Is the algae or the skimmer stealing all my nitrates?

Joe31415 · Jul 18, 2021

This is still what you would consider a 'new' tank. No, or very, very little coralline yet, but a lot of algae...or cyano or something. It's long, stringy, red and difficult to pull off the rocks (I use a hemostat to get a grip on it). I spent about a 20 minutes a few times a week removing it and it barely makes a dent in it. I do have a rather large snail that eats a lot of it, just very slowly. It'll move about 6 inches a day. However, I bought it not for algae removal, but because it's shell is compleatly covered in coralline. Plus I have two bottles of ARC coralline in a bottle coming in a few days.

In any case, my Nitrates have been at zero for about a month now. This, despite several fish (and a few corals), as well as some snails and hermit crabs. Plus, I overfeed.
I'm assuming it's all the algae stealing the nitrates, but I just want to make sure it's not the skimmer.

I seem to be getting lucky though. Whatever I'm doing (dosing nitrates when I think of it? overfeeding? daily AB+? etc), my corals, especially my euphyllias, look great.

Dkmoo · Jul 18, 2021

Its likely a combination of the algae and new tank

If you see algae growthing, that means its absorbing nutrients.

New tank substrates and rock will absorb nutrients into their pores until they are saturated. This "saturation" is one of the maturation processes. Usually takes between 8 to 12 months depending on your nutrient level.

I would be mindful about overfeeding bc I'm not sure how much is being stored in yiur rock and substrate vs being exported. At some point, it will saturate, and you will see the full impact of overfeeding in the form of algae outbreak so, when it reaches that point, just make sure you adjust accordingly by either reduce feeding or increasing export. This is typically when we see posts like "help my tank is 8 months old nothing changes and everything looked find then suddenly I have massive algae"

Joe31415 · Jul 18, 2021

Regarding overfeeding, it's not that I'm just dumping food in, but I'd wager that maybe half of it goes down the overflow or gets stuck to the power head guard. But I understand what you mean.

Nicklepickle · Aug 14, 2021

Dkmoo said:
Its likely a combination of the algae and new tank

If you see algae growthing, that means its absorbing nutrients.

New tank substrates and rock will absorb nutrients into their pores until they are saturated. This "saturation" is one of the maturation processes. Usually takes between 8 to 12 months depending on your nutrient level.

I would be mindful about overfeeding bc I'm not sure how much is being stored in yiur rock and substrate vs being exported. At some point, it will saturate, and you will see the full impact of overfeeding in the form of algae outbreak so, when it reaches that point, just make sure you adjust accordingly by either reduce feeding or increasing export. This is typically when we see posts like "help my tank is 8 months old nothing changes and everything looked find then suddenly I have massive algae"

This is a great observation. Very well put and I think a common occurrence. I couldn’t buy pest algae in the first 6 months and everything was on the up and up. Great coralline growth, ph, alkalinity stability etc. Then I hit some trouble at 7 months. Just at the point when u think u can relax.