Spam me with your pictures of macro tanks please! I want to start a tank for them!
What can you have as a CUC that wont eat them? I recently added red flat branch gracilaria to my DT and within a week my turbo snails have all but demolished it! Ugh!
Any tips for how to keep macros thriving are also appreciated!
@BrittneyC,
I have ornamental & utilitarian macros in every display tank I own. In the green utilitarian macros, I like Caulerpa Paspoidies and Caulerpa Prolifera. The Paspoidies is a faster grower and more prone to go sexual. In the red macros, you have many options. A hardy red macro that stands up to herbivore pressure is Gracilaria Hayi. It is lightly calcified and not readily grazed on.
with respect to FOWLR in your 150G upgrade, I suggest you first establish nitrification bacteria cycle using ammonia & bottled bacteria. Then add diver collected live rock with no fish or CUC. GULF Coast Live Rock is heavily grazed off algae. Once in your tank, emerging sprouts of diverse macro algae become evident. In 55G seaweed lagoon, a rock the size of a softball grew diverse macro that covered 40% of display..
gulfliverock.com
[This rock is fully blanketed with colorful coralline algae's, these algae's come in multitudes of fascinating shades of purple, reds, oranges, peaches and yellows. Most rocks contain bryzoans,orange leather sponge,gracilaria algae,halimeda, sea grapes, cluster corals, and cup corals. All of our premium decorative live rocks contain seeded plant life,both macro and micro algae.All pieces are hand collected fresh from our gulf lease site by our diving staff and shipped directly to our customers.We do not use any chemicals in our process. The rocks pictured are for example only. All of our premium decorative live rock is as good or better than the rocks pictured.]
check out this guide from GulfCoast EcoSystem / Live Plants.
An online guide to the identification and care of marine plants and macroalgae in the aquarium.
www.marineplantbook.com
The first time seaweed went sexual on me was 10 years ago with a 150G display with both Caulerpa Paspoidies & Prolifera being pushEd with 1000W of 6500 Kelvin lighting. When I woke. In the morning I couldn’t see back glass. I immediately added an air stone and used activated carbon. Water cleared up in 24 hours. The main reason Caulerpa goes sexual is nitrogen limited while growing fast. I typically add nitrogen & chaetogrow to macro tank after macro are well established.
I have had dragons breath go sexual. It’s a survival technique. Because all of my tanks have excess gas exchange, when macro goes sexual, I add ammonia $ ChaetoGrow.
I have tangs & algae blennie in these seaweed tanks, but the fish were not added until macro growth was substantial. In that way, seaweed grew faster than grazers eat it.
