When do I put refugium back online?

[bryan3536]

Long story, but my refugium macro algae went kaput, then my skimmer went, and through lack of maintenance (I was in a prolonged “hate my tank” phase) I let turf algae take over my display tank. My tank and I are back on good terms, and I’ve been systematically doing my part to get rid of the turf algae - water changes, manually removing what I can from rockwork, reduced light on DT, removing detritus where’ve I can find it, dosing a small amount of NoPox (7-10 ml per day on a 220g system - my nitrate/phosphate at 0 so afraid to dose too much).

Been a few weeks but I’m starting to see the tide turn and the algae is fading. Question is when do I bring fuge back online? I was thinking I get a ton of clean chaeto, load up the fuge, and see if that’s the knock out punch for the turf. But my concern is putting a ton of chaeto into an already low nutrient situation might cause it to crash and cause a spike itself? Am overthinking?

 

[Saltyreef]

Long story, but my refugium macro algae went kaput, then my skimmer went, and through lack of maintenance (I was in a prolonged “hate my tank” phase) I let turf algae take over my display tank. My tank and I are back on good terms, and I’ve been systematically doing my part to get rid of the turf algae - water changes, manually removing what I can from rockwork, reduced light on DT, removing detritus where’ve I can find it, dosing a small amount of NoPox (7-10 ml per day on a 220g system - my nitrate/phosphate at 0 so afraid to dose too much).

Been a few weeks but I’m starting to see the tide turn and the algae is fading. Question is when do I bring fuge back online? I was thinking I get a ton of clean chaeto, load up the fuge, and see if that’s the knock out punch for the turf. But my concern is putting a ton of chaeto into an already low nutrient situation might cause it to crash and cause a spike itself? Am overthinking?

Not overthinking one bit. Actually you are quite accurate in your assumption.
You should add a very small amount only when you notice your nutrients
start to spike. If you dont see that, you may need to reduce nutrient export Or increase bioload somehow.

If you have enough nutrients to support the chaeto, and it grows, its time.
You will likely need to suppliment it as time goes on and dont forget to trim it!

 

[bryan3536]

OK, I have a plan and I like it on paper. I kept dosing the nopox, and went to blue lights only for last several days, and feel like that broke the turf algae - it had been slowly (sooooo slowly) disappearing, but in the last few days what is left is looking thin and less vibrant (and the tangs and angels seem more interested in it for whatever reason). My new fuge light showed up over the weekend, and arriving yesterday was the blue separator / filter mesh that I use to keep large detritus out of the fuge (on front end) and stray light and chaeto from entering my skimmer compartment. Today two softball sized bunches of chaeto arrived looking pretty healthy, and after a short acclimation (opened lid to get ph leveled, put in sump to level temp, rinsed in tank water in a white bucket to weed out any critters) into the fuge it went. I'll give it 24 hours before putting the light on, and hopefully it will grow and the stuff in the tank will not.

This is a funny hobby - you get into it for the pretty fish, quickly become obsessed with coral, and yet your most lasting love is for your inverts and fish with jobs, a skimmer that gets you a nice, solid skim, and a ball of stringy green algae, ideally rotating hypnotically under a pink light.

 

[bryan3536]

Here is the before and after - growth in a little over 5 weeks under a waterproof grow light I got from amazon, no nuisance algae has returned to the display tank, and I've been feeding the fish well.