sand bed covered with algae...

[Prozium]

ok need help. sand bed is covered with algae.(both brown and red)

here's all the tests that I have.

kh=6:sad:
ammonia= 0
ca =600:waaaht:
ph= 8.4
No3= 5ppm
po4=0
salinity= 1.027

note these numbers are with me needing to add about 10 gallons of top off.

I'll add the top off tonight and do another set of tests tomorrow.

so what is going on, (besides me over dosing CA??*kicks self*)and how do I raise my KH, and lower my CA....or should I just not worry about the CA and let it drop on its own??

 

[gparr]

How large is your tank? How old is your tank. Light or heavy bioload? How much do you feed and how often. Obviously, you need to get your alk and Ca levels back in line. What are you using to maintain alk and Ca? Are you confident of the accuracy of your test kits and your testing technique?

If you have a relatively small tank, you can correct your alk/Ca levels by doing 25% water changes daily until things get balanced. Should just take a few days. In the meantime, figure out how it got out of whack so you won't have the problem again. Your sand bed covered with red and brown algae sounds like a combination of diatoms and cyanobacteria. If your tank is relatively new, it could just be part of the breaking-in process. If your tank is a year old or older, those two things suggest high organic levels and poor flow.

Basically, it's easier to help if we have more information about your tank.

Gary

 

[_Alex_]

wats You r magnesium at? Im guessing low by the numbers on ph and calcium. These 3 effect each other a lot and I had problems with ph and cal intill I got my mag where it needed to be. Then coraline algae took off using up the calcium like it should. And kh/ph stay a lot more stable.

 

[condor]

How large is your tank? How old is your tank. Light or heavy bioload? How much do you feed and how often. Obviously, you need to get your alk and Ca levels back in line. What are you using to maintain alk and Ca? Are you confident of the accuracy of your test kits and your testing technique?

If you have a relatively small tank, you can correct your alk/Ca levels by doing 25% water changes daily until things get balanced. Should just take a few days. In the meantime, figure out how it got out of whack so you won't have the problem again. Your sand bed covered with red and brown algae sounds like a combination of diatoms and cyanobacteria. If your tank is relatively new, it could just be part of the breaking-in process. If your tank is a year old or older, those two things suggest high organic levels and poor flow.

Basically, it's easier to help if we have more information about your tank.

Gary

+1...........

 

[beaslbob]

Kill you lights for a few days untill the sand bed is clean. the resume with shorter duration lighting so the corraline, corals, macros thrive but the brown red on the sand bed doesn't


my .02

 

[wampuscat]

I was battling cyno and an algae problem..... I was running 4 60" t5 giesemann actinic+ bulbs, I switched to 3 250 watt radiums running on galaxy ballasts and lumen max elite fixtures and added 20 trochus snails and three days later the cyno is 100 percent gone and the algae is just about wiped out also.

Just sayin', lights play a big role.....

 

[Prozium]

How large is your tank? How old is your tank. Light or heavy bioload? How much do you feed and how often. Obviously, you need to get your alk and Ca levels back in line. What are you using to maintain alk and Ca? Are you confident of the accuracy of your test kits and your testing technique?

If you have a relatively small tank, you can correct your alk/Ca levels by doing 25% water changes daily until things get balanced. Should just take a few days. In the meantime, figure out how it got out of whack so you won't have the problem again. Your sand bed covered with red and brown algae sounds like a combination of diatoms and cyanobacteria. If your tank is relatively new, it could just be part of the breaking-in process. If your tank is a year old or older, those two things suggest high organic levels and poor flow.

Basically, it's easier to help if we have more information about your tank.

Gary

tank is a 150g (200g total water) about 1.5 months old with fish in it 3 months from cycling start. it has 5 tangs in it all about 3"-4" and a 1.5"-2" green mandarin, dont know what that bio lode would be....shrugs. I feed flake food 2x a day the tang eat most of it only leaving a little bit of the small stuff. I have been dosing Brightwell Elemental (it's an all in one) guess I should stop and dose individually, ya? I use a Red Sea's CA test kit and tested 3 times (couldn't believe it was so high) and a Tetra KH test kit (tested 2 times) I'm fairly sure there right, or at least very close. I doubt it's poor flow I have about 7000gph flow total and everything moves in that tank in every spot.

wats You r magnesium at? Im guessing low by the numbers on ph and calcium. These 3 effect each other a lot and I had problems with ph and cal intill I got my mag where it needed to be. Then coraline algae took off using up the calcium like it should. And kh/ph stay a lot more stable.

I'll have to buy a test kit and some mag this week.

Kill you lights for a few days untill the sand bed is clean. the resume with shorter duration lighting so the corraline, corals, macros thrive but the brown red on the sand bed doesn't


my .02

2 days+ with out light wont hurt my corals?

I was battling cyno and an algae problem..... I was running 4 60" t5 giesemann actinic+ bulbs, I switched to 3 250 watt radiums running on galaxy ballasts and lumen max elite fixtures and added 20 trochus snails and three days later the cyno is 100 percent gone and the algae is just about wiped out also.

Just sayin', lights play a big role.....

3x 250w MH with 2x 80w T5 (ATI blue+)

 

[beaslbob]

...
2 days+ with out light wont hurt my corals?

..

Probably not. (at least not as much as being covered with cyano)

Some actually use a monthly blackout as standard operation procedure.

 

[emerald525]

Well for whatever it's worth. Are you using an RO/DI unit? I assume you are but the TDS had risen because I was late in changing out the resin and the problem is better now.

Also the Koralias just did not provide enough flow and since adding vortechs the problem is much better. The other problem I had is that some of the rock I had had been stored for a year and was leaching phosphate so I took those rocks out.

I also run GFO and find this helps too.

 

[HighlandReef]

I had this exact same issue this past summer but mine was due to neglecting the tank, I just got busy during the summer and the tank payed for it cause I went too long without water changes, back to the normal routine now and tanks looking much better but I also started running gfo to help bring down the po4, just shows how important it is to stay on schedule with the water changes, I do ~35 gallons every 2 weeks on my system, that's my normal schedule and I'm embarrassed to say how long I went this past summer with no water change