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Jmradtke13

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Hey! So Im new to r2r and new to forums so excuse the naiveness. A little back story. I have been a salt water hobbiest for about 7 years now. I used to have a beautiful tank but ended up moving and with lack of knowledge and a promotion at work leading to a very busy work schedule I neglected my tank. I didnt really care enough again until like 5 months ago when I started paying someone to come and do water changes. Fast forward to today and lessons learned Im reaching out to this wonderful community for the knowledge I need that I am lacking to continue on this journey without paying someone my hard earned money on something I enjoy. I currently have a 55 gallon with only some polyps and candy cane coral that is pretty small. I have a small clean up crew consisting of hermits, astreas, 2 tiger conchs, seahare and 1 or 2 mexicans and a turbo. Livestock wise 2 dominos, a fox face I just purchased a long with a school of 5 chromis. My question to you guys is I had a bloom of hair algea and I think diatoms? ( the sand has a film and red in color) I tested my water and nitrates were high along with a very high salinity. I went to the LFS today to have them test as well he said my phosphates were kinda high but not to extreme along with a slightly high salinty. So I was advised to do a small water change (like 5 percent) and add about 3 gallons of fresh to my 2 gallons of salt. Any other advice to get rid of hair algea? How many snails should I own in my tank? Could my lights contribute to any of this? I have owned nems before, tangs, and other coral and would like to get back to that but I know I need to get the numbers right. Sorry for the long post, I have attached some photos of my tank as well. I am glad to be apart of this community .
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Welcome!!! Astrea snails! Kind of a pain as they can't right themselves if flip over....and I need someone to tell me how they manage to do that on a flat sand bed with no flow....but algae eating machines.
 
Welcome to R2R!!! Thank you for the introduction - we're glad you're here!

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Welcome to R2R!!! I recommend roughly 1 snail per 10 gals of each type of snail. I have Trochus, Nassarius, and Cerith snails.
Thank you! I knew there was a formula for snails/gallon. I just purchased 20 astreas but I am looking to buy 20 more. I have never heard of trochus or cerith and will definitely do research on them, but I heard Nassaruis are better than astreas right?
 
Welcome to R2R!
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How often are you doing water changes?
So sadly when I was paying someone he was only coming once a month, but now that I am taking it over again I did a 5 percent 3 days ago and since the salinty was throught the roof, I did another one today and it went down a bit after adding more salt than fresh. Are you thinking the lack of water changes are due to the bloom? I am planning on doing 2 a month? Doesnt it depend on the amount of livestock you have in the tank?
 
The seahare you have should wipe that algae for you.
Thats what I heard also but he doesnt seem interested in climbing on the rock. I picked it up and placed it near the algea on the rock and within 30 min it was on the ground again.
 

IF YOU HAD TO TAKE A REEFING EXAM, WOULD YOU PASS?

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