GHA Issue and Plan of Attack
48 hrs later
you need to fix this tank by hand cleaning it first, with an algaecidal step so you have a leg up.
when I saw the OP's picture I knew the exact match for it from our nr.com thread.
instate your prevention approaches only after the hand reset, top method.
all tanks look exactly like the one above after a rip cleaning session, its the ultimate opposite of a slow, painful 3 mos wait process.
the changes it will take on your water table to starve and await the dieoff of all that mass are not the same ones required to make a clean reef not produce it.
I estimate we've cataloged about three thousand examples exactly like the above, it never ceases. skip cycle clean it, have a clean reef by Sat.
we would clean out your sandbed so its cloudless
clean the rocks + algaecide
masses of algae are self supporting in ways that are independent of tank params. killing the mass is the #1 step, separate from preventing its return.
el reseto
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48 hrs later
you need to fix this tank by hand cleaning it first, with an algaecidal step so you have a leg up.
when I saw the OP's picture I knew the exact match for it from our nr.com thread.
instate your prevention approaches only after the hand reset, top method.
all tanks look exactly like the one above after a rip cleaning session, its the ultimate opposite of a slow, painful 3 mos wait process.
the changes it will take on your water table to starve and await the dieoff of all that mass are not the same ones required to make a clean reef not produce it.
I estimate we've cataloged about three thousand examples exactly like the above, it never ceases. skip cycle clean it, have a clean reef by Sat.
we would clean out your sandbed so its cloudless
clean the rocks + algaecide
masses of algae are self supporting in ways that are independent of tank params. killing the mass is the #1 step, separate from preventing its return.
el reseto
What kind of algacide?
peroxide for sure, if anyone posted such above and didn't lead into that my acct has been hacked.
the key here is simply killing the target, its cells, as a cheat because the whole tank is accessible. no wait required.
all we'd do is hand clean all the algae off the rocks, outside the tank, where physical force and scrub made the algae go away and dislodge from its holdfast.
then the -cleaned-area is lightly misted
then rinse, then put back. ultra kill with no impact to cycle or filtration bacteria.
clean that cloudy sandbed too, the whole thing, all at once.
anything we employ as a preventative is 100x boosted when its target mass is nil
target mass is currently critical mass...this tank here would sustain the cleaning long after even if lighting blue vs white/topoff water/sandbed clouding/whatever the actual cause was never adjusted.
adjust those combined with the hand cleaning/tank restoration gold.
if we combine a sandbed cleaning with the cheat plant kill, this tank is fixed by Saturday
from the clean condition, apply any number of preventatives. the chance they'll work is higher than 50% now
(hinting this might save the tank again one day, its just a back pocket cheat for accessible tanks)
the key here is simply killing the target, its cells, as a cheat because the whole tank is accessible. no wait required.
all we'd do is hand clean all the algae off the rocks, outside the tank, where physical force and scrub made the algae go away and dislodge from its holdfast.
then the -cleaned-area is lightly misted
then rinse, then put back. ultra kill with no impact to cycle or filtration bacteria.
clean that cloudy sandbed too, the whole thing, all at once.
anything we employ as a preventative is 100x boosted when its target mass is nil
target mass is currently critical mass...this tank here would sustain the cleaning long after even if lighting blue vs white/topoff water/sandbed clouding/whatever the actual cause was never adjusted.
adjust those combined with the hand cleaning/tank restoration gold.
if we combine a sandbed cleaning with the cheat plant kill, this tank is fixed by Saturday
from the clean condition, apply any number of preventatives. the chance they'll work is higher than 50% now
(hinting this might save the tank again one day, its just a back pocket cheat for accessible tanks)
peroxide for sure, if anyone posted such above and didn't lead into that my acct has been hacked.
the key here is simply killing the target, its cells, as a cheat because the whole tank is accessible. no wait required.
all we'd do is hand clean all the algae off the rocks, outside the tank, where physical force and scrub made the algae go away and dislodge from its holdfast.
then the -cleaned-area is lightly misted
then rinse, then put back. ultra kill with no impact to cycle or filtration bacteria.
clean that cloudy sandbed too, the whole thing, all at once.
anything we employ as a preventative is 100x boosted when its target mass is nil
target mass is currently critical mass...this tank here would sustain the cleaning long after even if lighting blue vs white/topoff water/sandbed clouding/whatever the actual cause was never adjusted.
adjust those combined with the hand cleaning/tank restoration gold.
if we combine a sandbed cleaning with the cheat plant kill, this tank is fixed by Saturday
from the clean condition, apply any number of preventatives. the chance they'll work is higher than 50% now
(hinting this might save the tank again one day, its just a back pocket cheat for accessible tanks)
Im not sure id call peroxide an algacide, but it definitely kills it.
Can you dose the whole tank with good effects? What are the most sensitive things to peroxide besides hair algae?
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My Blasto shrivels up when I h2o2 dose, must burn it's polyp's
that above was with whole tank dosing and hand removal as it died off...GHA responds really fast to it
invasive macros too
all our peroxide threads Im in, we're discouraging whole tank dosing for sure. its always a hand work method, the polar opposite of what causes an invasion.
we like to have sandbeds that will not/can not cloud as part of the restoration, people are always interested in addressing the root cause and a tank dosing of peroxide doesn't... though killing a target mass that way in a large inaccessible tank has been done and is still preferable to any mass that is self-sutaining (example #1, catches and holds detritus that mechanical systems cannot remove. onsite N and P fuel, degrading within the algae tufts. then there are algae/bacteria commensal relationships that give more fuel to the algae, the tuft is self supporting in many ways)
our system is better used on nanos where we can truly clean house while we kill algae.
outliers exist for any dosing in reefing. people have killed their tanks with kalk before, yet kalk is not claimed as a dangerous thing to use. freshwater has killed our reef tanks before, etc
that being said, tolerant vs sensitive organisms will range between users but what massive 8 yr peroxide threads show as trends are:
lysmata cleaners are number one risk
fireworks w die
decorative macro for clear reasons
xenia can shrivel, doesn't like peroxide
anemones get mad, but we've never lost one in the whole tank dosings we had to run due to tank size.
no known reef fish are listed as sensitive. the ones we keep, have not sampled every reef fish
coralline algae bleaches and comes back.
part of the reason I advocate non tank dosing is the way we run it as a rip clean, there are no sensitives. peroxide never contacted non targets in the prescribed method.
Though Ive used peroxide in my own tank thousands of times just as a model, not even when it was needed, Ive never dosed it to my water and would never advise it.
Only the largest, most inaccessible tanks should do that, or the occasional dino invasion if that's arrived at in a given thread of details.
it lightly burns polyps if dosed to water... so does kalk addition etc. all of this is just balance we're seeking. many times Ive got the undiluted 35% directly on my own corals and they didn't die, there's a vid of it on my youtube page. most work posted online is from weakwater 3%
this tank in this thread can have the fix easy, its a fully accessible tank.
invasive macros too
all our peroxide threads Im in, we're discouraging whole tank dosing for sure. its always a hand work method, the polar opposite of what causes an invasion.
we like to have sandbeds that will not/can not cloud as part of the restoration, people are always interested in addressing the root cause and a tank dosing of peroxide doesn't... though killing a target mass that way in a large inaccessible tank has been done and is still preferable to any mass that is self-sutaining (example #1, catches and holds detritus that mechanical systems cannot remove. onsite N and P fuel, degrading within the algae tufts. then there are algae/bacteria commensal relationships that give more fuel to the algae, the tuft is self supporting in many ways)
our system is better used on nanos where we can truly clean house while we kill algae.
outliers exist for any dosing in reefing. people have killed their tanks with kalk before, yet kalk is not claimed as a dangerous thing to use. freshwater has killed our reef tanks before, etc
that being said, tolerant vs sensitive organisms will range between users but what massive 8 yr peroxide threads show as trends are:
lysmata cleaners are number one risk
fireworks w die
decorative macro for clear reasons
xenia can shrivel, doesn't like peroxide
anemones get mad, but we've never lost one in the whole tank dosings we had to run due to tank size.
no known reef fish are listed as sensitive. the ones we keep, have not sampled every reef fish
coralline algae bleaches and comes back.
part of the reason I advocate non tank dosing is the way we run it as a rip clean, there are no sensitives. peroxide never contacted non targets in the prescribed method.
Though Ive used peroxide in my own tank thousands of times just as a model, not even when it was needed, Ive never dosed it to my water and would never advise it.
Only the largest, most inaccessible tanks should do that, or the occasional dino invasion if that's arrived at in a given thread of details.
it lightly burns polyps if dosed to water... so does kalk addition etc. all of this is just balance we're seeking. many times Ive got the undiluted 35% directly on my own corals and they didn't die, there's a vid of it on my youtube page. most work posted online is from weakwater 3%
this tank in this thread can have the fix easy, its a fully accessible tank.
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ill tell ya how I arrived at peroxide too, more than one cheat liquid could do this job
the actual act of being algae free is done by hand without cheats, other than a kitchen knife scraping that algae off whereas the ocean has no knives (though it has parrotfish beaks, darn close)
the feed for the algae is mitigated in the sandbed cleaning. by rule, any display tank DSB (as opposed to a remote one) will cloud if tested due to whole pellet waste from fish and CUC being stored, though this tank isn't very old its still an ok time to rob it of all the nutrient stores that prevent strong feeding from being able to be applied to corals
(the nitrate maximums which set our feed input are often factored against a sandbed producing the most nitrate in the tank, for ex)
peroxide has the exquisite example of being 100% predictable in its affect on the tank, and it goes away fast in the way we are using it. it does the job, then poof, gone, no residuals.
no habituation is formed to it Im seeing in mass testing. where applicable, and accessible, its just shocking the # of tanks we turn around w that stuff.
when combined with pre rasping, the outcome is usually months and weeks of algae prevention not even changing the actual problem. I like it for that reason.
I prefer its ingredients to other avail options, such as algaefix marine. it takes two keyboards to type out the main ingredient name of that stuff and some goosed up oxygen water in my opinion is better suited, carefully used, to a delicate reef. <-- disagreed by many/ this is the - and + that drives reefing.
the actual act of being algae free is done by hand without cheats, other than a kitchen knife scraping that algae off whereas the ocean has no knives (though it has parrotfish beaks, darn close)
the feed for the algae is mitigated in the sandbed cleaning. by rule, any display tank DSB (as opposed to a remote one) will cloud if tested due to whole pellet waste from fish and CUC being stored, though this tank isn't very old its still an ok time to rob it of all the nutrient stores that prevent strong feeding from being able to be applied to corals
(the nitrate maximums which set our feed input are often factored against a sandbed producing the most nitrate in the tank, for ex)
peroxide has the exquisite example of being 100% predictable in its affect on the tank, and it goes away fast in the way we are using it. it does the job, then poof, gone, no residuals.
no habituation is formed to it Im seeing in mass testing. where applicable, and accessible, its just shocking the # of tanks we turn around w that stuff.
when combined with pre rasping, the outcome is usually months and weeks of algae prevention not even changing the actual problem. I like it for that reason.
I prefer its ingredients to other avail options, such as algaefix marine. it takes two keyboards to type out the main ingredient name of that stuff
and some goosed up oxygen water in my opinion is better suited, carefully used, to a delicate reef. <-- disagreed by many/ this is the - and + that drives reefing.
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that above was with whole tank dosing and hand removal as it died off...GHA responds really fast to it
invasive macros too
all our peroxide threads Im in, we're discouraging whole tank dosing for sure. its always a hand work method, the polar opposite of what causes an invasion.
we like to have sandbeds that will not/can not cloud as part of the restoration, people are always interested in addressing the root cause and a tank dosing of peroxide doesn't... though killing a target mass that way in a large inaccessible tank has been done and is still preferable to any mass that is self-sutaining (example #1, catches and holds detritus that mechanical systems cannot remove. onsite N and P fuel, degrading within the algae tufts. then there are algae/bacteria commensal relationships that give more fuel to the algae, the tuft is self supporting in many ways)
our system is better used on nanos where we can truly clean house while we kill algae.
outliers exist for any dosing in reefing. people have killed their tanks with kalk before, yet kalk is not claimed as a dangerous thing to use. freshwater has killed our reef tanks before, etc
that being said, tolerant vs sensitive organisms will range between users but what massive 8 yr peroxide threads show as trends are:
lysmata cleaners are number one risk
fireworks w die
decorative macro for clear reasons
xenia can shrivel, doesn't like peroxide
anemones get mad, but we've never lost one in the whole tank dosings we had to run due to tank size.
no known reef fish are listed as sensitive. the ones we keep, have not sampled every reef fish
coralline algae bleaches and comes back.
part of the reason I advocate non tank dosing is the way we run it as a rip clean, there are no sensitives. peroxide never contacted non targets in the prescribed method.
Though Ive used peroxide in my own tank thousands of times just as a model, not even when it was needed, Ive never dosed it to my water and would never advise it.
Only the largest, most inaccessible tanks should do that, or the occasional dino invasion if that's arrived at in a given thread of details.
it lightly burns polyps if dosed to water... so does kalk addition etc. all of this is just balance we're seeking. many times Ive got the undiluted 35% directly on my own corals and they didn't die, there's a vid of it on my youtube page. most work posted online is from weakwater 3%
this tank in this thread can have the fix easy, its a fully accessible tank.
Im interested in whole tank dosing on a daily basis. What dose is recommend?
Are sea urchins/snails/hermit crabs sensitive?
Thank you so much for the in-depth discussion. Im a little confused on peroxide dosing. Do you remove the rocks, scrub off the algae and then mist with peroxide? And how would you clean the sand bed? Im real impatient, especially after all the money Ive spent to the dismay of my wife lol, so this shock and awe approach seems like the way to go
2 minutes is fine too since we've pre removed all that mass.
that growth is also plugging up the porosity of the rock system, the in/out and ability of that rock to express its detritus, so removing it and rinsing off the rocks externally is the right reboot here Im certain.
ill link below a sand rinse thread, take an hour to check it out since it shows other peoples work before you act. many of them had more corals to risk, this is a great time to practice full on control in your reef and it will never misbehave again.
even if your example rocks were covered in corals and that algae was in between, we'd still be doing the same stuff. this is the action to take if preventatives don't work, we wont accept an invaded tank if they don't work, we'll just have to cheat it into compliance then back to prevention if possible. its impossible to have an algae invaded reef with that approach, only the set-and-leave option makes invaded tanks.
when that set and leave option works, that's an ideal, its low work, and its how we all start in reefing (being uber careful)
but after losing a tank or three, or with the appro external lady pressures we'll turn into gardeners/internal locus of controllers mighty fast!
the sand rinse thread reference:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/t...ead-aka-one-against-many.230281/#post-2681445
per that thread, your exact breakdown and reset up would be:
catch fish and hold in buckets sep from rocks, not with rocks
hold your clean up crew and a few corals if applicable in there, but not rocks, we don't know how much waste is in them yet so they and the sand stay isolated from the sensitives.
step one is all sensitive animals in a bucket away from the tank.
with that done, all that's in the tank is bacteria (w be preserved) and rocks and sand and water and algae, we're free to work.
start by lifting out rocks and scrape off algae that algae, brush it off roughly, whichever. be rinsing rocks only in saltwater, to wash away that mass as you scrub scrub
when each rock is cleaned, mist them with peroxide, around any targets, and let sit a couple mins. rinse off last time w saltwater, they're now detritus and growth free rocks ready for install
whats left so far now is only muddy water and sand in the tank. either replace your entire sandbed with new, if its cheap and you want to, or just rinse your current sandbed any way you want to rinse it until its clear, and this w take a while. you will see in the reference thread I rinse my living, old sandbed with tap water for about 30 mins straight till it runs clean
*we pre rinse any live sand, before use, as the point of all those pages* when doing a bed replacement. Your sandbed is so new it doesn't have to be replaced if you don't want to, just blast it into compliance. This is the work price of having a zone in a reef that we can't access daily for cleaning (though many nowadays do pre stirring of the bed routinely)
then I saltwater rinse, then put the sand back. I didn't put back tapwater sand into my tank
use distilled water, or seawater if you want, but those are finite and tap isn't. tap rinsers can be thorough, saltwater rinsers always run out of mix water before its cloudless/murphys law
the sand retains its bacteria, so did the rocks, because these steps are not completely antibacterial.
reinstall everything with totally new water, re acclimate animals, the reef is reset. we'll put pics in our threads if you do this work.
anticipating things that can go wrong from prior posts:
-incomplete rinse. detritus is the source of your cycle risk, so don't leave some in the bed. be thorough, even replacing the entire bed is advisable if you want, cloudy sand has nothing we need to keep or transfer over. make a cloudless sandbed before you put things back on it.
-don't rinse rocks in anything but saltwater, they're our filtration source we're protecting. the light peroxide misting for 2 mins wont hurt em
-storing pre cleaned rocks with fish. one poster lost fish as the rock was emitting ammonia and had pent up detritus in it. holding separate stops that.
pretty much those two were the only bad outcomes ive seen. hope that helps. I know its a lot of type but it took years to condense all those moves into actions that do not kill tanks.
that growth is also plugging up the porosity of the rock system, the in/out and ability of that rock to express its detritus, so removing it and rinsing off the rocks externally is the right reboot here Im certain.
ill link below a sand rinse thread, take an hour to check it out since it shows other peoples work before you act. many of them had more corals to risk, this is a great time to practice full on control in your reef and it will never misbehave again.
even if your example rocks were covered in corals and that algae was in between, we'd still be doing the same stuff. this is the action to take if preventatives don't work, we wont accept an invaded tank if they don't work, we'll just have to cheat it into compliance then back to prevention if possible. its impossible to have an algae invaded reef with that approach, only the set-and-leave option makes invaded tanks.
when that set and leave option works, that's an ideal, its low work, and its how we all start in reefing (being uber careful)
but after losing a tank or three, or with the appro external lady pressures
we'll turn into gardeners/internal locus of controllers mighty fast!the sand rinse thread reference:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/t...ead-aka-one-against-many.230281/#post-2681445
per that thread, your exact breakdown and reset up would be:
catch fish and hold in buckets sep from rocks, not with rocks
hold your clean up crew and a few corals if applicable in there, but not rocks, we don't know how much waste is in them yet so they and the sand stay isolated from the sensitives.
step one is all sensitive animals in a bucket away from the tank.
with that done, all that's in the tank is bacteria (w be preserved) and rocks and sand and water and algae, we're free to work.
start by lifting out rocks and scrape off algae that algae, brush it off roughly, whichever. be rinsing rocks only in saltwater, to wash away that mass as you scrub scrub
when each rock is cleaned, mist them with peroxide, around any targets, and let sit a couple mins. rinse off last time w saltwater, they're now detritus and growth free rocks ready for install
whats left so far now is only muddy water and sand in the tank. either replace your entire sandbed with new, if its cheap and you want to, or just rinse your current sandbed any way you want to rinse it until its clear, and this w take a while. you will see in the reference thread I rinse my living, old sandbed with tap water for about 30 mins straight till it runs clean
*we pre rinse any live sand, before use, as the point of all those pages* when doing a bed replacement. Your sandbed is so new it doesn't have to be replaced if you don't want to, just blast it into compliance. This is the work price of having a zone in a reef that we can't access daily for cleaning (though many nowadays do pre stirring of the bed routinely)
then I saltwater rinse, then put the sand back. I didn't put back tapwater sand into my tank
use distilled water, or seawater if you want, but those are finite and tap isn't. tap rinsers can be thorough, saltwater rinsers always run out of mix water before its cloudless/murphys law
the sand retains its bacteria, so did the rocks, because these steps are not completely antibacterial.
reinstall everything with totally new water, re acclimate animals, the reef is reset. we'll put pics in our threads if you do this work.
anticipating things that can go wrong from prior posts:
-incomplete rinse. detritus is the source of your cycle risk, so don't leave some in the bed. be thorough, even replacing the entire bed is advisable if you want, cloudy sand has nothing we need to keep or transfer over. make a cloudless sandbed before you put things back on it.
-don't rinse rocks in anything but saltwater, they're our filtration source we're protecting. the light peroxide misting for 2 mins wont hurt em
-storing pre cleaned rocks with fish. one poster lost fish as the rock was emitting ammonia and had pent up detritus in it. holding separate stops that.
pretty much those two were the only bad outcomes ive seen. hope that helps. I know its a lot of type but it took years to condense all those moves into actions that do not kill tanks.
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Alright i like it. Will def be a several hour process but i am determined to have a beautiful healthy reef. I will document the process with photos and everything and post the results here. Wont be able to get it to it for a few days, maybe even next weekend, but stay tuned i will provide results. Thank you to all for the advice and support
skiergd011013
Well-Known Member
thats what everyone says, and I believe it. I dont test phosphates, but i have run it in a bag, inside my skimmer outflow. It just sort of "cakes" up and turns into a solid brick. It really needs to be agitated and lightly tumbled 24/7 to be used correctly. I got the two little fishies phosban 150 and i am 100% satisfied with it. Should of gotten it a year ago. I didnt have too big of an issue to begin with, but since installing it, my tank looks clearer that it ever has, and I am having to clean my glass Less frequently now.
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