L system.
homer1475
Figuring out the hobby one coral at a time.
Think of testing this way.....
What were testing is residuals in the water column, not whats actually being used. The GHA in your tank is stripping the water of any residual phosphates before you can test for it. So even though your testing 0, your phosphates aren't truly 0(if it were you wouldn't have an algae issue).
With that said, I would still be discontinuing any phosphate remover media. Kind of counter productive, I know. But you do not want to hit absolute 0 either.
homer1475
Figuring out the hobby one coral at a time.
Vibrant will kill the chaeto, might want to pull that, or plan on replacing it. Just let vibrant do it's thing, and control what nutrients your adding to the tank.
Nitrates and phosphates test 0? What test kits are you using?
nzkiwi80
Active Member
What’s the residuals water testing?
sure I can stop with phosphate removal but what’s the plan to remove it? It just keeps growing. I’ve done manual for over a year now
nzkiwi80
Active Member
nzkiwi80
Active Member
I don’t get what you mean. I test the water in my display tank?
homer1475
Figuring out the hobby one coral at a time.
Vibrant to kill back the algae, then chaeto to keep nutrients in control after the vibrant has run it's course.
FWIW, get better test kits. Your 0's on an API kit could mean anything. API isn;t sensative enough to the low ranges of PO4 we like to keep our tanks at.
FWIW, get better test kits. Your 0's on an API kit could mean anything. API isn;t sensative enough to the low ranges of PO4 we like to keep our tanks at.
nzkiwi80
Active Member
Sure but doing the full 360 the GHA is likely eating up what I have so even the best kits won’t tell me anything helpful
how do I get rid of this s@@t
homer1475
Figuring out the hobby one coral at a time.
I'm not the best linguist out there so let me try an explain it......
Nitrates and phosphates are used in the basic building blocks of life. After our corals use what they need, there is an excess in the water they are not using, and that excess is what were testing for.
In a new tank with 0 coral or biomass using up nutrients, what you test in the water is whats actually in the tank. In a tank with some biomass, that biomass uses up nutrients to grow, what the biomass doesn't use is left over in the water. That left over is what we test for.
nzkiwi80
Active Member
North
nzkiwi80
Active Member
That makes complete sense now, how do I test for it?
homer1475
Figuring out the hobby one coral at a time.
API kit starts at 0.25. To control algae you want to be much below that(most keep thier tanks around 0.1 or lower). And API is notorious for not being very accurate either.
You need better test kits to measure PO4 at the level you want to control algae.
FWIW....
You do own a reef tank, some algae is a good thing as long as it's not out of control. Care to post an FTS so I can gauge the level of infestation?
You need better test kits to measure PO4 at the level you want to control algae.
FWIW....
You do own a reef tank, some algae is a good thing as long as it's not out of control. Care to post an FTS so I can gauge the level of infestation?
homer1475
Figuring out the hobby one coral at a time.
Personally, I would be doing manually weekly removals, using vibrant(worked well for me in the past, but takes a loooooooong time for it to actually work, like months), and dosing live phytoplankton to out compete the algae for the nutrients.
Get your Clean up crew from your own waters then. Urchins is good too.
But - a huge but - I´m not sure that you pictures show a GHA growth (microalgae growth) I have seen both cyanobacteria and dinoflagellates species looking like that in a bloom. If so - high nutrients is not your problem - it is too low nutrient that it is the problem in that case. You have tried the "lowing" strategy for a long time - you also dose rowa direct in the aquarium - I´m rather sure - you have not a "too high" problem. That your test with CUC not succeeded strenght my thinking that you are battling a Cyano/dino problem.
I would clean mechanical, stop all nutrient limitation processes - inclusive chaeto - get a dissent CUC and just see what´s happen.
Sincerely Lasse
But - a huge but - I´m not sure that you pictures show a GHA growth (microalgae growth) I have seen both cyanobacteria and dinoflagellates species looking like that in a bloom. If so - high nutrients is not your problem - it is too low nutrient that it is the problem in that case. You have tried the "lowing" strategy for a long time - you also dose rowa direct in the aquarium - I´m rather sure - you have not a "too high" problem. That your test with CUC not succeeded strenght my thinking that you are battling a Cyano/dino problem.
I would clean mechanical, stop all nutrient limitation processes - inclusive chaeto - get a dissent CUC and just see what´s happen.
Sincerely Lasse
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homer1475
Figuring out the hobby one coral at a time.
While I don't agree with it not being GHA, and dieing GHA with cyano on top of it(I'm not seeing the typical brown snot of dino's)..
All I've been saying is manual removal, and bolster the CUC same as @Lasse just said.
Like I said earlier, I'm not the best linguist, and I often times try to explain things to only confuse people even more, but it makes sense to me.
