Not growing algea. Inverts and parameter issues.

[Llyod276]

So here's the problem and I'm wondering if it's good or bad. Seem like it could go either way.

1. A few weeks ago I basically intentionally by accident put the tank into a recycle. I had a bubble algea out-break and got some api algea fis and nuked the tank. Success! Victory was mine! Or so I thought... turns out my macro algea got cooked as well. Thus began the catastrophe. The catastrophe, prompted via much swearing and breaking defectective equipment, a major upgrade. Now three weeks later and I'm worried about my inverts specifically, my snails. I had 12 adults, a few even shot eggs into water and I had 150 baby snails, now I'm down to 50 that I can see and count. (yes, I have nothing better to do).

No problem, lfs has plenty more salad. And I got a medley.

2. Tank parameters... at least what I can measure. Sorry I dont have the reefmaster, 212 element test kit. Nope cheap dipstick, gonna have the not so L fs, test it this weekend. Except for a few in the pics.

Today 6/9/21

Temp: set at 80, inkbird says 79.5 photo. (There is a big temp difference between sump and dt ambient temps. Basement is at 64°; DT is at 71°. Open DT, covered sump.
Salinity: 1.024
Ph: see photo, 8.3 I would guess. Pulsing xenias: pulsing like mad if that's any measure.
No2 photo ~undetectable.
N03 ~undetectable. But wait! i do have a liquid 2 part test kit which reads:0? Photo.
Phosphates: historically high at pre rodi 4. Now rodi at photo, ( I have a hard time cause I'm colorblind in this spectrum they cyan...) .25~.5(?).
Calcium pre rodi 350, now rodi 280. Got liquid additive may add, but need advice.
Harness 180+ photo.
Kh photo.
Ammonia NH3: not worried, everything yet lives.
Key notes:
Nitrates have historically been @ stable 2.
Can't test tds yet, got to get a tds meter.
Calcium has historically been 350 ppm pre rodi. 3 pieces of spa, frags small open and happy. Have about 50 baby snails, and down to 6 I can see adult snails, mixed turbo and some other. Limpits are mainly gone had 6 to start but may have died off/catastrophe casualties.
More baby snails are being found in the filter socks, still alive, every 3 days.

I run a gfo and carbon dual reactor(s) . Brs type. 1 hour a day, to prevent stagnation/clumping. 24hrs sat and Sunday.

This is an rodi system. With an auto topoff. No gross salinity changes so to speak. Salinity tested weekly.

Macro algea shows growth, the small viney looking ones have the most, the cheato has gotten darker. The palm fronds looking, hard to judge, but have a) not died) seem to have gotten greener. Theres is a grow light over this part of the fuge; set for 12hrs, reverse cycle.

Skimmate production hard to say, but there is production. Not a while lot. The old 150 used to explode, literally, every 2 days. BUT this was during the catastrophe. The 240 has been dialed in and no explosion, just steady dark green skimmate.

According to some of the forums the params are excellent, but to me this is not good.

I'm the sole proprietor of the local 102 not-clean-the-back-glass union. I'm losing alot ot algea growth on the back glass, the snails have eaten most of it and I'm not regaining lost algea.
The one spot of some green hair(?) has stopped growing. The sailfin takes care of the rest. The rocks never able to sustain algea except bubble algea which has been eradicated.
To help grow algea I have started to leave my blinds open, where as before they were closed. No change. So even direct sunlight is not having an effect. Current light is a kessil ap 700, photo.

Pod count is high, hasn't been this many pods for a long while. Both large and small pods. My 6line is fat again, and wont eat frozen, because of pod bloom. Pods present in DT and sump, dt having more on glass, sump having larger and greater mix, large and small.

No cyano present em masse, was a diatom/dino outbreak and now gone. For the most part. I posted a few pics with white light as well.

Hence my suspicion of a cycle again.
So questions:

1. Are these params good?

2. I dont want to starve my snails, what should I do?

3. What do I change?

4. 1 fish death in past 6months, I got a yellow coris wrasse, who died of something to do with popeye. It was less than a week, in my tank. Thinking it got scratched then infected. Then dead. Or something. I wonder if it could be related... but it was post catastrophe..


P.s. all this info for a bunch of snails. But I hate watching my critters die. Even snails.

 

[KrisReef]

Snails eat algae. No algae, no snails.

Get some better test kits if you want to keep coral.

Calcium is supposed to be ~400ppm, in the tank, not in the rodi water?

 

[blasterman]

Well, the fact xenia is pulsing is a good thing. Means your water params have to be somewhat decent. Xenia won't pulse if you have disastrous water params.

Not understanding your calcium levels. You dont have anything in the tank to really deplete calcium so its going to be at the same level as you salt mix.

 

[DrZoidburg]

Pod explosion out competing everything? Test No3 again in 24 hrs? Edit. Ok I see algaefix. May be that it is binding up the nitrate. "The electrostatic bond between the cation and negative charge on the cell wall of algae, disrupts the cell function and kill it." I also read that it had antimicrobial properties. Maybe it stalled some of your bacteria. Did you test ammonia, and or nitrite?

 

[DrZoidburg]

this is what you dosed in your tank

 

[BostonReefer300]

Algaefix isn't removed by skimming or carbon evidently, so until you've done a bunch of water changes, you'll have significant amounts of it in your tank killing your algae. That being said, your pictures show plenty of film algae IMO which should be fine for your snails. With all those pods going and everything else you posted, it sounds like your tank is doing fine. Are you finding dead snails / empty shells? Some wrasses will eat snails. In my tank, only big snails can survive my murderous yellow coris wrasses. I wouldn't be surprised if your fat 6 Line has been chowing down on snails

 

[Llyod276]

I dunno the direct proprotion/ratio of the water changes as a measure of removal, but in the past 2ish months, starting apr March 15th 25% weekly and then 50% not quite three weeks ago during the tank move, tear down and reassemble, also the sand was halfassed rinsed, via stirred and then drained then refilled. It only took a day and a half laf to clear. I added new Caribsea sand 40lbs 30 to DT and 10 to sump. I did not remove the old, just stirred it up.

Had one planned for this weekend but holding off, because I'm trying to see if the spores from the old algea will come out of hibernation in the rocks. Yeah right who am I kidding, I dint have time during the week and with the holiday, I was outta town. Besides protien skimmer right?
The growth has slowed down in the past 2 weeks. I use the shelf rocks to judge growth because they are the newest of rocks put in. They were live rock but are nonporous, and are used as shelves in this case to create a throughfare/ hidey hole for the sailfin tang.

Yeah the algeafix should be exceedingly diluted and it's been almost three months since I added the last dose. It's like a calcium test really no change and all of a sudden everything's dead (at least algea).

The growth in the glass, is minimal, like maybe 2mm. A day/couple of days. Overall the pods are definitely in charge and even though the glass is clean they are present in the form of ~20per square inch. Hard to get a pic cause they're the tiny ones. On my filter sock rims, they appear red in color. On the glass, whitish.

I have seen 3 new empty shells. Dunno if the hermits got them or 6line. 6line has never gone after them before I dont really ever see him do this. I'm thinking starvation. I have one snail that I'm watching shrink and has not moved beyond a 2inch area a corner. Theres room for him to go anywhere, yet he either refuses or can't think to go up. Odd thing too, hermits have died off too had 12 of them, now maybe 8, hard to see only 4 or 5 climb Mt. Sushi to have thier Klan meeting. of the hermits, they are brown and red tiny dudes <1" . One is the alpha and has been there a year and he has the biggest shell and I dont know where he came from. Hes about an 1" and his shell is 1.5". I didn't put the shell in thier so maybe the it was a gift from hermit jesus.

No ammonia testing, not really an issue, as all my dinos/diatoms died off, more likely remission. I may have caught the ammonia spike just in time (during the catastrophe) from when the algea went up in sludge. Because the corals closed and the fish weren't happy. I look to my tang for the over all fish health, just my superstition. Having a photochromatic fish helps. Hes usually neutral, happy colored, but by the end of the catastrophe he changed to black. Im not losing Stripey!!! So I took action. Prior to the catastrophe, weather was cold and I'll admit to being a lazy reefer. But know I'm wiser, not any more intelligent, but able to learn and can say well if you do this stuff is gonna die.

Even though I got an A in chem that atomic signature means ****e to me. Plus i stopped when the molecules contained more than three elements. Shots hard!!! Great to know though. I had reckoned that like melafix which ticks off my zoas and palys, but makes water smell nice, it was weak sauce snake oil. Nope definelty works and after month or so will nuke your tank. There was another brand I was looking at but it said it would kill everything including macro. I even ignored the warnings from dudes/ettes on here about mixing adding chemikills. Oh well, lesson learned, harsh but at least it worked.

I gotta wonder if the params are good to keep as much as I can where they're at, or increase to some detectable nitrate levels. Nitrites according to dipstick are at 0/undetecable.

I forgot to mention my sandsifter star is dead/mia for 4 months or so. He lost an arm and half, and was FINALLY cleaning the sand everywhere, but then went off to the great reef in the sky. I assume. I poked the sand in various likely places and he gone! Also had a small 3 armed astrea starfish, have not seen it in 3 months. Would be nice to get them back. I dont see stars of any sort as a nuisance. No more snadsifters, I dont want to watch favored critters die, I dont thinkmy tank is big enough to support such a critter.

I can add calcium, not an issue. But I also reckoned that aside from baby snails, nothing is using much of it; the sps I have are slow growers, but that may change. The orange twig thing, finally got its growth tips back. The orange crusting thing, is open again instead of polka dot. And the chalice is the darkest purple I've ever seen it.

Like I said I'll have the mostly L fs, test this weekend. Youve all made a point, I think I need to test the source............this weekend. I'll test my rodi as well.

 

[BostonReefer300]

If you have that many pods, they must have a good food source and like your parameters. And if pods are doing well, a correctly-sized CUC population should be doing well too.