Side effects of Turf Scrubber

michaelstevenbrice · Apr 18, 2019

That's awesome! I'm not in any hurry for this tank. I've had a 24g nano running for 3 years in my office, and I am upgrading it to a Red Sea Max S 650 - so I can take PLENTY of time - (all summer) to get it how I want it. I also have a few tufts of hair algae that I produced myself, so I will do some seeding.

cracker · Apr 18, 2019

May I ask what lights you are using?

Clarksski · May 4, 2019

The fox face and any tangs that you have will eat the GHA up like spaghetti noodles. It's good for them too. I harvest some, attach a bunch of it to a small rock with a rubber band, and plop it into display. Usually gone in an hour.

Lovefish77 · Dec 29, 2020

Interesting, was just wondering if ATS scrubber would raise PH. I was told that an ATS scrubber would not be so effective in raising PH!!

Treefer32 · Dec 30, 2020

Lovefish77 said:
Interesting, was just wondering if ATS scrubber would raise PH. I was told that an ATS scrubber would not be so effective in raising PH!!

I have noticed my PH never drops below 8.01 on a 350 gallon system with ATS running for the past two years. It's full of GHA every 6-7 days and I have no pest algae in the display, only in the scrubber. I would say it helps with oxygenation and a little with keeping ph stable at night. I would not use it only to raise PH though. Need to take a wholistic approach to what problem(s) are you solving), if it's only ph and you have no algae issues, then you may want to consider something else. I dose baked baking soda for alkalinity. It has the side effect of raising ph as it's dosed. There's a recipe for it somewhere on the BRS site I believe.

Lovefish77 · Dec 30, 2020

Treefer32 said:
I have noticed my PH never drops below 8.01 on a 350 gallon system with ATS running for the past two years. It's full of GHA every 6-7 days and I have no pest algae in the display, only in the scrubber. I would say it helps with oxygenation and a little with keeping ph stable at night. I would not use it only to raise PH though. Need to take a wholistic approach to what problem(s) are you solving), if it's only ph and you have no algae issues, then you may want to consider something else. I dose baked baking soda for alkalinity. It has the side effect of raising ph as it's dosed. There's a recipe for it somewhere on the BRS site I believe.

Interesting, thanks for sharing. My air in the apartment is very stale so I am assuming ph would take a hit. I run my scrubber on 12 hours reverse photo period and it is effective in not getting any algae in display. I dose soda ask for alk consumption and they say it bring ph up a bit. But again this is only dosed during the day like 3 or 4 times.
What do you recommend?

Treefer32 · Dec 30, 2020

Lovefish77 said:
Interesting, thanks for sharing. My air in the apartment is very stale so I am assuming ph would take a hit. I run my scrubber on 12 hours reverse photo period and it is effective in not getting any algae in display. I dose soda ask for alk consumption and they say it bring ph up a bit. But again this is only dosed during the day like 3 or 4 times.
What do you recommend?

If you have a skimmer, many run an air intake line for the skimmer out a window or hole in the wall to get fresh air. If the air inside is stale, open a window near the tank. When the family and I go on a vacation, you'd be amazed how much the PH increases just from the increased O2 saturation inside the house. Simply making more fresh air available to the tank will significantly improve your overall PH. I've heard of running CO2 scrubbers, and other mechanical means to decrease CO2 and increase Oxygenation, I have no experience on ph though.