Melev's new 280g Starfire tank thread

[Alaska_Phil]

I don't suppose there's a similar product for removing hair algae? Hair-B-Gone??

I'm getting pretty frustrated with my 50 gal. Phosephate reactor has lowered that to nearly undetectable levels, below 0.02 now. Nitrates stay between 1 and 2 ppm. My fish are on a starvation diet (except my lawnmower, who's so fat he can hardly swim!). Skimmer's pulling nice dark skimmate daily. Snails can't seem to stay alive more than a couple months though. And I'm removing as much hair as I can manually, as well as doing a 10% water change weekly. I've checked my source water, no nitrates or phosephates there. I'm about to go looking for a sea hare, as nothing else is working.

Any suggestions? Please?

Phil

[jnarowe]

hair-b-gone...that's rich! Putting a sea hare in a 50g could be seriously dangerous. when they croak, they get super nasty. super, super, nasty.

maybe you are using the wrong snails? but the real question is, why is the algae growing? Some things to consider:

1. lighting: lamps old, color shifted, not enough?
2. food: what are you feeding, purchased food, flakes, pellets?
3. skimmer: which one and is it working well?
4. testing: what tests are you using for nitrates and phosphates, and are they old?
5. mechanical filtration: socks or floss?
6. Sand bed: do you have one, and are you cleaning it?
7. livestock: what kind of fish, how many, and what size?

[Alaska_Phil]

Originally posted by jnarowe
hair-b-gone...that's rich! Putting a sea hare in a 50g could be seriously dangerous. when they croak, they get super nasty. super, super, nasty.

maybe you are using the wrong snails? but the real question is, why is the algae growing? Some things to consider:

1. lighting: lamps old, color shifted, not enough?
2. food: what are you feeding, purchased food, flakes, pellets?
3. skimmer: which one and is it working well?
4. testing: what tests are you using for nitrates and phosphates, and are they old?
5. mechanical filtration: socks or floss?
6. Sand bed: do you have one, and are you cleaning it?
7. livestock: what kind of fish, how many, and what size?

1. 2x55W PC, 10,000k, just replaced as they were 1 year old. And 1x40W N.O. Actinic, 1 year old. Algae seemed to grow faster when I replaced the lamps.

2. Currently feeding a pinch of Omega 1 marine flakes 2x per week, 1/3 cube of rinsed brine shrimp 1x per week. Small strip of Nori, about the size of 2 postage stamps, 2x per week because the yellow tang was looking pretty skinny.

3. Backpack 2 skimmer. Not the best, but it's pulling 1/4, to 1/2" of nice dark skimmate per day.

4. Brand new Salifert test kits.

5. I do have an HOB filter. I change or rinse the filter pad every 2 to 3 days.

6. Shallow sand bed across the front, I suck all the algae off the surface each week when I do my water changes. Going to be bare bottom soon at this rate.

7. 2 False Perc clowns, one adult, one juvenile
1 adult yellow tang.
1 very fat juvenile lawnmower blennie.
1 4" wrasse, possibly a tail spot, not completly sure on it's ID.
1 very large coral banded shrimp.
3 or 4 hermit crabs.
down to 2 margarita snails again, possibly still some nassarius too, haven't seen them for a while.

Corals are mostly leathers and mushrooms plus a couple LPS's and 1 pretty new Zoa colony. All are doing well, showing good color and growth, except the zoa, who generally has about 10% of it's polyps closed these days.

Lots of info, so hopefully you guys can spot a smoking gun.

Phil

[Alaska_Phil]

P.S. I'm contemplating a 20 gal water change this weekend at this point. Hate to do that, afraid I'll shock things and do more harm than good.

Phil

[Micki]

What water are you using? What's the TDS of the water?

[Alaska_Phil]

Unfortunately I don't have a TDS meter. I was buying RO from the LFS, but they charge $2/gal. Since I wasn't getting any improvement I recently went back to a local drinking water vendors water. Also, RO, with carbon and fine particulate filters. Don't know the TDS, but I did check for phosephate and Nitrate and it came up zero for both.

Using Instant Ocean salt.

Phil

[kmacartney]

FWIW, when I started topping off with kalkwasser, my briopsis went away.

[Alaska_Phil]

Since I have mostly softies, my CA and Alk demand is very light. I'm just starting to need CA dosing between water changes, and most of it seems to be going into coraline algae at this point. My CA stays pretty consistenly at 400 to 420 and my Alk tents to run a bit high at 3.4 to 3.6.

Phil

[Stile2]

what is your Mag levels? I have heard that low levels can let the algae grow.

[Alaska_Phil]

Mg levels I don't know. I'll find out.

[poppin_fresh]

Originally posted by Alaska_Phil
I was buying RO from the LFS, but they charge $2/gal.

Holy canoli, thats a lot for water! It wouldn't take long at that price to justify an RO purchase. Dont forget, an RO is not just for the tank, but it makes awesome drinking water also.

[Micki]

Agree with poppin_fresh! Just remember you need the RO/DI not just RO.

[melev]

Are you cleaning the skimmer's collection cup daily? I used the same one and that is important, imho.

You need more snails. 1 per gallon is the recommendation, but even 20 would be better than 3. If you could get a few (3 or 4) of the huge Mexican Turbos, they'd help significantly. Keep in mind that they are bulldozers and you'll have to pick up any corals that have fallen over that day.

Pick the algae away, then place the snails on those areas to mow down the patch you left behind. Each time you find a 'stray' snail, take it back to the problem areas.

[poppin_fresh]

I thought the Turbos are a cooler water species that wont live long in a reef? I put 3 in several months ago and now I only have two left. I am curious to see how long they actually live.

[Alaska_Phil]

One per gallon!!! Yikes! I stopped by the LFS tonight, I've got a finger leather that split so I'm going to trade it for some more snails. But I don't think they even have 50 in stock. And at $5.99 each...

And the turbos are part of the problem. I've never been able to keep one alive in this tank for more than a month. And they always die is some hidden corner to sit and rot. I have 2 snails currently, I put 6 in only 2 months ago, including 2 turbos. Is there some mysterious predator that only attacks snails? I don't get it, I'm using the same water and salt in my 20 gal tank, same temp, similar lights and one of my 7 snails in that tank is the first critter I ever put in it 18 months ago!

I'd order more snails on-line, but the delivery drivers have a nasty habit of leaving packages on my doorstep. And it's -5F and dropping right now.

Marc, I clean the skimmer cup, daily or at least every other day.

Poppin_fresh, you should see what we're paying for heating oil, it went up a $1/gal since last year. But since we've pretty much ruled everything else out, I'll order an RO/DI and TDS meter from Marc as soon as I can find my pay-pal password again.

There is one other possibility...this tank is in our office. So it's possible someone is "helping me" by feeding the fish on weekends.

Thanks again everyone, and Marc, sorry for hijacking your thread...again... Congrats on getting rid of your Cyano...been there too.

Phil

[jnarowe]

hmmm...in your office could be an issue, environmental like temp swings or contaminants. Like you said, someone may be messing with it, but from what you have describe let me offer up an idea:

The Mexican Turbos will mow down algae like nobody's business, but they also poop huge piles. They don't actually export nutrients, so while the tank may look better, the nutrients are piling up and bonding with your rock and substrate. When they die, they release wicked toxins and further exascerbate the nutrient issue.

I had a warm spell this last Summer which kicked off my turbos. They are really temperate climate animals and cannot take temps above 82F for very long or on consecutive days. When they die, they foul the water horribly, and other stuff will die off while algae blooms like mad. I had about 50 die in a 1000g tank and it wreaked havoc. So do the math on that.

My assumption based on your above responses is that although your test results are not showing abnormally high nutrients, clearly your system is not able to keep up with it, and algae is taking advantage of that. True, when you install new lamps, the extra intensity can cause an algal bloom, so a good method is to either burn them prior to installation, raise the lamps for the first couple of weeks and slowly lower them, or reduce the lighting period.

You have experienced at least a double whammy with the snail die-off and the lamp swap, so your current issues could be easily expected. It has happened to me, and just about every other reef keeper you will come into contact with.

There are a lot of avenues to take and none of them will work by themself IMO.

1. I would swap out about 1/3 of your sand to give some fresh substrate the opportunity to bind nutrients. This is a short term buffer while you work out the source of the nutrients.

2. I would only re-stock snaila with captive reef appropriate snails that are from tropical climates, breed in captivity, and stay within an acceptable size range.

3. Run some carbon and change it out every week until the issue is resolved. You would be amazed at how much fresh carbon can help your system.

4. Continue doing partial water changes once a week.

5. Bite the bullet and get a small RO/DI system. They are widely available, easy to install, and even people posting in your thread could hook you up.

6. Try feeding fresh made food rather than the flake. There is some really good info. on this in Marc (melev's) web site including an excellent ***cast showing just how to do this. Better nutrition will be beneficial to your fish and inverts, and gets rid of some of the less than desirable ingredients:

INGREDIENTS: Whole Herring, Whole Salmon, Halibut, Black Cod, Seafood Mix (Whole Krill, Rockfish, Whole Shrimp, Squid, Clams, Salmon Eggs, and Octopus), Wheat flour, Wheat Gluten, Fresh Kelp, Spirulina, Lecithin, Astaxanthin, L-Ascorbyl-2-Phosphate (Source of Vitamin C), Natural and Artificial Colors, Vitamin A Acetate, Vitamin D3 Supplement, Vitamin E Supplement, Vitamin B12 Supplement, Riboflavin, Niacin, Pantothenic Acid, Folic Acid, Biotin, Inositol, Tocopherol (Preservative), Ethoxyquin (Preservative).

Fish and corals don't need food color, wheat products, preservatives, etc. and check out the source of Vitamin C...

Brine shrimp is virtually useless unless you are soaking it in vitamins, aminos etc. and you probably should feed more nori as the tang needs a lot more than that to stay healthy.

Zoanthids typically close up when there is a water quality issue, and if your yellow tang has any pale coloration, that is also an indicator of poor water quality.

And BTW, I don't think, other than the turbos, that your bio-load is out of line. It seems to me that is managed well, but you are introducing more nutrients than your system can handle.

Feel free to PM for more discussion, as although Marc is very open to discussion, he probably would rather talk about HIS reef!

Thanks Marc.

[poppin_fresh]

Phil...time to move man!

I thought it was cold here, but -5F already?? We wont see that for another week! I dont know what oil is going to cost me this year, I didn't do the budget thing...doh!

Like I said, the RO is good for the tank, but dont be afraid to use it for the home also. It makes great drinking water and you will never need to vinegar douche the coffee maker again if you use RO water.

[Alaska_Phil]

Well, just tried to order an RO/DI unit from Marc. Got the following from paypal


"This account has been permanently locked with a $0.00 USD balance. All information associated with this account has been blocked from the PayPal system and cannot be registered with another account."

Won't let me use my credit card either, won't let me start a new account. I'll try it again tomorrow, if that doesn't work I'll call Marc and see if we can work something else out. I really don't understand this, I've only used paypal twice, and both transactions went through without a hitch. Grrr...

Phil

[melev]

Phil, it is a balmy 50F over here right now.

You don't have nearly enough snails. Snails die if they can't right themselves, so your job is to flip them and put them back on the rockwork. Hermit crabs kill snails for their shells. As long as your tank is a stable temperature, snails should last you a longer amount of time provided nothing is in the water that can harm them. (RO or RO/DI is preferred specifically for this reason - a far lesser risk of metals entering the tank.)

Getting snails delivered to your job might help avoid the minus Fahrenheit problem. And buying them online, you can get way more. I bought 50 Astreas recently, and TCU_Reefer bought 50 as well. Together, we had a combined order that cost us $78 shipped to my door.






Sooooo, back to my tank.

Today, I soaked my Euro-Reef 12-2 skimmer in a vat of muriatic acid and water. I had the pumps running, but even after a couple of hours, so red algae was stubbornly staying in place. So I dumped out the solution, and made more with the rest of the acid and let it run again. It is 95% cleaner, but I wasn't as determined as normal to get it brand new. Because, something else was distracting me: The outlet to the skimmer has been loose for some time, but I saw a 2" crack in the acrylic. During the cleaning, the fitting moved more and more.

Once it was throughly dry, I applied a bead of Weld-On #16 all around that spot and pressed the fitting into place. It has been set aside to cure for the night.

With the skimmer out of my way, it was the perfect time to siphon out the detritus in my sump. However, I wanted to clean it better, so I scraped away all the coralline that had grown in that section, the wall of the refugium, what I could reach in the baffles, etc.





Then I worked in the prop section that has been neglected for way too long. It was full of detritus as well, and I siphoned out bucket after bucket of dark disgusting waste water. Some LR was moved from the back of that section to the area where the water pours into the sump to break up the bubbles. Other stuff was cleaned out that had to go. The heaters were checked and were working correctly.



The effluent box is nice and clean again, something I do every couple of months.

New saltwater was added. I ran out of Red Sea Pro, so I mixed it 50/50 with Kent Sea Salt. pH was 8.3 after a day of mixing, but I tested alkalinity anyway. It was 7.3 dKH, so I added three teaspoons of baked Baking Soda (mixed in a cup of RO water) and raised the alk to 11 and pH to 8.6 -- a few hours later, it was down to 8.3 again and safe to use.

The suncorals were happy to keep me company while I worked on the tank this evening.



I tested my water tonight to see where the nitrates and phosphates were, now that I'm completely done with AZNO3. Remember I just ran Chemi-Clean in my tank and nuked the cyano bacteria. Nitrates were around 15ppm (arrrgh) and PO4 was approaching 1 ppm. It is my hope that once the skimmer is running again and pulls out all the DOCs that are currently in the system, those two numbers will be lower. I know, I'm living in a dream world.

[gkarshens]

I think getting the RO/DI will help the most. Who knows how well maintained those water dispensers are. I know someone locally was using one and having all kinds of problems. They switched to RO/DI and it helped significantly.

[melev]

My son turned 21.

[melev]

I forgot to mention that while I was cleaning out the sump, I discovered my little Purple Firefish. He's been down there for probably two months, and impossible to catch. Since I'd siphoned out so much water, he didn't have any vertical space to avoid my nets, and after about 10 minutes I had him. He's back in the angled tank where he belongs.

[Alaska_Phil]

Cool, can't wait to get a sump set up on my tanks. Just for all the little mystries they bring.

And buy your son a cold one for me

Phil

[jnarowe]

The sun corals are sweet Marc. And congrats on getting your son to 21. I know it ain't easy.

[gkarshens]

Originally posted by melev
My son turned 21.

WooHoo! Let's get hammered!