Ryujin (210gal) and Wee Wetboy (15gal) builds
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ScottF
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He's doing well, but I think he needs some tank mates. I saw him chasing the two spot around earlier today. He was also tail whipping the algae scrapper that I was using to flip over a capsized snail.
He may be getting a little big for his britches basically having the whole tank to himself. The yellow watchman has always been shy, but he doesn't come out from his rock much ever since the pistol shrimp moved in with him.
He may be getting a little big for his britches basically having the whole tank to himself. The yellow watchman has always been shy, but he doesn't come out from his rock much ever since the pistol shrimp moved in with him.
skyrne_isk
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My two cents, get more tangs in there, Zebrasomas specifically. And urchins… the short spine variety. The ones I got in from Tampa Bay Saltwater with their rock have been insanely proficient at keeping this kind of algae limited in my tank. But for as new as the tank is, the level of algae looks about right to me.Whatever this algae is, it's growth is pretty insane. It seems like it is photosynthesizing so hard that little bubbles have been bubbling up from it to the surface.
On the plus side, I've been scrubbing the rocks with a toothbrush and after the first time I brushed all of the rocks, my tank seems to have stopped consuming Alk for no reason. I've been dosing 200ml per day of soda ash solution to maintain 9 dkH. Now it is barely consuming any.
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ScottF
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Yeah. I ordered a Tomini Tang and a Foxface from Marine Collectors a little over a month ago. I'm hoping they will help when they eventually arrive.
I ordered a Tuxedo Urchin along with some more snails, hermits, a fighting conch and a emerald crab last week from Inverted Reef. I believe they said they were going to ship them on Monday.
One of my LFS has a bunch of Yellow Tangs. I'm thinking about biting the bullet and setting up a QT tank and getting a couple of them. I think I can handle the copper part without a problem. I'm just not sure what meds they tolerate for stuff like Flukes. Formalin baths? Prozi?
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ScottF
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I've changed my mind about mixed reef. I think I'm going to go more SPS dominant. The branching hammer that I had on the rock structure that I was going to try to make a Euphyllia tree, didn't like the amount of flow I have in the tank.
It was completely withdrawn. I decided that I'd rather try to do one thing well instead of trying to force two types of creatures from two very different environments to live next to each other.
I still have some LPS in the tank, but I moved the hammer to Wee Wetboy and it is looking much happier.
It was completely withdrawn. I decided that I'd rather try to do one thing well instead of trying to force two types of creatures from two very different environments to live next to each other.
I still have some LPS in the tank, but I moved the hammer to Wee Wetboy and it is looking much happier.
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ScottF
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I got my order in from Inverted Reef. Super nice people! A bunch of snails, a blue tuxedo urchin, an emerald crab and a fighting conch in Ryujin. A porcelain anemone crab in Wee Wetboy.
Everyone seems happy with their new homes. The urchin is a little smaller than I expected. Hopefully he is hungry. He seems pretty cool. I may need to get another one.
Everyone seems happy with their new homes. The urchin is a little smaller than I expected. Hopefully he is hungry. He seems pretty cool. I may need to get another one.
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ScottF
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Yesterday was a bit of a rough day for my tank. Woke up and immediate could tell that it wasn't happy. My Kermit the Frog acro is a skeleton. The Bali Green Slimer lost half of it's tissue.
Also, my Twin Spot Goby was looking very distressed and eventually died. I think the Gold-rimmed Tang had been harassing him a lot and whatever was going on with the water may have pushed him over the edge. I'm not sure how much nutrition it had been getting. It had been picking pods off of the glass for the past day or two instead of it's usual sand sifting. Not sure if it was eating the frozen brine I was sending its way.
I'm not 100% sure what the cause was. I've been fighting the algae so hard that I'm constantly in the tank brushing rocks or blowing off rocks with the turkey baster style feeder. It could have been something on my skin.
The Acros have been getting algae stuck on them and I've been blowing it off with the turkey baster. I've tried to be gentle, but maybe I was hitting them too hard with jets of water from the baster. Over all they were looking pretty good until suddenly they were dying.
I also added a bunch of snails, an urchin, a conch and a emerald crab. Don't think that would cause an issue like this, but it's a change. Not sure how well the urchin is doing. He hasn't moved much from the rocks he went under. Hopefully he is still alive.
The big one that I am most suspicious of is the reef roids. The night before I fed reef roids to the tank for the first time. I followed the directions of 1tsp per 100G and target fed everything. It seemed like a lot of crap in the water. I wonder if my biological filtration wasn't up to the task yet of handling that much crap in the water.
I tested for ammonia with my hanna checker. It came back with 0.06. I'm not sure at what level ammonia starts killing stuff. I siphoned out my sand bed that was covered in algae with a Python and changed out probably around 30 or 40 gallons of water. I ran my fuge light on 100% all day yesterday and last night.
Over all things seem much better today. I've tried to leave the tank alone for the most part today. No scrubbing, no dosing. Just some frozen mysis and brine shrimp to feed the fish.
Edit:
No dosing except All for Reef and soda ash to maintain Alk/Calcium/mag.
Also, my Twin Spot Goby was looking very distressed and eventually died. I think the Gold-rimmed Tang had been harassing him a lot and whatever was going on with the water may have pushed him over the edge. I'm not sure how much nutrition it had been getting. It had been picking pods off of the glass for the past day or two instead of it's usual sand sifting. Not sure if it was eating the frozen brine I was sending its way.
I'm not 100% sure what the cause was. I've been fighting the algae so hard that I'm constantly in the tank brushing rocks or blowing off rocks with the turkey baster style feeder. It could have been something on my skin.
The Acros have been getting algae stuck on them and I've been blowing it off with the turkey baster. I've tried to be gentle, but maybe I was hitting them too hard with jets of water from the baster. Over all they were looking pretty good until suddenly they were dying.
I also added a bunch of snails, an urchin, a conch and a emerald crab. Don't think that would cause an issue like this, but it's a change. Not sure how well the urchin is doing. He hasn't moved much from the rocks he went under. Hopefully he is still alive.
The big one that I am most suspicious of is the reef roids. The night before I fed reef roids to the tank for the first time. I followed the directions of 1tsp per 100G and target fed everything. It seemed like a lot of crap in the water. I wonder if my biological filtration wasn't up to the task yet of handling that much crap in the water.
I tested for ammonia with my hanna checker. It came back with 0.06. I'm not sure at what level ammonia starts killing stuff. I siphoned out my sand bed that was covered in algae with a Python and changed out probably around 30 or 40 gallons of water. I ran my fuge light on 100% all day yesterday and last night.
Over all things seem much better today. I've tried to leave the tank alone for the most part today. No scrubbing, no dosing. Just some frozen mysis and brine shrimp to feed the fish.
Edit:
No dosing except All for Reef and soda ash to maintain Alk/Calcium/mag.
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ScottF
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I'm starting to think that this brown algae taking over my tank could be dinos. After doing some reading last night I realize that I've setup the perfect environment for them.
I started with dry rock. I've struggled to maintain any nitrates or phosphates. I started dosing CoralAmino when I added corals.
It doesn't look nearly as bad first thing in the morning. At least some of this is because it seems to gather bubbles as it photosynthesizes through out the day. As it gets more bubbles it starts to extend upwards. By evening it looks pretty terrible.
The inverts that I've been adding to consume it don't seem to do well. I wonder if it's toxic to them. It seems like cerith snails seem to do a little better, but a lot of my snails seem to be dying off rather quickly. The urchin that I put in took a little cruise around the tank, went into a cave and hasn't really moved since. It could be dead for all I know.
I read one of the posts here that said ozone can get rid of dinos. I don't know how true or effective that is, but it is worth a try. Thus far I've only been using ozone on it's lowest setting for short periods of time. It didn't make my ORP go up at all. In fact some times it went down when the generator was on.
I've cranked it up to 4 and I've been letting it run while I was awake last night and since I've gotten out of bed. My ORP is slowly rising now. We'll see where this goes. At this point I believe the "algae" is causing loss of livestock.
I had backed off of the nutrient dosing because I thought maybe I was making the problem worse. I think now I am going to double down on it. I never really managed to get phosphates above 0.01 or nitrates above 5.
I also ordered a very large package of snails from Reef Cleaners the other day. It seemed like it was mostly cerith snails. So I'll see where that goes. Hopefully they don't all just die.
I started with dry rock. I've struggled to maintain any nitrates or phosphates. I started dosing CoralAmino when I added corals.
It doesn't look nearly as bad first thing in the morning. At least some of this is because it seems to gather bubbles as it photosynthesizes through out the day. As it gets more bubbles it starts to extend upwards. By evening it looks pretty terrible.
The inverts that I've been adding to consume it don't seem to do well. I wonder if it's toxic to them. It seems like cerith snails seem to do a little better, but a lot of my snails seem to be dying off rather quickly. The urchin that I put in took a little cruise around the tank, went into a cave and hasn't really moved since. It could be dead for all I know.
I read one of the posts here that said ozone can get rid of dinos. I don't know how true or effective that is, but it is worth a try. Thus far I've only been using ozone on it's lowest setting for short periods of time. It didn't make my ORP go up at all. In fact some times it went down when the generator was on.
I've cranked it up to 4 and I've been letting it run while I was awake last night and since I've gotten out of bed. My ORP is slowly rising now. We'll see where this goes. At this point I believe the "algae" is causing loss of livestock.
I had backed off of the nutrient dosing because I thought maybe I was making the problem worse. I think now I am going to double down on it. I never really managed to get phosphates above 0.01 or nitrates above 5.
I also ordered a very large package of snails from Reef Cleaners the other day. It seemed like it was mostly cerith snails. So I'll see where that goes. Hopefully they don't all just die.
BetteMidler
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I would say you are in the initial ugly stage, even after a month. I can only offer some encouragement to stick with a routine & become the tank whisperer that you need to be. I'll be following along.
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ScottF
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My ozone experiment is already interesting. I may have pushed a little too hard though. I've been running my generator all day set to around 4. My ORP was steadily rising from around 195 to about 230 over the span of about 6 hours. The ORP seemed to have stopped rising and I was no where near "dangerous levels" based on ORP.
So I decided to push it a little further. I bumped the ozone generator up to 5 and went to do some chores for about an hour. When I came back there were what looked like micro bubbles in the water column. My ORP was at 240. I bumped the generator back down to 4 and watched the tank for a few minutes and then saw a big burst of what looked like micro bubbles come from the return nozzles.
So I turned off the ozone and looked in my sump. The top of the sponge in the baffle between the skimmer chamber and the return pump chamber was white. I had harvested about half of my chaeto earlier and there was a thin layer of chaeto strands on top of the sponge that I think were being oxidized. I took the sponge out and rinsed it in some clean saltwater and put it back in the baffle.
Everything seems calm now. No micro bubbles. The fish and corals don't seem to be upset. My wife and I agree that the algae or dinos or whatever it is doesn't look as healthy as it usually does. By this time in the evening, usually my rocks look like they are covered in shag carpet.
It by no means looks good. The rocks are still covered. The algae just doesn't look as healthy and doesn't seem to be photosynthesizing as much. There also seems to be a thin film forming on top of my water with some strands of algae in it on the side of the tank where my gyre is blowing.
It may actually be working. So far it seems encouraging.
Edit:
I was just thinking that it is possible that the white stuff was precipitated calcium carbonate. I am trying to dial in my All for Reef dosing and manually dosed a little earlier while my soda ash may have been running. My tank currently uses way more alk than calcium or mag. I dose soda ash most of the day and night except for a three hour window in the morning when I dose All for Reef.
It's possible that the soda ash was dripping right next to the all for reef. There is a lot of flow there though. I have a gyre spinning chaeto there.
So I decided to push it a little further. I bumped the ozone generator up to 5 and went to do some chores for about an hour. When I came back there were what looked like micro bubbles in the water column. My ORP was at 240. I bumped the generator back down to 4 and watched the tank for a few minutes and then saw a big burst of what looked like micro bubbles come from the return nozzles.
So I turned off the ozone and looked in my sump. The top of the sponge in the baffle between the skimmer chamber and the return pump chamber was white. I had harvested about half of my chaeto earlier and there was a thin layer of chaeto strands on top of the sponge that I think were being oxidized. I took the sponge out and rinsed it in some clean saltwater and put it back in the baffle.
Everything seems calm now. No micro bubbles. The fish and corals don't seem to be upset. My wife and I agree that the algae or dinos or whatever it is doesn't look as healthy as it usually does. By this time in the evening, usually my rocks look like they are covered in shag carpet.
It by no means looks good. The rocks are still covered. The algae just doesn't look as healthy and doesn't seem to be photosynthesizing as much. There also seems to be a thin film forming on top of my water with some strands of algae in it on the side of the tank where my gyre is blowing.
It may actually be working. So far it seems encouraging.
Edit:
I was just thinking that it is possible that the white stuff was precipitated calcium carbonate. I am trying to dial in my All for Reef dosing and manually dosed a little earlier while my soda ash may have been running. My tank currently uses way more alk than calcium or mag. I dose soda ash most of the day and night except for a three hour window in the morning when I dose All for Reef.
It's possible that the soda ash was dripping right next to the all for reef. There is a lot of flow there though. I have a gyre spinning chaeto there.
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ScottF
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I do. I took a beat to let things calm down with the micro bubbles, but now I have the generator turned back on and set to 4. I changed the programming on the Apex to remove the line that made it only run for an hour while I was sleeping.
It's now set to this:
Fallback OFF
Set ON
If ORP > 350 Then OFF
So it will run until it hits 350. I'll probably turn it off when I go to bed. I don't think I'm comfortable letting it run all night at this level while I'm asleep.
It is advisable to raise the ORP slowly. I would raise to 300 and then 350. Just being cautious.
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ScottF
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I'm keeping an eye on it. That rule in the Apex is mostly for safety. It is currently only at 244 and probably won't hit 300 tonight.
As I'm sitting here watching the tank, pale translucent strands of the algae are breaking off and floating to the surface. I think it's working.
I really wish I would have done this a week ago. My Kermit the Frog acro would probably still be alive and well. Maybe my Two Spot as well. Trying to get by as a sand sifting goby in a carpet of toxic dinos probably isn't good.
I had vacuumed the sand over the weekend, but it came back really quickly. R.I.P. Doug the Two Spot Goby.
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Got any socks?
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ScottF
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The dino destruction continues. It definitely looks less thick. More patchy than it did yesterday. It also looks less brown and is taking on a grayish look. It is very hard not to crank the dial on the ozone generator up to eleven and cackle maniacally while the dinos bubble off of the rock.
I keep telling myself to be patient. Slow and steady wins the race.
My pH is taking a big hit. It was climbing up to 8.4 in the evenings with the photosynthesis from the thick carpet of dinos. Now I've had the CO2 scrubber turned off (the air for the ozone generator doesn't go through the scrubber) for a couple of days and I can see that most of the dinos aren't photosynthesizing now.
Before as the day went by, the dinos would get filled with more and more air bubbles. Now I only see bubbles in a couple of small patches.
My pH dropped to 7.82. I turned my fuge light back on in a desperate attempt to raise the pH a little.
I keep telling myself to be patient. Slow and steady wins the race.
My pH is taking a big hit. It was climbing up to 8.4 in the evenings with the photosynthesis from the thick carpet of dinos. Now I've had the CO2 scrubber turned off (the air for the ozone generator doesn't go through the scrubber) for a couple of days and I can see that most of the dinos aren't photosynthesizing now.
Before as the day went by, the dinos would get filled with more and more air bubbles. Now I only see bubbles in a couple of small patches.
My pH dropped to 7.82. I turned my fuge light back on in a desperate attempt to raise the pH a little.
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