How often do you harvest your algae reactor?

[Letterkenny]

So I have a chaeto reactor set up. First batch my chaeto ended up dying from what I assume was too low of phosphates in a new tank. Second time around it seems healthy but not really growing in the reactor. Probably been 3-4 weeks and haven’t really seen noticeable growth. How often do you typically harvest?

This is in a Tunze 3181 reactor. I also haven’t had any luck getting this chaeto to spin (tried balling it up and tried stretching it out).

 

[WIReefer]

When I ran Chaeto I would harvest every 3-4 weeks. What is your PO4?

 

[Letterkenny]

When I ran Chaeto I would harvest every 3-4 weeks. What is your PO4?

It’s up now. Nitrates are 7ppm or so and PO4 of 0.08ppm

 

[khmer_reefer]

do you dose any iron?

 

[Letterkenny]

do you dose any iron?

I started dosing chaeto grow by Brightwell so I assume it has it in there.

 

[Letterkenny]

I’m still not sure with this thing. I keep seeing chaeto dying and not growth. I am always between 5-10ppm in nitrates and under 0.1ppm oh phosphates so while not ULN, I am still not sure why there is no growth. My only real thought it that the reactor is being fed from the return manifold that has gone through the filter roller and skimmer so maybe that water is too clean?

 

[Modest]

Besides iron chaeto also requires iodine.

 

[Letterkenny]

Besides iron chaeto also requires iodine.

I would have thought Chaetogrow by its name would have everything but apparently not iodine! What’s the best way to add this as I believe you need to do this cautiously?

 

[ichthyogeek]

I would have thought Chaetogrow by its name would have everything but apparently not iodine! What’s the best way to add this as I believe you need to do this cautiously?

Fairly certain there's an iodine supplement that Brightwell puts out. Most of the dosings I've heard about involve Lugol's Solution (which is just fancy Potassium Iodide, KI)