- Joined
- Oct 21, 2016
- Messages
- 299
- Reaction score
- 110
Just spent a good portion of this morning reading through all the posts! You have a beautiful system and I really love the aquascape! Your fish seem very happy as well! I am on board with the dinoflagelates and lack of nutrients/ biodiversity. It's surprising that with the age of your system and the amount of fish you have that you're dealing with this pest as well as the inability to grow acros!
I used to run sumpless systems and never had any issue with dinos, or chryophytes. Once I upgraded to a system where I could have a sump everything went downhill before it suddenly evened out and now everything is seemingly in balance. I battled dinos and all my acros would wither away as though they were starving. Then I went through chryophytes, I could grow acros but the nasty slime covering the rocks made the tank more of an eyesore than anything! The acros grew slow and had a dull color.
I could never keep N or P to save my life so I bought some quality flake food and started feeding 2-3 times per day along with some frozen mysis and LRS reef frenzy. I now have P levels (.01-.1) and my N levels are still usually non existent but I don't worry about that anymore. I also slowed way down on running activated carbon. I will run a tiny amount if my water smells fishy or if the water looks off colored. I pulled the uv off my system as well. Adding more flow will definitely help! We could never add more flow in our home reefs than what nature gives them on the ocean!
Recently I had an explosion of growth and the colors are amazing! I attribute that to adding a calcium reactor to my system. This is the best addition I have made! I believe the calcium reactor media releases nutrients as well as calcium and alkalinity.
Everyone has their own way of being successful and I'm confident you will find yours! Good luck!
I used to run sumpless systems and never had any issue with dinos, or chryophytes. Once I upgraded to a system where I could have a sump everything went downhill before it suddenly evened out and now everything is seemingly in balance. I battled dinos and all my acros would wither away as though they were starving. Then I went through chryophytes, I could grow acros but the nasty slime covering the rocks made the tank more of an eyesore than anything! The acros grew slow and had a dull color.
I could never keep N or P to save my life so I bought some quality flake food and started feeding 2-3 times per day along with some frozen mysis and LRS reef frenzy. I now have P levels (.01-.1) and my N levels are still usually non existent but I don't worry about that anymore. I also slowed way down on running activated carbon. I will run a tiny amount if my water smells fishy or if the water looks off colored. I pulled the uv off my system as well. Adding more flow will definitely help! We could never add more flow in our home reefs than what nature gives them on the ocean!
Recently I had an explosion of growth and the colors are amazing! I attribute that to adding a calcium reactor to my system. This is the best addition I have made! I believe the calcium reactor media releases nutrients as well as calcium and alkalinity.
Everyone has their own way of being successful and I'm confident you will find yours! Good luck!