Nutrient/Algea issue

[ItouchedThebutt]

Not sure if this is the spot to post this. I’m not exactly “new” to reefing but definitely not seasoned.

My main concern is really my nitrates are 0-1 with my nyos tester, and my phosphates have bottomed out to 0.00 today with my Hannah checker.

Last test was 5/30/24
Nitrate 0
Phosphate 0.03

Tank is a Red Sea 170 total volume little over 40 gal with the sump. Do have bubble algae starting to pop up, just introduced emerald crab yesterday for. Main issue has been a brown algae all over the rocks and sand. Do have a small patch of cyano as well. I do not run a skimmer but I do run a fuge.

Fuge is ran off a AI fuge light at 30% for 12 hours alternate to tank lighting.

I want to master my nutrient levels for the corals sake, but don’t want to feed the nuisance algea even more. I’ve fed reef roofs twice this week along with usually a cube or less of mysis a day for the other fish and inverts. Change filter socks out three times a week with weekly 5 gallon water changes.

I would just like a direction to go towards to help. If any one can offer advice or like a recipe to follow here was my plans to bring up and manage nutrients going forward just want to make sure I don’t make things worse.

I was planning on swapping to some tropic Marin products. First is the salt they sell, bio actif salt. Read about it and like the parameters offered for what I’m doing and the pharma grade salt. Along with some carbon dose benifits. Other products was basically their carbon dosing line, in this case there NP plus and bacto balance. My idea was to basically use this meathod to get my nutrients under control while also being able to feed corals reef roids, amino acids and etc with out it going rampant.

I also contemplated running the fuge during the day to help actually out compete the nuisance algea in the display. Don’t know if that makes a difference or if I should increase the intensity of the light for more intake consumption. Right now my Cheto grows well. Nothing is exactly plaice like proportions yet just trying to avoid that in a months time.

 

[ItouchedThebutt]

Here are to date photos of the tank, also the tank was started on February 18th.

 

[ItouchedThebutt]

I’ve been reading about the tropic Marin products and listening to Lous videos about their carbon dosing meathod and really like the idea and sound of it. I would like to implement it but want to make sure I don’t get a algea farm instead of a coral farm.

 

[ItouchedThebutt]

Bump

 

[Semper.Reefing]

Have you checked out the DIY Ammonia Dosing for Low Nitrate Systems thread? Very interesting and intended to be a clean way to raise nitrate levels for coral direct consumption. I started dosing ammonium bicarbonate and keep my nitrates around 20ppm. No algae at all!

 

[ItouchedThebutt]

Have not looked into that. I’ve never carbon dosed, and tropic marins product was my first time hearing about it and it sounds legit. Atleast Lou sounds real convincing. I just wanna make sure if I start beefing up my phosphates they don’t start encouraging more algae growth to the max.

 

[Semper.Reefing]

DIY Ammonia dosing for low nitrate systems

Some reef aquaria have chronic low nitrogen availability. One indicator is very low nitrate. Nitrate dosing is a fine remedy, but it is possible that ammonia dosing may be more beneficial for some organisms since ammonia can be energetically easier to assimilate than is nitrate. For this...

www.reef2reef.com

It’s a very interesting article by Randy and worth a read! Very very affordable nitrate dosing too. I can’t speak too much on carbon dosing since I’ve never really done it. I always thought carbon dosing was intended to feed your bacteria colony for better nutrient export? Not sure

 

[Semper.Reefing]

The brown algae almost looks like Dino’s but never know for sure unless you check under a microscope. Not unusual in a newer system. I had to beat Dino’s by encouraging other nuisance algae growth- which I had a big gha out break but was easily resolved with a big clean up crew

 

[ItouchedThebutt]

Kinda looks like Dino’s to me to just cause it has bubbles trapped in it here and there. I’m probably going to bump up my fuge light to 40% and go ahead and harvet about half of it.

 

[Semper.Reefing]

Kinda looks like Dino’s to me to just cause it has bubbles trapped in it here and there. I’m probably going to bump up my fuge light to 40% and go ahead and harvet about half of it.

I’ll just say, my way of beating Dino’s was dirtying up the tank. Need to reduce your nutrient export since Dino’s tend to thrive in clean low nutrient systems. They usually over take when nutrients bottom out. I personally wouldn’t run a refugium until they’re under control. If you’re on Facebook, there’s a group Mack’s reef Dino support group with files and methods to beat them!

 

[ItouchedThebutt]

Idk about not running it because of ph being an issue. I should get the things to start carbon dosing in a week so I should be able to dirty up the tank with that and I can always put more reef roids in more frequently.

 

[Semper.Reefing]

Idk about not running it because of ph being an issue. I should get the things to start carbon dosing in a week so I should be able to dirty up the tank with that and I can always put more reef roids in more frequently.

IMO if your pH is stable at or above 7.8 then I wouldn’t worry about it. There are other ways to increase it without exporting nutrients (kalkwasser, CO2 scrubber). I would also hold off on the carbon dosing since it is in fact another nutrient export method.

 

[ItouchedThebutt]

I’m trying to stay over 8 with ph. I’ll look into Dino’s. Never had them before. I unfortunately do not have face book.

 

[Semper.Reefing]

I’m trying to stay over 8 with ph. I’ll look into Dino’s. Never had them before. I unfortunately do not have face book.

I wouldn’t chase pH until your biology has leveled out. There should be plenty of threads on Dino’s here. Good luck and happy reefing!

 

[Glowurm]

What is your bio-load? Given the tank size and maturity i'd avoid dosing (for now) and concentrate on natural ways to increase nutrient levels. So more fish, more feeding, increasing CuC!

 

[ItouchedThebutt]

Bio load includes total of four fish, two clowns, purple fire fish, yasha goby with pistol shrimp. One skunk cleaner one emeral crab. Approximately 5 hermits and maybe 6-8 snails including a sand conch. So pretty well stocked tank. Waiting on a healthy copepod population before adding my last fish a ruby scooter.

 

[ItouchedThebutt]

Also to note a side issue I have that I would love to resolve is constant waves of cloudy water. Like now when the lights are off if I shine a light through the tank I can see a constant cloud going through it. I’ve been battling this since starting this tank and have no clue what’s causing it. The only thing I can suspect would be bacterial blooms but can’t understand why I have so many with this particular tank.