Mike's Red Sea Reefer 525 XL build

[SPR1968]

Hi Mike

Just my thoughts, but I’ve just been reading through all of this and your phosphate etc. If the Hanna ULR is reading 0 it has a margin of error of +/- 0.04 and on the basis you have fish and are feeding, and taking into account this margin for error, its highly unlikely you have zero phosphate. When my Hanna reads 0 I am delighted and on target because is probably higher because I feed etc. My target is 0.03ppm and this is within the error margin.

So I wouldn’t think you need to add phosphate to your system, and just also note that with Nopox it is not very effective at reducing phosphate. It’s very good with nitrate control but when using it you need to wet skim for it to be most effective and your nitrates are not high at 12ppm really. I run around that level all the time.

From what I know if cyno, and I’ve never had it in my current system, it can thrive and be triggered when parameters change and especially in low nutrient environments were it can outcompete other organisms. From what I’ve read it can also use phosphate as food so if your adding more.....

I have used chemiclean once in my original smaller tank when I had red cyno and it killed it all off, so it does work for a quick fix but I suppose it’s then a matter of trying to address what the cause was/is.

Have you got any up to date FTS ?

 

[mta_morrow]

Hi Mike

Just my thoughts, but I’ve just been reading through all of this and your phosphate etc. If the Hanna ULR is reading 0 it has a margin of error of +/- 0.04 and on the basis you have fish and are feeding, and taking into account this margin for error, its highly unlikely you have zero phosphate. When my Hanna reads 0 I am delighted and on target because is probably higher because I feed etc. My target is 0.03ppm and this is within the error margin.

So I wouldn’t think you need to add phosphate to your system, and just also note that with Nopox it is not very effective at reducing phosphate. It’s very good with nitrate control but when using it you need to wet skim for it to be most effective and your nitrates are not high at 12ppm really. I run around that level all the time.

From what I know if cyno, and I’ve never had it in my current system, it can thrive and be triggered when parameters change and especially in low nutrient environments were it can outcompete other organisms. From what I’ve read it can also use phosphate as food so if your adding more.....

I have used chemiclean once in my original smaller tank when I had red cyno and it killed it all off, so it does work for a quick fix but I suppose it’s then a matter of trying to address what the cause was/is.

Have you got any up to date FTS ?

Thanks for the write up Shaun and taking the time to do so.

Between you and @Fudsey and @Brew12, my tank is making it thru year 1. 2 months to go!

I will get a FTS this evening and also picks of any new cyano as I did a good cleaning yesterday.

I won’t get the Seachem till late in the week so I will hold off on dosing any until we all discuss again.

And I do feed very well and skim very wet!

Thanks everyone for helping and not letting me jump off the ledge!

 

[Brew12]

Thanks for the write up Shaun and taking the time to do so.

Between you and @Fudsey and @Brew12, my tank is making it thru year 1. 2 months to go!

I will get a FTS this evening and also picks of any new cyano as I did a good cleaning yesterday.

I won’t get the Seachem till late in the week so I will hold off on dosing any until we all discuss again.

And I do feed very well and skim very wet!

Thanks everyone for helping and not letting me jump off the ledge!

You're doing great! I do think Shaun gave some great advice. Patience is good.

I saw that you were approaching your 1 year mark. I realized my system hit it's one year anniversary 1 week ago. That year went fast!

 

[najer]

Are you dosing any aminos?

 

[Fudsey]

Well there's something I didn't think of.... @najer made me think of something. Check your food too, some have been mentioning that high vitamin c had been causing cyano in their tanks. @jsker and @saltyfilmfolks were talking about it I believe.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Well there's something I didn't think of.... @najer made me think of something. Check your food too, some have been mentioning that high vitamin c had been causing cyano in their tanks. @jsker and @saltyfilmfolks were talking about it I believe.

It rare.
Bit if you are already using nopox and have cyano I’m not surprised.

 

[mta_morrow]

Are you dosing any aminos?

No I am not.

Only 5 ml of nopox and 2 ml of alk every other day.

Nopox is down from 10 ml as I have added more Seachem matrix

 

[mta_morrow]

No I am not.

Only 5 ml of nopox and 2 ml of alk every other day.

Nopox is down from 10 ml as I have added more Seachem matrix

My goal and hope is to stop dosing nopox. That is why I have added more matrix.

I would like very much for nutrients to be stable and acceptable prior to adding sps which I hope to do in Feb, the 1 year mark.

 

[mta_morrow]

Well there's something I didn't think of.... @najer made me think of something. Check your food too, some have been mentioning that high vitamin c had been causing cyano in their tanks. @jsker and @saltyfilmfolks were talking about it I believe.

I will check my foods.

I use NLS pellets twice a day in auto feed.

And I mix a cube of mysis and a cube of homemade blend (oysters, mussels, and clams). I add a squirt of selcon to this mix and this lasts 2-3 days, so, about 2/3 cube of frozen per day.

 

[Brew12]

My goal and hope is to stop dosing nopox. That is why I have added more matrix.

I would like very much for nutrients to be stable and acceptable prior to adding sps which I hope to do in Feb, the 1 year mark.

I'm of the belief that every system will eventually find it's own balance of nutrients if we don't screw it up too badly. For some people it may be 3ppm NO3 for others it may be 25ppm NO3. I wouldn't use a product like NoPox unless I was above 30ppm. Just my opinion....

 

[mta_morrow]

I'm of the belief that every system will eventually find it's own balance of nutrients if we don't screw it up too badly. For some people it may be 3ppm NO3 for others it may be 25ppm NO3. I wouldn't use a product like NoPox unless I was above 30ppm. Just my opinion....

I believe systems will find their balance too.

I am finding my self caught by my own words.

I don’t want to dose anything or chase numbers, but I am.

I will finish out the week at 5ml daily dose, then next week I will dose nothing.

I started at 15ml 2 months ago when I was above 20, then a few weeks at 10, then 2 weeks at 5.

And matrix during that time went from 2 liters in the sump, to 4, and now 6.

So starting this Sunday after weekly testing, no nopox.

The only thing I will be dosing daily will be alk.

If anything goes wrong I have a lot of people I can blame, and then ask for their help! [emoji3]

 

[Brew12]

If anything goes wrong I have a lot of people I can blame, and then ask for their help!

;Facepalm ;Hilarious;Hilarious;Hilarious;Hilarious;Hilarious

I find a fuge to be the most effective method myself, but the Matrix may help. I like I can visualize the nutrient removal when I throw out large clumps of algae.

 

[najer]

Still young, as @Brew12 said, let it settle IMO, not everyone runs their " systems" as casually as I do, get a feel for your tank, corals use nutrients as well!

 

[mta_morrow]

Hi Mike

Just my thoughts, but I’ve just been reading through all of this and your phosphate etc. If the Hanna ULR is reading 0 it has a margin of error of +/- 0.04 and on the basis you have fish and are feeding, and taking into account this margin for error, its highly unlikely you have zero phosphate. When my Hanna reads 0 I am delighted and on target because is probably higher because I feed etc. My target is 0.03ppm and this is within the error margin.

So I wouldn’t think you need to add phosphate to your system, and just also note that with Nopox it is not very effective at reducing phosphate. It’s very good with nitrate control but when using it you need to wet skim for it to be most effective and your nitrates are not high at 12ppm really. I run around that level all the time.

From what I know if cyno, and I’ve never had it in my current system, it can thrive and be triggered when parameters change and especially in low nutrient environments were it can outcompete other organisms. From what I’ve read it can also use phosphate as food so if your adding more.....

I have used chemiclean once in my original smaller tank when I had red cyno and it killed it all off, so it does work for a quick fix but I suppose it’s then a matter of trying to address what the cause was/is.

Have you got any up to date FTS ?

FTS and other shots of the tank. Some newer rocks are evident

 

[NY_Caveman]

I have been discussing Cyanobacteria some also lately. I have near zero PO4 and NO3. FWIW, I stopped Selcon and Aminos for three weeks and blew the rocks off a couple of times a week. The Cyanobacteria, which spread to all rocks, is almost completely gone. There is only one small spot left. For me its bloom did seem to coincide with when I began using Selcon and dosing one drop of Coral Essentials Amino.

 

[SPR1968]

I’ve been thinking about this, and these are just my thoughts on what I would do so everyone please feel free to comment etc

Your feeding a fair amount of food into the system and your fish will be fat and much happier than mine because you’ve seen how many fish I have and your feeding about the same as me.

As far as I know, and correct me if I’m wrong, the only method currently in use to remove phosphate is Nopox, which basically doesn’t work very well at phosphate removal in my experience.

So phosphates are being introduced to the system, they are not really being removed, so we’re could they be going as your getting 0ppm readings on the Hanna? Are they being taken up as a primary food source by the hungry cyno bacteria?

So this is what ‘I’ would do if it were my system and again (disclaimer! Lol) everyone give your thoughts to help Mike out.

Firstly I would manually remove as much cyno as possible to start out.

I would leave Nopox in place at reduced dosage amounts (as per the instructions) to retain the bacteria in the system and that’s nitrate kept under control and by leaving it in the system your not upsetting anything to much at a bacterial level. I would personally target 5-10ppm nitrate.

I would start running GFO/rhowaphos in the system to actually really lock phosphate down. I personally use rhowaphos 24/7 in a Deltec FR509 reactor and this ‘is the best single thing I ever did to my system’. Since adding this I have had no issues with algae or anything else and I know the guys at DD use tons of the stuff in their systems which are world renowned tanks and I’ve spoken to Stuart B a few times about rhowaphos when I first started using it.

If Hanna says 0, happy days (remember margin of error) because with the amount your feeding and fish waste it’s not likely to be 0, and if it is it won’t be after the next feed. And anyway what’s the difference between 0 and 0.03ppm target, not much as far as testing is concerned, but enough for the required biological processes to take place.

I would maybe also take a look at water flow especially around the areas primarily affected by the cyno to see if this can be increased.

Just my thoughts...... oh I forgot, remember Stability, stability.....

PS the tank looks great as well!

 

[Brew12]

Firstly I would manually remove as much cyno as possible to start out.

Agreed. Breaking up those mats is important. They form mats to help maintain ideal chemistry for their growth underneath them.

I would leave Nopox in place at reduced dosage amounts (as per the instructions) to retain the bacteria in the system and that’s nitrate kept under control and by leaving it in the system your not upsetting anything to much at a bacterial level. I would personally target 5-10ppm nitrate.

This one I would disagree with. NoPox is basically a mixture of vinegar and vodka. It's an odd thing I can't claim to understand, but sometimes one will cause a cyano bloom in a tank but the other will not. When using NoPox, you are more likely to get a cyano bloom than when you use one or the other. If you insist on carbon dosing to lower nitrates I would start by dosing vinegar instead of Nopox. If your cyano doesn't improve after 2 weeks, or if it gets worse, switch to vodka for 2 weeks and see if that helps.

I would start running GFO/rhowaphos in the system to actually really lock phosphate down.

Agreed that this is the best for PO4 control. Many strains of cyanobacteria thrive in low nitrate environments so reducing phosphate can reduce total biomass. Just be careful and start slowly if going this route when already undetectable, you can starve out your coral trying this. You may also open the door to dino's. So not a bad idea, but one that needs to be used cautiously.

 

[SPR1968]

This one I would disagree with. NoPox is basically a mixture of vinegar and vodka. It's an odd thing I can't claim to understand, but sometimes one will cause a cyano bloom in a tank but the other will not. When using NoPox, you are more likely to get a cyano bloom than when you use one or the other. If you insist on carbon dosing to lower nitrates I would start by dosing vinegar instead of Nopox. If your cyano doesn't improve after 2 weeks, or if it gets worse, switch to vodka for 2 weeks and see if that helps.
.

I can see this yes, my line of thinking here is basically not to disturb the current bacterial balance within the system.

I once asked in the chemistry forum about changing from Nopox to either vinager, vodka or mix of the two, basically a copy of Nopox. The reason i didn’t was that it could result in the development of different strains/types of bacteria which may be beneficial, but then again may not and could cause further issues. So my view was if it isn’t broken don’t try and fix it, so I stayed with Nopox.

But switching things around it’s certainly another angle to consider for sure

 

[Brew12]

I can see this yes, my line of thinking here is basically not to disturb the current bacterial balance within the system.

I once asked in the chemistry forum about changing from Nopox to either vinager, vodka or mix if the two, basically a copy of Nopox. The reason i didn’t was that it could result in the development of different strains/types of bacteria which may be beneficial, but then again may not and could cause further issues. So my view was if it isn’t broken don’t try and fix it, so I stayed with Nopox.

But switching things around it’s certainly another angle to consider for sure

I agree that if NoPox is working, no reason to change. I'm a big fan of stability so every change should be made cautiously. In this case, it could be feeding the cyano. In my minds eye, this means something isn't working and this is a fairly low impact trial to try and get improvement.

 

[Katrina71]

Cyano will go away on it's own if you wait it out. Just sayin'