Took some bad advice from LFS, now what?

[brandon429]

if you try and assemble parts and pieces of fix info Robin it wont work the same as handing over the reigns for someone remotely.

your reef could easily, easily be zoomed into compliance in about a week but not by you picking the best sounding options, its by only running the plan. nanos have a rescue option that large tanks do not have, specifically because they are small and a five gallon water change strategically ran is 20~% of your water. that accessibility can be used a certain way to fix your tank from bottom to top, you wont have to test params to attain this. its a manner of cleaning and how you feed and guide the system, its not in a dose or a test reading.

its doing everything opposite the lfs tried to sell you. you'd be hands on vs hands off, and that will fix things like you want them to be

when you are on the absolute last stage of experimentation, about to start reconsidering the hobby-remember this option, takes about a week. we already have a recent job from the nanos forum on file, he's week 4 and looking strong and already upgrading his totally clean tank. formerly dinos packed. Tokash23 in the nanos forum the work is right there for study.

there is a certain way you clean the reef to make a fresh start, and then a certain way you feed it for several months to pack back in coral mass. not anyone I know runs reefs in this way, we use it to rescue reefs that are following the rules and not having fun. if more nanos were ran this way, there'd be less loss and more coral mass gained at the expense of water changed to process it all like exercise, literal reef tank exercise vs sitting there passively invaded.

there's nothing bigtime wrong with your picture, real reefs look worse in places. the matter is do you want it gone, do you consider it an eyesore. if so, we have means....

 

[vetteguy53081]

One thing to stop doing is continually doing something else.

i.e. stop doing x, then y, then z, then a, b, and c

chose 1 or 2 things and stick to those.

by constantly changing you’re going to send your tank into constant swings.

nothing wrong with some GFO and a skimmer.

that’s a little Cyano, which also never hurt anyone.

doesn’t look nice. But it’s not dangerous. You more or less just don’t want it to consume your tank, but I think any long term keeper will tell you forever more you’ll be constantly having little bits of Cyano, diatoms, algae and other things pop up here and there.

you have a new tank.

also I don’t think I have EVER seen any tank ever exist that from start to maturity didn’t have at least 3 nuisance algae’s pop up.

It’s just not how it works. So stop stressing over it too much.

don’t act the second it happens unless it’s something like a disease or parasite killing things.

instead, observing, testing, comparing, and looking over any significant recent changes to find out what needs to be tweaked, will get you a lot farther.

otherwise listen to the other advice so far and I’m sure to come.

Natural way is best. Light reduction and cleaner crew is best recourse for a new tank.
To every ACTION is a REACTION, and why I say no need for chemiclean, etc

 

[RobinV]

if you try and assemble parts and pieces of fix info Robin it wont work the same as handing over the reigns for someone remotely.

your reef could easily, easily be zoomed into compliance in about a week but not by you picking the best sounding options, its by only running the plan. nanos have a rescue option that large tanks do not have, specifically because they are small and a five gallon water change strategically ran is 20~% of your water. that accessibility can be used a certain way to fix your tank from bottom to top, you wont have to test params to attain this. its a manner of cleaning and how you feed and guide the system, its not in a dose or a test reading.

its doing everything opposite the lfs tried to sell you. you'd be hands on vs hands off, and that will fix things like you want them to be

when you are on the absolute last stage of experimentation, about to start reconsidering the hobby-remember this option, takes about a week. we already have a recent job from the nanos forum on file, he's week 4 and looking strong and already upgrading his totally clean tank. formerly dinos packed. Tokash23 in the nanos forum the work is right there for study.

there is a certain way you clean the reef to make a fresh start, and then a certain way you feed it for several months to pack back in coral mass. not anyone I know runs reefs in this way, we use it to rescue reefs that are following the rules and not having fun. if more nanos were ran this way, there'd be less loss and more coral mass gained at the expense of water changed to process it all like exercise, literal reef tank exercise vs sitting there passively invaded.

there's nothing bigtime wrong with your picture, real reefs look worse in places. the matter is do you want it gone, do you consider it an eyesore. if so, we have means....

Hi Brandon! I started looking through your thorough cleaning thread and I don’t think it’s an option for me, as I have zoanthids glued to the rocks and a rbta who seems determined not to move an millimeter from its spot on one of the rocks.

 

[Brew12]

Chemiclean doesn't work on all strains of cyano so there is no reason to try it again imo. It is an antibiotic that doesn't have much impact on nitrifying bacteria but it can adversely impact other good bacteria in our systems.

Since you didn't start will all live rock your system is going through its ugly stage. I would do fewer water changes and stir your sand bed every day or two to release trapped detritus and break up the cyano mats. Blow any cyano off the coral using a turkey baster or small pump.

Your problems will fix themselves as it matures if you let it.

 

[RobinV]

Chemiclean doesn't work on all strains of cyano so there is no reason to try it again imo. It is an antibiotic that doesn't have much impact on nitrifying bacteria but it can adversely impact other good bacteria in our systems.

Since you didn't start will all live rock your system is going through its ugly stage. I would do fewer water changes and stir your sand bed every day or two to release trapped detritus and break up the cyano mats. Blow any cyano off the coral using a turkey baster or small pump.

Your problems will fix themselves as it matures if you let it.

This is what I’m hoping. My new plan is stirring the bed and blowing off the rocks once the lights are off, lowering the white light, and getting some more clean up crew. As long as no one in there shows any distress, I’ll stick with this.

 

[RobinV]

One more question for you all, and thanks sooo much for the replies so far -- there is black stringy stuff growing on the rocks that is now starting to touch on my corals and rbta. I carefully remove it when I see it with tweezers but it's back in a matter of hours. Is this something I need to be alarmed about?

 

[Brew12]

One more question for you all, and thanks sooo much for the replies so far -- there is black stringy stuff growing on the rocks that is now starting to touch on my corals and rbta. I carefully remove it when I see it with tweezers but it's back in a matter of hours. Is this something I need to be alarmed about?

Sounds like dinoflagellates. Not uncommon at all in new systems. Keep an eye on it but it should clear up on it's own over time.

 

[heybae]

I think everyone gets an outbreak in new tanks. I just got over mine by reducing feeding, good water changes,I used nitrophos minus by aqua forest love it btw works like a charm and some starving snails. And natural is cool but I will say I love my chemipure elite makes my water crystal clear and helps fight off things like out breaks.

 

[Uncle99]

Keeping your nitrate and phosphate in the normal operating ranges, blow it off, suck it up, put it in the water column and change filters daily before lights go on.

As your biosphere matures and the population of good guys increases, it will just slowly disappear, provided, you keep your nutrients in check.

 

[Adamantium]

Just out of curiosity, did you take your skimmer offline when you used chemiclean?

 

[RobinV]

Just out of curiosity, did you take your skimmer offline when you used chemiclean?

No, according to the directions, it said to keep running the skimmer so I did, both times. The second time I took out the phosguard to see if that would make a difference. It did not.

 

[RobinV]

An update: I’ve been blowing off the rocks at lights out every night and stirring the gravel. Changed the filter twice a day because they were getting so brown. Stopped feeding the corals. Did one 20% water change to siphon the mess from the rocks and gravel yesterday. Started using Purit yesterday with the water change because it was getting stinky. There seemed to be a crop of green hair algae coming in on one of the rocks yesterday, but looks like it got eaten up by cuc last night.
Today, things are looking up. There’s still black strings on the rocks and red spots on the gravel but both seem to be gradually decreasing. I just change the filter before lights up in the morning now, and it doesn’t seem as dirty as it was getting. Fish and anemone look happy. Zoanthids look happy. Acroporas I’ve seen look better but they don’t look worrying.
All parameters look good, except phosphate and nitrate still testing zero.
I’m just going to continue down this path and keep a close eye on things.
New snails should arrive sometime next week.