jtown Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 I've been battling this algae problem for a long time now. I have snails/red hermits/emerald and they don't touch this stuff. Now I'm thinking I need chemical warfare to beat this thing. what can I do? btw, that is an old pic ... now it's 10x worse occupying the entire rear of my tank. Link to comment
Crakeur Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 lmao. you think that's bad? my tank is beginning to look like a refugium. Welcome to my nightmare. Link to comment
Xavier Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 pull out what you can by hand and toothbrush.. then reduce the light on your tank for a while.. have you tested for nitrates? Link to comment
jtown Posted April 11, 2003 Author Share Posted April 11, 2003 oops ... terribly sorry for the lack of information. tank size: 20 gallon Long fish: 2 percs / 1 royal gramma water: r/o from LFS (was doing 2 gallon water changes every week, now every 2 weeks with top off) salinity: 1.026 Ammonia/nitrate/nitrite : close to 0 feeding: 3 times a week ... flake food / nightime to the corals corals: 1 torch frag/1 hammer frag/ 1 very smalll blautosomething/2 green candy cane frags (growing fast) dose: small amount of calcium each week. (like a few drops) lighting: 2 x 55w PC's on for12 hours (maybe I should cut this back a bit as well) I almost think the fish store is just selling me regular tap water. mine looks like a damn kelp forest. that pic was when it first started. I ahve to try and clean it out once a week. problem is that it grows in the back so it's a little harder to reach. Link to comment
SeaMountain Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 That pic looks like my tank - - - LAST WEEK! LMAO! Just dropped in a clean up crew 2 hours ago, so I'll let it go another couple of weeks and see how they do before I treat or scrub anything. I'm using RO Culligan water from Wally World - A 3g jug only costs .99 cents for a refill. My problem is... I get these friggin' bubbles in the early evening! Don't know why either. Morning is clear. Afternoon is clear. Early evening PH's are belching mini-bubbles. They get caught in the algae, under the nooks and crannies of the LR... Then later in the night, after lights out... It all quits! ??? All I test for is Ammonia, Trites and Trates and all are good. Guess i need to pick up the rest of the kits but I'm waiting to place another online order. My LFS SUX!!! SUX!!! SUX!!! Link to comment
Ike Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 UGH!!!!! I'm glad I'm not the only one with this problem. 15g with 10g sump 110watts pc Prizm skimmer 15lbs Fiji 15lbs Tonga 35lbs oolite sand only RO/DI water Tropic Marin salt B-ionic 5 astrea snails 3 red leg hermits 1 queen conch 1 emerald crab 100 lbs thick swaying hair algae. While everyone in the tank appears to be VERY healthy & happy and are constantly eating they don't put much of a dent in it. I'm hesitant about adding any more snails, etc. at this point just in case the algae decides to die off leaving them with nothing to eat. I wish I were that lucky to have my alge die off. Since the tank is only a a month & a half old I expect an algae bloom, but enough is enough!!!! Some rocks are pretty clean, but others are completely covered in a thick lucious mat of green crap. It's actually no longer a nice vibrant green, but turning a pale yellow green & grey. I don't want to scrape it off the rocks because the rocks are literally BLOSSOMING with tons of cool life forms, which I'd rather not damage with my ham-fisted algae scraping. Any ideas or words of wisdom/experience? Yes Dave I know that I should have searched the forums for entries on "algae" but I just don't have the time nor the desire to wade through hundreds of postings that happen to mention algae in passing, so flame away. Sorry about the length, but I'm really bored at work today. Ike Link to comment
jtown Posted April 11, 2003 Author Share Posted April 11, 2003 well I'm glad I'm not the only one as well! =) this stuff is really gross, I usually use a chopstick and move it around really fast in the algae and it gets all dislodged. then I take a net and sweep the water until most of it is gone. this method works pretty well, but it's a pain in the ass once a week. I'll take a picture of this big fern looking plant I have that keeps growing once it grows back. I just trimmed it yesterday. Link to comment
Xavier Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 jtown.. how old is your tank?... these things tend to come and go in new tanks.. just try to pull out what you can.. and reduce your photo period for a few days.. maybe even start out with a day or two of lights out.. then gradually bring them back on for a few hours a day.. increasing every few days... Link to comment
jtown Posted April 11, 2003 Author Share Posted April 11, 2003 I've had the tank for a little over a year now. Link to comment
Raise Posted April 12, 2003 Share Posted April 12, 2003 jtown! This is 2kLuder from po.com! Madness, its cool to see that you are also into Reeftanks... Hows your car? Link to comment
Bucket o Chum Posted April 12, 2003 Share Posted April 12, 2003 You can buy a tang at your LFS put it in let it feast and then return it once the algae is gone. Link to comment
jtown Posted April 13, 2003 Author Share Posted April 13, 2003 Originally posted by Raise jtown! This is 2kLuder from po.com! Madness, its cool to see that you are also into Reeftanks... Hows your car? whoa! wtf! hahahaha ... sweet man. the lude is great ... haven't done anything to it recently though. what kind of tank do you have? Link to comment
Raise Posted April 13, 2003 Share Posted April 13, 2003 I have a 55g Reef and started a 5.5 a couple months back. SMALL WORLD! Hehe Link to comment
mattdog Posted April 13, 2003 Share Posted April 13, 2003 well i found a interesting "coral"ation between hair algae and high salinity...i had a problem with a crapy hydrometer and hair algae was through the roof...took a sample to someone with a refractometer and my salinity was at 1.033...way off...so i purchased my own refractometer and slowly lowered my salinity down to 1.024 and ever since I've had ZERO hair algae, just good ol coraline and that stupid green calcareous crap that grows on the glass (basically the only thing I use my Discover Card for anymore).... I don't know if the two (algae probs and high salinity) are related in any way, shape or form but I did find it odd for it all to dissapear after I corrected the problem...perhaps I'm on to something or perhaps I need to take these zoos out of my mouth...TASTY!!! --Matt Link to comment
Crakeur Posted April 13, 2003 Share Posted April 13, 2003 interesting dog. My algae has become a plague since I have been working these ridiculous hours. I've pruned a bit in the dark and killed a majority of my xenia frags. Two acro frags and my maxima have suffered from the lack of tlc the past month or two. I'm going to do a major cleaning and rework the tank once this miserable tax season ends and I will set up my top off system that is still sitting in a box, get myself a refractometer and start testing the water again. I will have this algae thing kicked or I will do the one thing I am dreading - pull out all the rocks and scrub them clean (I do this and I will lose a lot of livestock as most of my zoos and acros and softies are attached to the two large rocks that make up the live rock). Three days left of hell, a two day wind down and then the Shock and Awe campaign begins in earnest in the tank. Link to comment
mattdog Posted April 13, 2003 Share Posted April 13, 2003 Crakeur, Question....I filed my taxes online and I had to print these forms to sign and return. Do those have to be postmarked by the 15th? Sorry to bring your hell into the thread but I just needed to know... Thanks, Matt "Doggy" Dogg Link to comment
mattdog Posted April 13, 2003 Share Posted April 13, 2003 Here's a link to the thread I made while I was experiencing the problem: http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/showthread...=&threadid=7020 Link to comment
Crakeur Posted April 13, 2003 Share Posted April 13, 2003 Don't know about the online stuff but I would assume the postmark should be dated no later than the 15th. We avoid the online filing, as well as the direct deposit. First off, they have found more mistakes and fraudulent returns filed online than by mail so they look at those a bit closer and cull more audit returns from the online filings. Second, filing online puts your information at risk. The irs computers are ancient and their tech is generally a few years behind the rest of the free world. I would expect the hacking attempts are relatively high. Third, by giving them a bank account and routing info for direct deposit, you are adding more risk per number two above and you also are giving the irs the information it needs to take money, if they feel it is due. They try and get it by mail but, if you don't pay, they snag it. so, if you are disputing something and the agent handling the case forgets to put that account levy on hold, bye bye money. Takes forever to get them to pay back erroneously taken levies. So many reasons to not do these things online. A hacking/security expert told me awhile back that he would rather run naked thru the streets than put that much information on the internet. That's $50 for answering the question about the date. the scary info was free. Link to comment
Xavier Posted April 14, 2003 Share Posted April 14, 2003 I must agree that the refractometer can mean all the difference... my hydrometer was way off.. but I've been keeping the SG around 1.024, and things are starting to come together Link to comment
Dave Scheiner Posted April 14, 2003 Share Posted April 14, 2003 I'm with Xavier, reduce the lighting. When I installed new lighting I had a huge diatom bloom, brown gunk on everything. I went from 12 hours to 8 and it cleared up with-in days. The corals have never looked better! Link to comment
Xavier Posted April 14, 2003 Share Posted April 14, 2003 Dave.. did you keep your lights at 8 hours, or did you raise them back up to 12 hours after the bloom? Link to comment
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