Need to lower phosphates now !

[juanmanuelsanchez]

Making the long story short I was on vacations and ICH made a feast of my fish, lots of casualties, no ammonia in the tank but phosphates are and I have a huge hair algae bloom.

Which is the most efficient way to take it out? Water changes are not doing anything atm.

Thanks !

 

[Jason mack]

Are you running gfo that Will help reduce po4 . As for the hair algae pull as Much as you can while doing wc .. and get Some mexican turbo’s

 

[juanmanuelsanchez]

No I don't run GFO. it's that the best way?

 

[kinetic]

1. More water changes (continue with that)
2. Run a TON of GFO (BRS carries it in bulk) through a reactor
3. Add a refugium / chaeto reactor / algae scrubber. This will use up a lot of phosphates and try to outcompete the algae for phosphates. Chaeto reactor works well and quickly, algae scrubber takes awhile, refugium works too but you'll need a specific space for it to grow chaeto.
4. You can also try dosing Red Sea NoPo4-X. It's essential a carbon source (vinegar and a bit of vodka perhaps) and will build up nitrate/phosphate processing bacteria. Takes a little while for it to kick in, but it'll work. You have to be VERY good at dosing daily (or multiple times a day) and don't miss a day. An auto dosing pump (with special lines, like the usual poly lines used with RO/DI) would help with that
5. Stop feeding anything if possible
6. Keep manually removing algae
7. Turbo snails and sea hares will help you manually remove (but will still poop, so they can't do it all). Sea hares are great, but very delicate to acclimate to a tank and will ultimately starve once algae runs out, so be sure to find a new home when you're cleaned up

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

There are a variety of ways to reduce phosphate, and a binder such as GFO is a fine way. I discuss the methods here:

Phosphate In The Reef Aquarium
https://www.reef2reef.com/blog/?p=3184

 

[GoVols]

No I don't run GFO. it's that the best way?

GFO is wonderful.

But you need to let it tumble in it's own reactor to get the full benefit.
Use a very small dose off the bat to lower the phos. slowly. If you drop it down too fast, you could shock your reef.

 

[juanmanuelsanchez]

I already have a reactor. I already ordered some online should be arriving next week.

Hope this works fast. The ammount of algae is really high