Shallow 30g rimless cube. Battling green slime......

[jinx]

Time to kill some sponges!!

[jedimasterben]

It was brought to my attention that the problems I've been having could be related to the large amount of sponges that are currently present and growing like crazy within this setup.. I have blue/purple/white sponges growing on my rocks and even my corals, this also includes a bunch of the pineapple sponges as well.. I have zero micro bubbles in my display and it's the exact opposite in my sump where there is no sponge and very little algae problem down there. Maybe I should do a little test and allow micro bubbles into the display for a week or so to kill off the sponges and see what happens with the algae.

What problems would the sponges create? They are generally very poor competitors.

[jinx]

Sponges are highly toxic and are also known to actively kill other corals. Some can also fuel cyano/dino breakouts when expelled from their cells at death. While they can also reduce said outbreaks, I don't want em... and I've seen them growing on my corals before, just never thought they were that bad.. Time to remove one more possible factor which is pretty easy to do. I could make a laundry list of things that could be causing problems, tweak said items, and still no breaks with the algae issue. Removing the sand definitely dented it, and possibly not using the HD buckets anymore has helped, but it's still going strong. 50% water changes isn't helping and it's getting costly quick. I'm barely feeding my fish but once a day if they are lucky. Water tests aren't showing anything out of spec and I've had it tested by two other places besides with my api's. Things I haven't changed yet in the quest of kicking this are, my green and red LEDs, RSCPS, and the main rock.. Something is still causing the problem. The sponges will still get the boot regardless.

[jinx]

Happy to report I'm seeing a decline in sponge fullness, so it's working. The pineapple sponges do not seem bothered by it at all. Already starting to see coralline growing on the bottom pane. My ph has become very stable and hasn't dipped below 8.0 since the sand was removed. Been using my ph controller to monitor it since I have the reactor offline.

[jinx]

Since adding mirco bubbles to the display, the algae has slowed greatly. Enough to where my RBU can keep up with eating it. Whether or not it's related is another story, but it seems to be helping. Can't wait to get this balanced out and get back to enjoying it!!

[jinx]

Will be stopping the bubbles tonight for a few days. Curious to see how the algae reforms.

[jinx]

Couple hours with no bubbles and............. The slime returns in full force. Will post a pic up asap. WTF!?!?

[jinx]

80+% of this growth is just since I killed the bubbles. Going to start dosing some peroxide tomorrow and see if it'll help. Keeping my finger crossed...

 

[jinx]

Also going to switch salts and see if the RSCPS is any bit of the problem.

[jinx]

I know of a shop that sells massive display pieces of dead coral/rock in the keys for super cheap and I'm considering getting rid of the rocks and rebooting the display completely with one. I may have to find time to head down there and do some digging for the right piece to replace everything. I will get rid of this without chems through process of elimination. The list is getting smaller by the day as to whats causing it. Did start dosing h2o2 this morning as well.

[Benny314]

Well that's horrible.

 

Is it seriously regrowing within hours of the bubbles going off?

[jinx]

Yep.. Supercharged like it's been eating crack Soon as the lights come on it's there.. Barely goes away with the dark period and comes right back after 3 day blackouts.

[jinx]

Well, it looks like the h2o2 is working.. I haven't bothered cleaning or touching any of the algae and it appears to have stopped dead growth wise and has even started receding in some areas. Not sure it'll work long term though. Still going to switch salts anyways. RSCPS is becoming hard to find locally atm and I may switch back to IORC for a bit.

day 1

 

day 2

 

[jinx]

Day 3 of h2o2. Looking promising colors are bit off due to lights at different hours of the day, but you can tell it's fading. I've only been doing 8ml per 30gal a day.. that's far under the safe dose of 10ml per 10gal. Just being super cautious.

[Benny314]

Well that's making a hell of a difference. I take it you still haven't figured out what's changed to cause the attack of the green slime?

[jedimasterben]

#awwyiss

[jinx]

Not really. The only things I haven't changed yet is my coral pro salt, the green and red leds, and the main rock. Considering I killed quite a bit of the sponges off, I'll probably see a spike from the kill off. My RO is finally storing @ 0 tds since I got the storage tank. I wish I could say it was due to sunlight exposure, but the windows in the room are blacked out. My real bet is on the main rock and having to redo that will be major set back. I'm going to keep dosing the peroxide and see how it goes for a little bit.

[jinx]

I've even gone as far as blacking out any green and red leds on devices in the room that may be fueling it at night. There's actually a ton of rogue led light sources on 24/7 in the room, from TV, consoles, router, phone, pc, a/c, ect. It's down to getting crazy in order to solve this lol. When the water is testing fine from different sources and test kits, it's something else.. the only time the water checked in the bad, was when all of my sps started dying off.

[jinx]

Will be posting continued pics of progress from the h2o2 as I go, just been busy the past few days. It's still thriving at the low doses but it's not coming on as heavy or matting as bad. I'm upping the dosage starting today.

[jinx]

Just turned the lights on to check the upped dosage status.

[jinx]

Got busy and forgot to dose it once. A ridiculous amount returned like it never went anywhere.

[jinx]

Still keeping up with dosing and it's working very well. I purposely skipped a day to see what would grow and to my surprise, not much at all.... Going to keep it up until nothing is left and then even some more after before stopping.

[Orangutran]

Still keeping up with dosing and it's working very well. I purposely skipped a day to see what would grow and to my surprise, not much at all.... Going to keep it up until nothing is left and then even some more after before stopping.

 

 

How's the green slim battle coming along with peroxide? I'm seeing some in my tank, and hoping to stop it before it gets worse..

[jinx]

 

 

How's the green slim battle coming along with peroxide? I'm seeing some in my tank, and hoping to stop it before it gets worse..

Mostly gone and I haven't dosed in a couple weeks now. I stopped because my female maroon clown started showing signs of what appears to be chemical burns that have yet to heal. The male never showed any signs of stress and he's much smaller, so I dunno.. I quit doing water changes as well.

[jinx]

Holy crap its be awhile... tanks still kicking and I haven't done a water change since before my last post lol... The green goo finally gave up a month ago and hasn't returned. I quit skimming and dosing too.. Fish still alive, mushrooms, gorgs, and zoas still there too. I quit fussing with it and it paid off apparently, but I'm not 100% convinced of total success just yet.