Help, algae is winning!

[Turnage]

Flux RX. You can get it off Amazon. I had a bad outbreak of turf algae 8 months ago. Treated the tank with Flux RX and 2 week later...boom no more algae. Best thing about it is that it's reef safe.

 

[Twodogsnnc]

don't do your whole tank yet.

pull one test rock out, work it over like a dentist would a bad tooth for plaque. totally picked clean, no peroxide yet, all hard work and rinsing off in saltwater till they're clean like below.


then peroxide for 5 mins

rinse off in sw, put back that one rock. chart it against the rest as you decide. it will hold its clear much much longer. in the cleaned vs invaded phase try different grazers who might prevent it or try UV light you'd be surprised how that helps with GHA even though its anchored.


it has a transitory phase too which UV helps suppress.

that above is careful external tank surgery its not dosing the water,

corals didnt do anything bad, we work around them. they get some air time while we dentist around them, but that's harmless. no peroxide on corals.


even if the job is too big to use surgical detailing, still do one rock.


one rock in your tank gets the kid gloves removed, the rest can be experimented with to save work. make one rock comply since you do have total control over that much real estate, see if you can control it at all on the mini model.

then one day if legits dont pan out you have a proven model already/fall back on. for nano reefs we dont hesitate one minute, its full rip clean / blasted sand clean all new water and rocks detailed. bam.

Do I dip the rock once scraped clean in 3% peroxide or do I mix the 3% peroxide with salt water. If so what ratio water to peroxide do you recommend?

thanks.

 

[brandon429]

It’s right from the bottle onto the cleaned surface, none is a dip. This allows us not to contact coral flesh, no algae there. This way is very exacting and it will test for rapid grow back, if that happens I’m more inclined to think nutrients, light levels and params might matter


but in the majority of cases, rasping a rock clean and then peroxide on the clean areas, then just rinsed off in saltwater and set back, stays clean a long time. do a whole rock like dentist detail, hard on the enamel parts, easy on the gums, then a burn with peroxide. Take pics we enjoy being able to see before and after test rocks, even if not the whole tank done.


the sandbed cleaning is optional, it usually affects the rate of grow back

 

[brandon429]

Also highly specific to your job, consider just these last two pages. Look at the level of ulva infestation here on p28

Reef2Reef Pest algae challenge thread hydrogen peroxide

Thank you for the quick reply and guidance. it Is a Waterbox 100.3 so a take down is fairly easy. Went through it to get all the fish out a month ago and is no problem. All corals on plugs aside from the nem so that is also a non issue. Conchs, snails, hermits, fire and cleaner shrimp is all...

www.reef2reef.com

then see it’s after pics on 29 they’re fixed


they did sand cleaning, assembled back an ulva-free system. by force.

 

[Twodogsnnc]

It’s right from the bottle onto the cleaned surface, none is a dip. This allows us not to contact coral flesh, no algae there. This way is very exacting and it will test for rapid grow back, if that happens I’m more inclined to think nutrients, light levels and params might matter


but in the majority of cases, rasping a rock clean and then peroxide on the clean areas, then just rinsed off in saltwater and set back, stays clean a long time. do a whole rock like dentist detail, hard on the enamel parts, easy on the gums, then a burn with peroxide. Take pics we enjoy being able to see before and after test rocks, even if not the whole tank done.


the sandbed cleaning is optional, it usually affects the rate of grow back

Sorry for the questions, but how do you apply the peroxide? Pour it on? Brush it on?

 

[brandon429]

Either, really I did them all, contact in any way


I think my favorite was by small dropper bulb and even as a mister bottle for larger swaths

once your tank is made free of invasion, then the various dosers like flux and fluconazole can be considered, but this is 75 cents to a very likely cure. Only use those if it comes back with a vengeance