What’s wrong with my refugium?

Fishingandreefing · Jul 10, 2022

Tank it’s being up close to 2 years so does the diy refugium in this redsea 350.

the problem is that the caulerpas always slowly die away then a bunch of hair algae will grow all over the place. I have tried other type of macro algae with same results

There’s no hair algae in the display not sure if I need to credit my two small tangs but I don’t think so.

there’s a small pump inside keeping it circulating.

nitrate is around 8 and phosphate is around .08

the last picture is a refugium of my 120 that’s being running for close to 5 years and it’s being growing.

thanks

Dkmoo · Jul 10, 2022

macro algae also need trace elements - i never had caulerpa but i know with chaeto they will deplete the iron and then die off.

but honestly - i don't see anything wrong with your fuge - what's wrong with growing GHA in there? i always say "every strand of GHA growing in your fuge is one less strand growing in your DT". the fact that you have a clean gha-free DT in my mind shows that your fuge is doing its job.

GHA in your fuge also feeds other micro crustaceans which also benefit the system

Tired · Jul 10, 2022

Try dosing Chaeto-Gro, macros love it.

Alternately, have a hair algae refugium. Your nutrients are good, and presumably it's growing some pods, so this is a perfectly reasonable 'fuge.

EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal · Jul 10, 2022

Dkmoo said:
honestly - i don't see anything wrong with your fuge - what's wrong with growing GHA in there? i always say "every strand of GHA growing in your fuge is one less strand growing in your DT". the fact that you have a clean gha-free DT in my mind shows that your fuge is doing its job.

GHA in your fuge also feeds other micro crustaceans which also benefit the system

Agree with this 100%! Macro in a fuge is supposed to utilize nutrients so that algae doesn't grow in the display. If the macroalgae that grows in your system is gha, just go with it

(At one point, my fuge was completely covered in cyano... But there wasn't any nuisance algae in my display, so I left it alone until I broke everything down for a move.)

TangerineSpeedo · Jul 10, 2022

Maybe your Caulerpa is competing with the GHA. Macros are good at preventing nuisance algae from getting a start because they are taking up all the nutrients and will grow and be limited to the amount of nutrients in your system. Right now the your Caulerpa is sharing the nutrients, and to be honest, who ever can process what's in your water column faster is eventually going to win. I would suggest throwing in a bunch of turbos in the fuge and help your Caulerpa win the war. See if that works.