My Chaetomorha dieing

TheReefNoob · Mar 16, 2018

Hey guys just wanna ask if you can help me figured out, why my chaetomorha is dieing? It's turning white on me, it's not even a week old.

Lighting is Kessil H80 Tuna (Flora)
Was running 12 hours someone told me to reduce down to 4 hours a day for a week and then increase it 2 hours every week till I get to 12 hours.

I don't know if my lighting is too high or something else.

I also placed a small amount in my nano tank with a Kessil H80 Blue and it living well

mtraylor · Mar 16, 2018

I would run the light 12 hours/day opposite of the lighting schedule for display. There is no reason for any of that other stuff. You had it right from the get go. Go back to what you had.
Also from the looks of it. Your aquarium is brand new. Your nutrient level is probably really low, so you will not get allot of quick growth out of it. The light should be enough. Just out of
curiosity. What are you tank parms right now? Are you still cycling aquarium?

GSPClown94 · Mar 16, 2018

There have been a few posts lately about chaeto dying while using Kessil lights, perhaps its just too much light.

KMench · Mar 16, 2018

I can’t get chaeto to live either

I just use calperula in my fuge instead.

TheReefNoob · Mar 16, 2018

mtraylor said:
I would run the light 12 hours/day opposite of the lighting schedule for display. There is no reason for any of that other stuff. You had it right from the get go. Go back to what you had.
Also from the looks of it. Your aquarium is brand new. Your nutrient level is probably really low, so you will not get allot of quick growth out of it. The light should be enough. Just out of
curiosity. What are you tank parms right now? Are you still cycling aquarium?

The tank is 4 months now, I did a quick cycle using Bio-Spria and Dr Tim's Ammonia. I had very high peaks of ammonia, then nitrites and nitrates off the scale during the cycle. Once everything was down to zerro and nitrates stayed at 10ppm. When I first added the chaeto my Nitrates came down to 5ppm and phosphates are at 0.05 ppm. I have 4 fish, snails, blood red shrimp and emerald crab. I do have green hairs algae growing in the display. But the snails have it under control. I also run a GFO and carbon reactors, along with a protein skimmer.

mtraylor · Mar 16, 2018

TheReefNoob said:
The tank is 4 months now, I did a quick cycle using Bio-Spria and Dr Tim's Ammonia. I had very high peaks of ammonia, then nitrites and nitrates off the scale during the cycle. Once everything was down to zerro and nitrates stayed at 10ppm. When I first added the chaeto my Nitrates came down to 5ppm and phosphates are at 0.05 ppm. I have 4 fish, snails, blood red shrimp and emerald crab. I do have green hairs algae growing in the display. But the snails have it under control. I also run a GFO and carbon reactors, along with a protein skimmer.

Ok. Well turn it back to the 12hour I mentioned before and tune that light more toward the red and you will be rocking in and rolling.

Fourstars · Mar 16, 2018

Maybe you stipping everything out with the GFO and carbon and the chaeto is starving for nutrients? might consider dosing iron also.

TheReefNoob · Mar 16, 2018

Fourstars said:
GFO and carbon

I was thinking of taking out the standalone GFO reactor and doing a mix carbon and GFO because then I would use less GFO, at least till it's gone. Then only use GFO if needed and just a carbon reactor.

Fourstars · Mar 16, 2018

IF it were my tank I would take them all off line and just use if your testing shows you have and issue with high phosphates. I only skim and grow chaeto. But I do keep GFO and a reactor handy. Or you could just start feeding more.

TheReefNoob · Mar 16, 2018

Fourstars said:
start feeding more

I have been adding brine shrimp to the reefroids and feeding increased to twice a day and I threw from food in the sump. Because I was thinking that too that I was taking everything out of the water for the Chaeto to grown. Skimmer is not taking a lot out of the water like it use to.

Matthew Frost · Mar 16, 2018

I would pull the GFO out and test your levels after a few days. Depending on total water volume/size of your fuge you could be starving the macro.

Fourstars · Mar 16, 2018

Just be carefull. If you start just concentrating on growing chaeto and make a lot of changes to fast you might get and algae bloom in the tank. The cheato has to be growing well enough with enough light and photo period it can take over for the GFO and carbon. And also out compete the main tank.

SurfLife · Mar 16, 2018

mtraylor said:
Ok. Well turn it back to the 12hour I mentioned before and tune that light more toward the red and you will be rocking in and rolling.

I can only comment on this because of a 'mistake' I recently made and mentioned in another post. Was away for 3 weeks and I left the same Kessil light on full intensity/red the entire time. I have timer for the light and forgot to set it up. So 500+ hours without a break and the chaeto has continued to grow. It has changed to a darker blueish green but seems to be thriving.
The light did not kill the chaeto... yet

I am back to 12on/12off now. Red.

mtraylor · Mar 16, 2018

I agree that you need to start testing your phosphates. That will tell you where you are at and when you need to add or exchange out your GFO. I run GFO reactor, Carbon Reactor, and have a refugium full of chaeto. Still have phosephates and nitrates, but I like to feed my fish. They get Nori for breakfast every day and frozen food in the evening.

Fourstars · Mar 16, 2018

I run mine 24/7

mtraylor · Mar 16, 2018

I run all my rectors 24/7 as well.

TinyChocobo · Mar 16, 2018

It has to eat - if you have other methods to control the nutrients that it would eat - it will starve.

You could reduce the flow through the GFO, reduce the GFO, or remove the GFO temporarily or you could just over-feed the system for a bit and see how the chaeto does.

PatW · Mar 16, 2018

I ran chaeto fine with a cheap compact fluorescent light.

Then I upped the light in the display tank and the chaeto withered.

I then ran a high powered kessel refugium light and the chaeto thrived and then died.

It turned out that the phosphates had depleted. I dose nitrates and phosphates to keep them at least at minimums and feed some dry food too.

The chaeto is thriving again.

Clownfish2 · Mar 16, 2018

I added chaeto to my 110 gallon with a H380 to combat hair algae. The chaeto slowly melted away! At the time, I was running a GFO reactor and had a total of 9 small fish. My phosphates and Nitrates always tested 0. When I removed the GFO reactor, the chaeto slowly grew back. A variety of snails consumed my hair algae problem. IMO, chaeto needs not only proper PAR but also nutrients (fish waste, nitrates).