george9
Active Member
Hey everyone,
I set up this system back in November. It was more of a tank transfer where I moved existing two year old live rock to a new tank, and added some Tampa Bay Saltwater rock to seed it even more. I've really enjoyed watching this rock evolve over the last few months as different species of algae and hitchhikers come and go. I already have dealt with dinos twice in this system where they basically took over the whole tank due to PO4 bottoming out. It's been about a 5 weeks since my last dino outbreak and PO4 has held steady above .1 the whole time. I am actually running slightly elevated nutrients just to avoid dinos altogether again and give all of the other species an advantage. My NO3 holds steady between 10-20 and PO4 I've kept elevated between .15-.25 PPM for over a month now.
This system is flourishing with life. I have pink coralline covering the back glass already and a maroon coralline and brown lobophora seem to be battling it out on the rocks. You can see I have quite a bit of this maroon coralline (which may actually be lobo as well) but also many areas of brown lobophora that kind of look like cyano, but are encrusting and don't blow off. Since PO4 has been elevated for over a month now, I am finally getting a diatom bloom on the sandbed which I may have induced by stirring the sand up a bit too much last week. I didn't get a diatom bloom at all when I first set the tank up in November, probably due to the dinos setting in before diatoms had a chance. I have a conch who is going to town on the diatoms as we speak, and I'm not worried about them at this moment.
The reason for the thread: I am thinking I need an herbivore to control the brown lobophora. I really really really don't want it to outcompete the maroon coralline or the nice pink/purple that is growing on the glass. Part of me is thinking I just need to let nature take its course and let the species compete, but if I go this route, I may end up with entirely brown rocks. Another option I was thinking of is adding a tuxedo urchin. Do these guys munch lobophora? This plan can easily backfire if the urchin prefers the prettier algae and ends up mowing the pink/purple/maroon coralline thus allowing the brown lobo to dominate. I'm hoping it eats all encrusting algae equally, and eventually I can introduce more spores of the pink/purple coralline and try to give them an edge over the lobo coming back.
Taking a look at these pictures, what do you guys think? The brown lobo really is most apparent on one larger rock and is only in isolated spots in other areas of the tank. If I look closely, there *may* be some areas where prettier coralline is beginning to grow over the lobo but not sure yet. I don't do chemicals whatsoever, I prefer to massage my biome with herbivores/manual removal/natural controls to nudge things in the direction I like. This is a reef tank and I don't mind isolated areas of algae (and actually prefer it) as long as one species isn't outcompeting everyone else. I dose phyto daily and have added pods to this tank twice already. Not sure what else to try other than just watching and waiting and hope the lobo is knocked back, or introduce a tuxedo urchin. I am not a fan of the longer spine urchins but have read they also may eat lobo.
(Also you'll see various corals growing in absolutely random places because I'm running this tank as FOWLR and whatever corals survived the transfer from my ex-Biocube reef I'm considering a bonus lol. I ripped most corals out before I transferred the rock and some corals have grown back from remnants left on the rocks. )
Thanks for reading!!
I set up this system back in November. It was more of a tank transfer where I moved existing two year old live rock to a new tank, and added some Tampa Bay Saltwater rock to seed it even more. I've really enjoyed watching this rock evolve over the last few months as different species of algae and hitchhikers come and go. I already have dealt with dinos twice in this system where they basically took over the whole tank due to PO4 bottoming out. It's been about a 5 weeks since my last dino outbreak and PO4 has held steady above .1 the whole time. I am actually running slightly elevated nutrients just to avoid dinos altogether again and give all of the other species an advantage. My NO3 holds steady between 10-20 and PO4 I've kept elevated between .15-.25 PPM for over a month now.
This system is flourishing with life. I have pink coralline covering the back glass already and a maroon coralline and brown lobophora seem to be battling it out on the rocks. You can see I have quite a bit of this maroon coralline (which may actually be lobo as well) but also many areas of brown lobophora that kind of look like cyano, but are encrusting and don't blow off. Since PO4 has been elevated for over a month now, I am finally getting a diatom bloom on the sandbed which I may have induced by stirring the sand up a bit too much last week. I didn't get a diatom bloom at all when I first set the tank up in November, probably due to the dinos setting in before diatoms had a chance. I have a conch who is going to town on the diatoms as we speak, and I'm not worried about them at this moment.
The reason for the thread: I am thinking I need an herbivore to control the brown lobophora. I really really really don't want it to outcompete the maroon coralline or the nice pink/purple that is growing on the glass. Part of me is thinking I just need to let nature take its course and let the species compete, but if I go this route, I may end up with entirely brown rocks. Another option I was thinking of is adding a tuxedo urchin. Do these guys munch lobophora? This plan can easily backfire if the urchin prefers the prettier algae and ends up mowing the pink/purple/maroon coralline thus allowing the brown lobo to dominate. I'm hoping it eats all encrusting algae equally, and eventually I can introduce more spores of the pink/purple coralline and try to give them an edge over the lobo coming back.
Taking a look at these pictures, what do you guys think? The brown lobo really is most apparent on one larger rock and is only in isolated spots in other areas of the tank. If I look closely, there *may* be some areas where prettier coralline is beginning to grow over the lobo but not sure yet. I don't do chemicals whatsoever, I prefer to massage my biome with herbivores/manual removal/natural controls to nudge things in the direction I like. This is a reef tank and I don't mind isolated areas of algae (and actually prefer it) as long as one species isn't outcompeting everyone else. I dose phyto daily and have added pods to this tank twice already. Not sure what else to try other than just watching and waiting and hope the lobo is knocked back, or introduce a tuxedo urchin. I am not a fan of the longer spine urchins but have read they also may eat lobo.
(Also you'll see various corals growing in absolutely random places because I'm running this tank as FOWLR and whatever corals survived the transfer from my ex-Biocube reef I'm considering a bonus lol. I ripped most corals out before I transferred the rock and some corals have grown back from remnants left on the rocks. )
Thanks for reading!!
