chaeto problem?

chewieee · #1 11/30/2007, 04:10 PM

I have a 75g reef tank with a 30gallon sump/fuge inside my fuge i have a ball of chaeto with a DSB. I have about 550gph going threw the fuge. I light it with the Bulb from Melev's site on a reverse photoperiod. The PROBLEM is for 2 months now my chaeto has not grown at all , seriously and honestly maybe 10% growth. Now it is my understanding if you have no nutrients in system it will not grow? BUT i have has 20 ppm of nitrate for about 1.5 months now. I have checked with 2 different test kits. Now if i have nitrate in system shouldnt my chaeto be growing and sucking it up?

Blown 346 · #2 11/30/2007, 04:26 PM

I had the same problem, once I had those extra nutrients it took off like crazy. Within 2 weeks it almost doubled.

cmc5dc · #3 11/30/2007, 04:29 PM

I had and still have same problem....I can't grow the stuff in my tank

yet a while ago I had a patch of red slime on my sand bed

backej1 · #4 11/30/2007, 04:35 PM

Is the bulb you're using in the 6000K range somewhere? If not, this would make a huge difference. Also, how many watts is the bulb?

techreef · #5 11/30/2007, 04:45 PM

i'm right there w/ cmc5dc and the OP. Melev's bulb (5100K, i believe) cheato slowly turned to mush and died. cyano in the fuge w/ the chaeto, so there was excess nutrients...

chewieee · #6 11/30/2007, 04:45 PM

http://www.melevsreef.com/fuge_bulb.html

chewieee · #7 11/30/2007, 04:46 PM

what b ulb do you use now

backej1 · #8 11/30/2007, 04:49 PM

I use a cheap "Lights of America" light from Home Depot. It comes with a 6700K bulb. My chaeto loves it.

I use these lights on 3 of my fuges and all are doing well.

ospouh · #9 11/30/2007, 04:50 PM

Hm... to tell you the truth my param always read close to 0 but my chaeto grows i would say about 10% a week. They only started after i got the 6500K Philips bulbs from Home Depot, before i was using a screw on power compact by coralife 50/50 and it did **** with chaeto.

chewieee · #10 11/30/2007, 05:22 PM

so a bulb around 6500k is the best?

conjuay · #11 11/30/2007, 06:51 PM

I would love to know where you find the K ratings of bulbs from Home Depot OR Phillips. I can't find it on the packaging...

jamiep · #12 11/30/2007, 07:08 PM

I live in Ireland and all I can ever get is 2700K bulbs. When I rehook my fuge after christmas I might get a freshwater plant bulb. How do halogen lamps fair for growing chaeto?

AlexB650 · #13 11/30/2007, 07:16 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by conjuay
I would love to know where you find the K ratings of bulbs from Home Depot OR Phillips. I can't find it on the packaging...

home depot has a few different brands. the one that shows the k rating is a brand (which i can't remeber the name exactly) that's called envision or something like that. anyways, they have three package colors which represent the different k ratings--green, red and blue. you want to buy the blue one, which i believe is 5,500k. however, these are on the steep side. for a bit more (around $35) they have the lights of america brand. i think someome said costco has them for $10 though.

Acillaton · #14 11/30/2007, 08:17 PM

If you are not sure, then on every package of the bulb you have customer service #.Call them from the home depot and ask about specific bulb you like. Most cust. serv. are 24/7.

stuccodude · #15 11/30/2007, 08:25 PM

mine dont grow either but i seen other reefers have there light 1inch over the cheato, i dont have that set up yet, if you can,place the light right above the cheato, good luck.

Misled · #16 11/30/2007, 09:30 PM

chewieee, another thing to do is reduce the flow through your fuge. You are presently going over 7 times an hour. For a sump 3 to 5 is good go on the lower end for a fuge. The water needs to spend some time with the cheato. If it's moving too fast it doesn't have time to remove anything from the water.