Every tank is different... If i were to run my tank at 12dkh i would probably burn up everything..LOL
Whats wrong with my zoas?? Pics inside!
- Thread starter Reef_a_holiks
- Start date
Every tank is different... If i were to run my tank at 12dkh i would probably burn up everything..LOL
OP
OP
the chemiclean treatment did wonders! all my zoas look way better! pic below
OP
OP
To everyone that has posted or followed my thread here are some quick before and after pic of the chemiclean treatment recommended by PRomero. The treatment did wonders, all my zoas bounced back and are back to thriving in my tank. Thank you so much PRomero!
Before chemiclean
After chemiclean, sorry pic is a bit blurry its a top down view taken with my phone
Huge difference! il be posting more before and after pics of the rest of my zoas later on today. just wanted to snap a quick pic of the colony that was doing the worse, that is now thriving. Thanks again PRomero
Before chemiclean
After chemiclean, sorry pic is a bit blurry its a top down view taken with my phone
Huge difference! il be posting more before and after pics of the rest of my zoas later on today. just wanted to snap a quick pic of the colony that was doing the worse, that is now thriving. Thanks again PRomero
Glad I can help 
now to do some preventative maintenance to keep your corals healthy is take a turkey baster and blast all your corals, rocks and sandbed if you don't have little critters to airate the sandbed once a week to prevent future issues
now to do some preventative maintenance to keep your corals healthy is take a turkey baster and blast all your corals, rocks and sandbed if you don't have little critters to airate the sandbed once a week to prevent future issues
Why do you use Chemi-Clean?
I thought that it was just for Slime Algae?
How does it help Zoanthids?
OP
OP
Well yea its used for red slime, but has been used to give zoas that extra "Pump up" to thriving health. Chemiclean is a slow oxidizer that will help bring the ratio of phosphates and nitrates back to a balanced ratio, resulting in happier zoas. Ide give it a try if you just cant find the answer to your zoas not doing well for no apparent reason, its helped for us and many others we have recommended it to. You can check out our blog, there is a article on chemiclean and zoas
OP
OP
I havent carbon dosed yet, but many do and again many dont so i guess its a preference thing. Im looking at trying it out myself soon.
OP
OP
Ive used chemiclean many times on tanks with zoas/palys, softies, and lps. but never on sps, but im pretty sure the chemiclean box says its completely reef safe. But definitely do your homework and find out before you dose it to Sps.May I ask if it is ok to use Chemi-Clean for reef tank? Does I affect any SPS? Highly appreciated
Thanks so much Reef_a_holiks: it is good to know. I will do more research...
So I'm 24hrs in with the chemiclean treatment and reporting observations.
A little tank history first:
It's a nano that housed a mantis shrimp and clown fish for many years with little maintenance, so the sand bed became a nutrient trap. After the mantis I decided to make it a reef so the sand bed was removed months ago when I couldn't control my NO2 and PO4 and have left it bare bottom since. I only use a filter sock and skimmer to clean my water and started carbon dosing to remove the leaching nutrients from the rocks before the sand bed was removed. I did reach excessively clean levels NO3 undetectable and PO4 at 0.03. I feed excessively a variety of frozen, flake and pellet fish foods as well as several coral foods several times a day and amino supplement in an attempt to raise NO3. No success. When I dial down the carbon dosing I get algae growth and a raise in PO4, not NO3. All corals, except one monti, never lost color and I attribute that to the excess in food added daily. Believe that particular monti was originally placed too high. Growth did slow and I think it's the lack of NO3. I recently started dosing NaNO3 to raise NO3 to 2-3ppm, works like a charm.
I've only really had continual trouble with some zoanthids, not most. We all know the mysteries of these! I've done several different dips for new arrivals and trying to figure out why certain colonies don't open fully, and some not at all. Only ever lost one colony. The dips usually provide temporary results. The dips I've done: iodine, furan2, peroxide, revive, flatworm exit and more recently bayer for the new arrivals. Through all of this I know for a fact that there's no parasites in the tank lol. I've even found some luck with physically scraping the polyps surface with some of my metal frag tools (not recommended to most people BTW). Most of them get better over time with repeated dipping and cleaning but it's exhaustive and I don't have the time anymore for individual treatments of >50 frags with more coming soon from friends.
Treatment:
Anyway, I left my filter sock in even though it's about time to change it. I usually change it only when it overflows because I don't have many fish and the lack of a sand bed.
I left my skimmer running but pulled the collection cup off because most of the crashes I found spoke of oxygen deprivation. My skimmer started going nuts within seconds and my tank is loaded with microbubbles nonstop.
I also read about bleaching corals, especially sps. It's been attributed to drastically cleaner and clearer water so I lowered the light (Kessil A360) intensity from 60% to 40%, but kept the spectrum. I don't know how much of a factor this would be for me because it's very low nutrient to begin with but better safe than sorry.
My Apex did show that my pH dropped to 7.52 last night which is lower than usual but the box does state that O2 and pH could be affected.
All my fish, inverts and corals are doing fine.
Most of my Z&Ps are open a little more than lately. There's a couple that haven't been open for about a week and I spotted them open for a short period today when I got home.
My sps all look good. My montis, birdsnest, millepora, and birds of paradise have full polyp extension but that's nothing new. My acros have better polyp extension this evening
I also see the usual pods running around the glass.
But best of all is most of the algae (at least three different kinds) is turning brown. This has mostly been growing on the (many) newer frag plugs and part of the birdsnest that has been dead. I know that the place I get most of my frags runs much higher NO3 and PO4, so it's just leaching out in theory.
Thoughts:
The box states it's an oxidizer so it shouldn't kill regular bacteria much as they have a natural defense to that. The reaction that I'm seeing with the algae is exactly like when I've done peroxide dips in the past. This makes complete sense because peroxide is an oxidizer also. So in a sense this is just like when people dose their entire tank with peroxide. This just might be a little safer for some people since there's an established dosage to follow. It also explains the pH drop but I won't get into the chemistry here.
I've already prepared for the 20% water change at ~48hrs per instructions.
Sorry for the length but I believe more info is better when researching something for your beloved reef! Hope this helps anybody thinking about it.
A little tank history first:
It's a nano that housed a mantis shrimp and clown fish for many years with little maintenance, so the sand bed became a nutrient trap. After the mantis I decided to make it a reef so the sand bed was removed months ago when I couldn't control my NO2 and PO4 and have left it bare bottom since. I only use a filter sock and skimmer to clean my water and started carbon dosing to remove the leaching nutrients from the rocks before the sand bed was removed. I did reach excessively clean levels NO3 undetectable and PO4 at 0.03. I feed excessively a variety of frozen, flake and pellet fish foods as well as several coral foods several times a day and amino supplement in an attempt to raise NO3. No success. When I dial down the carbon dosing I get algae growth and a raise in PO4, not NO3. All corals, except one monti, never lost color and I attribute that to the excess in food added daily. Believe that particular monti was originally placed too high. Growth did slow and I think it's the lack of NO3. I recently started dosing NaNO3 to raise NO3 to 2-3ppm, works like a charm.
I've only really had continual trouble with some zoanthids, not most. We all know the mysteries of these! I've done several different dips for new arrivals and trying to figure out why certain colonies don't open fully, and some not at all. Only ever lost one colony. The dips usually provide temporary results. The dips I've done: iodine, furan2, peroxide, revive, flatworm exit and more recently bayer for the new arrivals. Through all of this I know for a fact that there's no parasites in the tank lol. I've even found some luck with physically scraping the polyps surface with some of my metal frag tools (not recommended to most people BTW). Most of them get better over time with repeated dipping and cleaning but it's exhaustive and I don't have the time anymore for individual treatments of >50 frags with more coming soon from friends.
Treatment:
Anyway, I left my filter sock in even though it's about time to change it. I usually change it only when it overflows because I don't have many fish and the lack of a sand bed.
I left my skimmer running but pulled the collection cup off because most of the crashes I found spoke of oxygen deprivation. My skimmer started going nuts within seconds and my tank is loaded with microbubbles nonstop.
I also read about bleaching corals, especially sps. It's been attributed to drastically cleaner and clearer water so I lowered the light (Kessil A360) intensity from 60% to 40%, but kept the spectrum. I don't know how much of a factor this would be for me because it's very low nutrient to begin with but better safe than sorry.
My Apex did show that my pH dropped to 7.52 last night which is lower than usual but the box does state that O2 and pH could be affected.
All my fish, inverts and corals are doing fine.
Most of my Z&Ps are open a little more than lately. There's a couple that haven't been open for about a week and I spotted them open for a short period today when I got home.
My sps all look good. My montis, birdsnest, millepora, and birds of paradise have full polyp extension but that's nothing new. My acros have better polyp extension this evening
I also see the usual pods running around the glass.
But best of all is most of the algae (at least three different kinds) is turning brown. This has mostly been growing on the (many) newer frag plugs and part of the birdsnest that has been dead. I know that the place I get most of my frags runs much higher NO3 and PO4, so it's just leaching out in theory.
Thoughts:
The box states it's an oxidizer so it shouldn't kill regular bacteria much as they have a natural defense to that. The reaction that I'm seeing with the algae is exactly like when I've done peroxide dips in the past. This makes complete sense because peroxide is an oxidizer also. So in a sense this is just like when people dose their entire tank with peroxide. This just might be a little safer for some people since there's an established dosage to follow. It also explains the pH drop but I won't get into the chemistry here.
I've already prepared for the 20% water change at ~48hrs per instructions.
Sorry for the length but I believe more info is better when researching something for your beloved reef! Hope this helps anybody thinking about it.
So I'm 24hrs in with the chemiclean treatment and reporting observations.
A little tank history first:
It's a nano that housed a mantis shrimp and clown fish for many years with little maintenance, so the sand bed became a nutrient trap. After the mantis I decided to make it a reef so the sand bed was removed months ago when I couldn't control my NO2 and PO4 and have left it bare bottom since. I only use a filter sock and skimmer to clean my water and started carbon dosing to remove the leaching nutrients from the rocks before the sand bed was removed. I did reach excessively clean levels NO3 undetectable and PO4 at 0.03. I feed excessively a variety of frozen, flake and pellet fish foods as well as several coral foods several times a day and amino supplement in an attempt to raise NO3. No success. When I dial down the carbon dosing I get algae growth and a raise in PO4, not NO3. All corals, except one monti, never lost color and I attribute that to the excess in food added daily. Believe that particular monti was originally placed too high. Growth did slow and I think it's the lack of NO3. I recently started dosing NaNO3 to raise NO3 to 2-3ppm, works like a charm.
I've only really had continual trouble with some zoanthids, not most. We all know the mysteries of these! I've done several different dips for new arrivals and trying to figure out why certain colonies don't open fully, and some not at all. Only ever lost one colony. The dips usually provide temporary results. The dips I've done: iodine, furan2, peroxide, revive, flatworm exit and more recently bayer for the new arrivals. Through all of this I know for a fact that there's no parasites in the tank lol. I've even found some luck with physically scraping the polyps surface with some of my metal frag tools (not recommended to most people BTW). Most of them get better over time with repeated dipping and cleaning but it's exhaustive and I don't have the time anymore for individual treatments of >50 frags with more coming soon from friends.
Treatment:
Anyway, I left my filter sock in even though it's about time to change it. I usually change it only when it overflows because I don't have many fish and the lack of a sand bed.
I left my skimmer running but pulled the collection cup off because most of the crashes I found spoke of oxygen deprivation. My skimmer started going nuts within seconds and my tank is loaded with microbubbles nonstop.
I also read about bleaching corals, especially sps. It's been attributed to drastically cleaner and clearer water so I lowered the light (Kessil A360) intensity from 60% to 40%, but kept the spectrum. I don't know how much of a factor this would be for me because it's very low nutrient to begin with but better safe than sorry.
My Apex did show that my pH dropped to 7.52 last night which is lower than usual but the box does state that O2 and pH could be affected.
All my fish, inverts and corals are doing fine.
Most of my Z&Ps are open a little more than lately. There's a couple that haven't been open for about a week and I spotted them open for a short period today when I got home.
My sps all look good. My montis, birdsnest, millepora, and birds of paradise have full polyp extension but that's nothing new. My acros have better polyp extension this evening
I also see the usual pods running around the glass.
But best of all is most of the algae (at least three different kinds) is turning brown. This has mostly been growing on the (many) newer frag plugs and part of the birdsnest that has been dead. I know that the place I get most of my frags runs much higher NO3 and PO4, so it's just leaching out in theory.
Thoughts:
The box states it's an oxidizer so it shouldn't kill regular bacteria much as they have a natural defense to that. The reaction that I'm seeing with the algae is exactly like when I've done peroxide dips in the past. This makes complete sense because peroxide is an oxidizer also. So in a sense this is just like when people dose their entire tank with peroxide. This just might be a little safer for some people since there's an established dosage to follow. It also explains the pH drop but I won't get into the chemistry here.
I've already prepared for the 20% water change at ~48hrs per instructions.
Sorry for the length but I believe more info is better when researching something for your beloved reef! Hope this helps anybody thinking about it.
Great write up.
Keep us posted daily of the results please.
What are the three different types of Algae that are Dying?
I thought Chemi-Clean only Killed Slime Algae?
I'm not quite sure of the names for them because I haven't really had many algae problems in the past or ever studied them, probably should though lol. One appears to be a sea lettuce, another is long filamentous type but not hair algae and the last I have no clue. The last one has characteristics of bryopsis from what little I've read, but I really have no idea. It's extremely difficult to pull from whatever it grows on and likes to smother my corals quickly if allowed! :mad2:
The product claims to be for red cyanobacteria but the mechanism is stated to be oxidation, which we know affects algae. If you have any experience with peroxide dips then you've seen something similar firsthand, just shorter term. You can also search any forum and find peoples experiences with peroxide. I'm only now taking a microbial metabolism course at my university, which is incredibly interesting to me as I see a huge connection with my reef tank. I'm in the process of other upper level biological and chemistry courses so I have some idea of what's happening :nerd: but I'm no Randy Holmes-Farley.
I will do a followup after the treatment at the least.
The product claims to be for red cyanobacteria but the mechanism is stated to be oxidation, which we know affects algae. If you have any experience with peroxide dips then you've seen something similar firsthand, just shorter term. You can also search any forum and find peoples experiences with peroxide. I'm only now taking a microbial metabolism course at my university, which is incredibly interesting to me as I see a huge connection with my reef tank. I'm in the process of other upper level biological and chemistry courses so I have some idea of what's happening :nerd: but I'm no Randy Holmes-Farley.
I will do a followup after the treatment at the least.
Do any of them look like this.
It is growing like crazy and I am trying to get rid of it.
Hopefully Chemi-Clean will Kill it for Me.
It doesn't look like that.
Try taking some regular household 3% peroxide mixed 50% with tank water and dip it for 5 minutes to see how it reacts. Of course, put it back in normal tank water afterwards and give it some time for the reaction to occur (up to 3 days). If you don't have a rock/frag/whatever to pull out (or don't want to dip a coral close to it) then just pull a clump of it off a rock and place it back into a bowl of tank water near the light. I'd be surprised if that doesn't kill it. That's similar to what chemiclean is doing in my tank.
Try taking some regular household 3% peroxide mixed 50% with tank water and dip it for 5 minutes to see how it reacts. Of course, put it back in normal tank water afterwards and give it some time for the reaction to occur (up to 3 days). If you don't have a rock/frag/whatever to pull out (or don't want to dip a coral close to it) then just pull a clump of it off a rock and place it back into a bowl of tank water near the light. I'd be surprised if that doesn't kill it. That's similar to what chemiclean is doing in my tank.
OP
OP
So I'm 24hrs in with the chemiclean treatment and reporting observations.
A little tank history first:
It's a nano that housed a mantis shrimp and clown fish for many years with little maintenance, so the sand bed became a nutrient trap. After the mantis I decided to make it a reef so the sand bed was removed months ago when I couldn't control my NO2 and PO4 and have left it bare bottom since. I only use a filter sock and skimmer to clean my water and started carbon dosing to remove the leaching nutrients from the rocks before the sand bed was removed. I did reach excessively clean levels NO3 undetectable and PO4 at 0.03. I feed excessively a variety of frozen, flake and pellet fish foods as well as several coral foods several times a day and amino supplement in an attempt to raise NO3. No success. When I dial down the carbon dosing I get algae growth and a raise in PO4, not NO3. All corals, except one monti, never lost color and I attribute that to the excess in food added daily. Believe that particular monti was originally placed too high. Growth did slow and I think it's the lack of NO3. I recently started dosing NaNO3 to raise NO3 to 2-3ppm, works like a charm.
I've only really had continual trouble with some zoanthids, not most. We all know the mysteries of these! I've done several different dips for new arrivals and trying to figure out why certain colonies don't open fully, and some not at all. Only ever lost one colony. The dips usually provide temporary results. The dips I've done: iodine, furan2, peroxide, revive, flatworm exit and more recently bayer for the new arrivals. Through all of this I know for a fact that there's no parasites in the tank lol. I've even found some luck with physically scraping the polyps surface with some of my metal frag tools (not recommended to most people BTW). Most of them get better over time with repeated dipping and cleaning but it's exhaustive and I don't have the time anymore for individual treatments of >50 frags with more coming soon from friends.
Treatment:
Anyway, I left my filter sock in even though it's about time to change it. I usually change it only when it overflows because I don't have many fish and the lack of a sand bed.
I left my skimmer running but pulled the collection cup off because most of the crashes I found spoke of oxygen deprivation. My skimmer started going nuts within seconds and my tank is loaded with microbubbles nonstop.
I also read about bleaching corals, especially sps. It's been attributed to drastically cleaner and clearer water so I lowered the light (Kessil A360) intensity from 60% to 40%, but kept the spectrum. I don't know how much of a factor this would be for me because it's very low nutrient to begin with but better safe than sorry.
My Apex did show that my pH dropped to 7.52 last night which is lower than usual but the box does state that O2 and pH could be affected.
All my fish, inverts and corals are doing fine.
Most of my Z&Ps are open a little more than lately. There's a couple that haven't been open for about a week and I spotted them open for a short period today when I got home.
My sps all look good. My montis, birdsnest, millepora, and birds of paradise have full polyp extension but that's nothing new. My acros have better polyp extension this evening
I also see the usual pods running around the glass.
But best of all is most of the algae (at least three different kinds) is turning brown. This has mostly been growing on the (many) newer frag plugs and part of the birdsnest that has been dead. I know that the place I get most of my frags runs much higher NO3 and PO4, so it's just leaching out in theory.
Thoughts:
The box states it's an oxidizer so it shouldn't kill regular bacteria much as they have a natural defense to that. The reaction that I'm seeing with the algae is exactly like when I've done peroxide dips in the past. This makes complete sense because peroxide is an oxidizer also. So in a sense this is just like when people dose their entire tank with peroxide. This just might be a little safer for some people since there's an established dosage to follow. It also explains the pH drop but I won't get into the chemistry here.
I've already prepared for the 20% water change at ~48hrs per instructions.
Sorry for the length but I believe more info is better when researching something for your beloved reef! Hope this helps anybody thinking about it.
Glad to here that some zoas and palys are showing signs of opening, same happen to me. First day, some started to reopen and showed signs of getting better. as the days went by they got better and better. By the 3rd day after the 20% percent water change, they were back to perfect health. Wide open and thriving!. Keep me updated on the results
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