Ripping out live rock
- Thread starter philip.aasen
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As “Sophies Mom” has already responded. Your tank will go haywire. Not only are you removing the bad bacteria you’re also removing the good. I would not recommend taking out all the rocks and cleaning them one by one. All you’ll end up doing is essentially restarting the cycle.
the predictions have now been cast by all sides.
The next step is to await outcomes from chosen actions and log that over the coming months in the tank via pics
The next step is to await outcomes from chosen actions and log that over the coming months in the tank via pics
Spare time
10K Club member
If its a massive infection, you can take the rocks out, pour hydrogen peroxide over the bubble algae and brush it off, then place it back in the tank. You can add a bottle of cycling bacteria if you are concerned (however the sand should still support lots of microbes that can process ammonia. The bubble algae will likely return either way but this would be better than scrapping the rock. Emerald crabs may or may not eat it, but there is another crab that supposedly works well and I can't think of the name of it but it has been mentioned before. Fluconazole has worked for some people, but the dose and timing is unique for dealing with bubble algae. The other option would be to remove the corals for a bit, and run an algaecide in the tank to wipe it out.
These are just a few options.
These are just a few options.
Philip
If you proceed with the rip clean to get the results of the linked rip cleans transfer the shrimp carefully, he’s adjusted to a very high organic loading presence we need to step him down in two increments, he’s delicate
Regarding transfer of your lysmata shrimp, carefully net him out into a holding container with 10% old tank water taken off the top tank water column mixed with 90% all new made water matching temp and salinity. Hold him alone in that clean water while you work
The fish go into another same setup, and clean rocks can go back in with the fish but keep the lysmata alone in water while you work. Any peroxide contact to the lysmata is fatal but it’s the only intolerant organism in your system to it
After your rocks are scraped clean you then look up close for hairlike projections off the rocks, and work them with a knife. No peroxide is used yet, it’s used last.
The original scraping of mass off the rocks is like debriding burned skin from a wound you’re preparing to heal, you’re re opening all that plugged live rock channeling by the act of flushing and rinsing off the rocks.
The peroxide step is last and is used targeted and sparingly, it only gets applied to scraped- clean areas that formerly had tufts of algae anchored in the rocks that didn’t come off after the initial rinse and rub off. By using it reduced and targeted your live rocks preserve all the needed filter bacteria, that’s why the reefers in those posts were so friendly and thankful and willing to share their pics with others. I’m so glad we get to see a best practices test run for this type of invasion challenge
If you proceed with the rip clean to get the results of the linked rip cleans transfer the shrimp carefully, he’s adjusted to a very high organic loading presence we need to step him down in two increments, he’s delicate
Regarding transfer of your lysmata shrimp, carefully net him out into a holding container with 10% old tank water taken off the top tank water column mixed with 90% all new made water matching temp and salinity. Hold him alone in that clean water while you work
The fish go into another same setup, and clean rocks can go back in with the fish but keep the lysmata alone in water while you work. Any peroxide contact to the lysmata is fatal but it’s the only intolerant organism in your system to it
After your rocks are scraped clean you then look up close for hairlike projections off the rocks, and work them with a knife. No peroxide is used yet, it’s used last.
The original scraping of mass off the rocks is like debriding burned skin from a wound you’re preparing to heal, you’re re opening all that plugged live rock channeling by the act of flushing and rinsing off the rocks.
The peroxide step is last and is used targeted and sparingly, it only gets applied to scraped- clean areas that formerly had tufts of algae anchored in the rocks that didn’t come off after the initial rinse and rub off. By using it reduced and targeted your live rocks preserve all the needed filter bacteria, that’s why the reefers in those posts were so friendly and thankful and willing to share their pics with others. I’m so glad we get to see a best practices test run for this type of invasion challenge
That type of coverage above over live rock surfaces temporarily reduces the function of live rock by covering it up, the rigid surface area no longer contacts wastewater
The live rock can't process waste as well, nitrification efficiency drops in the system, that's what eutrophication does in reef systems
The covering material contacts the wastewater and adds in its own chemical exudate, that covering mass directly causes live rock to be unable to expel waste pellets from the animals within the rocks and waste builds up in the rock crevices
It takes smashing waves action to dislodge that waste, and your current tank is like a heated stilled tidepool in a rock cropping being subjected to accumulation stresses before the next tide hits to flush it all out
This is why the overall pic tone from a eutrophic challenge tank are muted grays and greens and yellows while post rip clean after pics are vibrant, bright and laser popped
You will get the posted results from your system if you take time to prepare these small details summarized and linked.
Shadow_k's tank from our example list is first pic drab and gray and sulking reef
Lasered into bright reflective popping vibrant high surface area standing corals
By export you do not by something you wait for. it's rather easy to fix your tank. Reef dentistry causes that change above.
The live rock can't process waste as well, nitrification efficiency drops in the system, that's what eutrophication does in reef systems
The covering material contacts the wastewater and adds in its own chemical exudate, that covering mass directly causes live rock to be unable to expel waste pellets from the animals within the rocks and waste builds up in the rock crevices
It takes smashing waves action to dislodge that waste, and your current tank is like a heated stilled tidepool in a rock cropping being subjected to accumulation stresses before the next tide hits to flush it all out
This is why the overall pic tone from a eutrophic challenge tank are muted grays and greens and yellows while post rip clean after pics are vibrant, bright and laser popped
You will get the posted results from your system if you take time to prepare these small details summarized and linked.
Shadow_k's tank from our example list is first pic drab and gray and sulking reef
Lasered into bright reflective popping vibrant high surface area standing corals
By export you do not by something you wait for. it's rather easy to fix your tank. Reef dentistry causes that change above.
Last edited:
@ChrisPPolys
List the steps he should take to fix the tank pls, before he selects a method, so we can factor predictions in place with the outcome
You've pointed out what won't work
What in your experience does work? Do you have a pic of it working
List the steps he should take to fix the tank pls, before he selects a method, so we can factor predictions in place with the outcome
You've pointed out what won't work
What in your experience does work? Do you have a pic of it working
Been up and running for 4 years, do you see any Algae? Been keeping nanos for 12 years. Never once have I taken out all my rock and cleaned it all (killing all good and bad bacteria). Aka restarting the cycle, however, after removing and cleaning everything you’re restarting the cycle without the good bacteria. Which in return will only cause a more severe algae bloom.
Attachments
Is this day 1 after following the process? I would definitely expect it to look that nice. Is there a six months later pic?That type of coverage above over live rock surfaces temporarily reduces the function of live rock by covering it up, the rigid surface area no longer contacts wastewater
The live rock can't process waste as well, nitrification efficiency drops in the system, that's what eutrophication does in reef systems
The covering material contacts the wastewater and adds in its own chemical exudate, that covering mass directly causes live rock to be unable to expel waste pellets from the animals within the rocks and waste builds up in the rock crevices
It takes smashing waves action to dislodge that waste, and your current tank is like a heated stilled tidepool in a rock cropping being subjected to accumulation stresses before the next tide hits to flush it all out
This is why the overall pic tone from a eutrophic challenge tank are muted grays and greens and yellows while post rip clean after pics are vibrant, bright and laser popped
You will get the posted results from your system if you take time to prepare these small details summarized and linked.
Shadow_k's tank from our example list is first pic drab and gray and sulking reef
Lasered into bright reflective popping vibrant high surface area standing corals
By export you do not by something you wait for. it's rather easy to fix your tank. Reef dentistry causes that change above.
He won’t post 6 month later pictures or 1 year later pictures. However he’s been proposing this as a solution for years. I wonder why? Oh wait…we know why.
You do the searching if you have something to disprove, let me know what you find.
The way to see if someone is tricking you with linked results is you search out a work thread they did or linked somewhere
You find an avatar from someone who’s tank they worked
Click find all posts
Search your own updates from their jobs, there must be 20+ work threads you can also self search. People tend to post about their reef over time after a rip clean.
I don’t do the double task of both producing the tank results and helping the critics avoid some effort, they already take full liberty of providing doubts and feedback guiding in every single post without having to show alternate methods they’ve ran.
Chris
Dodge post #27 some more pls
The way to see if someone is tricking you with linked results is you search out a work thread they did or linked somewhere
You find an avatar from someone who’s tank they worked
Click find all posts
Search your own updates from their jobs, there must be 20+ work threads you can also self search. People tend to post about their reef over time after a rip clean.
I don’t do the double task of both producing the tank results and helping the critics avoid some effort, they already take full liberty of providing doubts and feedback guiding in every single post without having to show alternate methods they’ve ran.
Chris
Dodge post #27 some more pls
So you save the before and right after pic and have no trouble posting those, but you didn’t save a 6 month pic?
Nice self plug for things bought at petsmart Chris
You were able to insert your tank here uninvited and without work examples, well done.
Do you have an example of work that starts with a before and after pic, from someone else’s tank, that’s relevant here
You were able to insert your tank here uninvited and without work examples, well done.
Do you have an example of work that starts with a before and after pic, from someone else’s tank, that’s relevant here
@philip.aasen
You can see the trolls are going to hit your thread hard, move with me to chat instead we work there. Only the results should be posted next, entertaining this ability to abuse the site isn’t what fixes your tank
See you in the bunkers man and we will turn your reef right around, then you update us for the coming year
You can see the trolls are going to hit your thread hard, move with me to chat instead we work there. Only the results should be posted next, entertaining this ability to abuse the site isn’t what fixes your tank
See you in the bunkers man and we will turn your reef right around, then you update us for the coming year
The don
You go find your own six month pic that’s bad, do some work
while we turn this tank around by chat + what’s logged already in steps. You spend your time looking back on files for something you can use to feed Chris, I’ll spend live time here closing results for you both to analyze endlessly.
At no time will either of you have to step up and make your own results live time in a tank that isn’t yours, where you don’t control the update pics posted
this is the perfect armchair expert opportunity.
You go find your own six month pic that’s bad, do some work
while we turn this tank around by chat + what’s logged already in steps. You spend your time looking back on files for something you can use to feed Chris, I’ll spend live time here closing results for you both to analyze endlessly.
At no time will either of you have to step up and make your own results live time in a tank that isn’t yours, where you don’t control the update pics posted
this is the perfect armchair expert opportunity.
Some of these responses depend on how people view the cycle. The true cycle of a ecosystem is every changing and never ends - thus the actual word of cycle. It does not just stop once some fish waste can be processed.
You will upset your ecosystem if you remove parts of it. This does not mean that fish die or that there are immediate consequences, but things will change and you might not even know about some of them.
There can be long term consequences. Hard to know what they are without more information since most of this seems focused on just the right-now.
In the end, all of that will come back if you don't change some things. Removing the algae is fine and can give consumers a chance to catch up, but you need more of them. You will also need to do some manual removal as the algae comes back.
In the end, this is truly a tough question to answer and anybody who tells you otherwise is likely a fool.
I would watch this before you start. All of this can work in concert with cleaning rocks, and even recommends it in some parts, but it should also show that this is just a step and not the whole process:
You will upset your ecosystem if you remove parts of it. This does not mean that fish die or that there are immediate consequences, but things will change and you might not even know about some of them.
There can be long term consequences. Hard to know what they are without more information since most of this seems focused on just the right-now.
In the end, all of that will come back if you don't change some things. Removing the algae is fine and can give consumers a chance to catch up, but you need more of them. You will also need to do some manual removal as the algae comes back.
In the end, this is truly a tough question to answer and anybody who tells you otherwise is likely a fool.
I would watch this before you start. All of this can work in concert with cleaning rocks, and even recommends it in some parts, but it should also show that this is just a step and not the whole process:
Progress pictures? Sure!
First is December 1st, 2022
second is February 16th 2023
What did I do? Increase the water changes from once a month/every two weeks to once a week.
What else? Turned the white lighting all the way to 0.
What else? Increased flow with a Nero 3. Please send me a link to where you can find those at Petsmart.
What else did I do? Use tweezers to manually remove the hair algae from the back of the aquarium while performing a water change. Then I scrubbed the back wall with a toothbrush. (Something you said doesn’t work)
What else did I do? Allow nature to run its course and the tank to mature.
Any other questions?
PS. Still waiting on some 6 month or year updates to the tanks you’ve posted
The proof is in the pudding, as you can see with a simple search everyone is providing concrete evidence of why this simple instant resolution doesn’t work.
Like anything in the hobby progress takes time. Before “taking it to the direct messages with bRaNDoN” You should check out some other threads where people poke holes throughout all his recommendations.
Again if his idea actually worked he’d be able to provide update pictures from 6 months down the road or a year later. If you notice he’s been proposing this solution forever and for some strange reason he has no update pictures. Again I wonder why!?
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