Peroxide saves my Tank! With pics to Prove It!

[brandon429]

I got one for you guys

 

laser removal. I did some early tests about 8 yrs ago shining a fixed red dj laser into a patch of algae, kept it on for about 8 hours for two days right through the vase while the tank was running. It bleached the algae, but I was unsure if this would weaken the spot of glass it was shining through as my tank is just decorative vase glass not meant for submersion weight.

 

 

anyone that has a party room might also hold the next big thing in algae removal, where we'll put peroxide on the shelf and laugh at the days we added strong oxidizer to our delicate systems. Any photoexcitable animal hates to have a fixed beam aimed at it for 8 hours, this is the general hypothesis.

 

 

the web has lasers that are way more powerful than the one I was using, a scorpion dj system.

if u have a dj laser go check it out. id experiment on aiptasias, different color lasers etc.

Edited June 15, 2011 by brandon429

[evilc66]

Well, flake food didn't work, and kalk paste started fizzing, so I'm not sure what the reaction was, and as a result didn't feel comfortable putting it in the tank. Need to find an inert binder of some sorts.

 

Lasers could work. I would think that lower wavelength lasers would be better, as they have a higher energy level, just due to the shorter wavelength of light. They are expensive though.

[Reef Miser]

Evil, did you try your original idea of Baking Soda and peroxide?

[evilc66]

Didn't have any baking soda at the house.

[Reef Miser]

I might give it a try. I might have time tonight, but not sure. It's an interesting idea. I think I will check pH before and after too.

[alfiefive]

I got one for you guys

 

laser removal. I did some early tests about 8 yrs ago shining a fixed red dj laser into a patch of algae, kept it on for about 8 hours for two days right through the vase while the tank was running. It bleached the algae, but I was unsure if this would weaken the spot of glass it was shining through as my tank is just decorative vase glass not meant for submersion weight.

 

 

anyone that has a party room might also hold the next big thing in algae removal, where we'll put peroxide on the shelf and laugh at the days we added strong oxidizer to our delicate systems. Any photoexcitable animal hates to have a fixed beam aimed at it for 8 hours, this is the general hypothesis.

 

 

the web has lasers that are way more powerful than the one I was using, a scorpion dj system.

if u have a dj laser go check it out. id experiment on aiptasias, different color lasers etc.

 

what do you mean by DJ laser? i was a DJ for the better part of my undergraduate career and i'm not sure of what you might mean other than the laser that reads BPM on a turntable?

[brandon429]

I mean the lasers dj's use to broadcast out into the crowd...there are really powerful ones costing $500 or less than can be programmed to produce shapes out on the dance floor, or a simple fixed beam I believe mine was called a scorpion. there are greens/reds etc and its worth experimenting with various colors and wattages to see which has an effect. The goal was to be able to control algae from outside the tank, with the tank full and running. Punch through the water refraction index etc...I bet it will be a big deal some day because it adds nothing to the chemistry of the water.

 

heres one of 4 million off goog:

http://www.smartdj.com/Price-Guarantee-Ame...mited-Stock.htm

 

 

Its possible that color might not even matter, just the wattage. Any fixed beam that intense might be very dangerous to photosynthetic systems, enzymes etc. I bleached a patch of green hair algae with something like this in the link

[Neya]

Well. The h202 worked. But it's growing back in treated places. Potentinallu where h2o2 did not get into crevices. It's growing much slower now though.

 

A paste/gel that would not affect ph would rock.

A tooth whitening gel might be the way to start looking. But expensive. And who knows what's it in.

Edited June 17, 2011 by Neya

[alfiefive]

brandon, i am so sorry that i didn't take before and after pictures, but:

 

1. i completely saved two frags of acans that had GHA growing on the "post-frag recovery" parts of their skeletons. the GHA is 100% gone, the acans are 100% inflated, and they look better than before. this was using 80/20 dips for 2 minutes.

 

2. i had a relatively consistent GHA problem in my tank since i (as a beginner) cycled it with too heavy of a light cycle. it was growing on everything.

 

3. later, i did your recommended 80% water change and spray h2o2 method on the rock in my tank. the GHA that infested the crevices in my live rock is 100% gone three days later. i am SO HAPPY to see my rock in it's true form. i do note that concurrently with the water change i replaced my chemi-pure elite.

 

THANKS.

 

I think i was able to make appropriate repair measures concurrently with appropriate systemic changes and I *LOVE* my tank as a result.

Edited June 21, 2011 by alfiefive

[brandon429]

Hey that is just great thanks so much for posting back.

 

I had a red spot of brush algae reseed again inside some tubipora skeleton, I suspect biomass is down in the tubes, crevices etc and not enough peroxide can get into those areas but it doesn't matter. Beforehand when the red algae would show, I'd spend hours trying to get flame down to it, removing and regluing tons of frags in the process, it was like dental surgery just a pure hassle.

 

But with this peroxide, I got lazy and let it run for a while knowing it would kill it and like you posted its all burned clean again for a fresh start

 

 

No breaking anything free, catch the spot when its tiny and insert two drops direct peroxide on it while the tank is drained, wait two mins, refill, spot dead in three days. Retreatments are expected as we aren't spending hundreds of dollars chasing perfect water params, but they are effective, algae doesn't build immunity to this stuff it will always work like this

[cberglof]

Someone posted earlier that their xenia bleach after dosing with H2O2. Anyone using H2O2 to remove xenia? I am sick of removing it, and any little bit of tissue I miss grows right back.

[alfiefive]

Someone posted earlier that their xenia bleach after dosing with H2O2. Anyone using H2O2 to remove xenia? I am sick of removing it, and any little bit of tissue I miss grows right back.

 

there are several comments in this thread indicating that xenia did not survive systemic h2o2 dosing.

 

the xenia in my 5g tank was 100% unaffected by any residual h202 introduced into the system from coating the majority of my live rock in peroxide.

 

you should try it and report your results.

[Reef Miser]

the xenia in my 5g tank was 100% unaffected by any residual h202 introduced into the system from coating the majority of my live rock in peroxide.

 

Good to hear. What type of Xenia do you have? I am the one that had my xenia melt with H2O2. It was the white/pink pom-pom type, not the brown longer wavy kind. It died when I dosed the tank (which I do not recommend). I don't know how well it would hold up to residual peroxide from the dip/spray technique, but it sounds like from your experience, pretty well. Xenia slimes up pretty well, so I would think it would be able to shed off the peroxide if it wasn't in constant contact with it like tank dosing does.

 

If you want to get rid of xenia, you could try H2O2, but I have had luck cutting it off and rubbing any residual tissue off of the rock with my finger. It didn't come back after that.

[Deleted User 6]

been doing 50/50 dips with h2O2 - killing the hell out of some algae. good remedy.

[simchaem]

After reading thru this topic, I decided to try H2O2 on my algae problem. I used a syringe to apply the peroxide directly to the algae w/o draining the tank. I specifically avoided any corals being directly dosed, but my blue xenia did close up for about an hour after the tx. Two days later, there were definite white patches where I put the peroxide. Success! So, this past weekend I decided to be a bit more drastic and during my water change, I removed several rocks and dipped them in some of the water change (old) water with a hefty dose of H2O2. I did not leave them for a specified time, but somewhere b/w 30sec and 5min, depending on the rock and whether anything else was on it (ie shrooms). As previously stated, bristles and pods don't like the peroxide. Shrooms and sps's did not seem to be affected AT ALL. But, the algae definitely was. It is completely white, as of yesterday. My xenia did not appear to be negatively affected at all and all other corals are extended and happy. I think this is a great way to get a handle on a nasty problem.

Thanks for the all the info!

Sorry I don't have any pics to post - I am terrible with the camera.

[cberglof]

Good to hear. What type of Xenia do you have? I am the one that had my xenia melt with H2O2. It was the white/pink pom-pom type, not the brown longer wavy kind. It died when I dosed the tank (which I do not recommend). I don't know how well it would hold up to residual peroxide from the dip/spray technique, but it sounds like from your experience, pretty well. Xenia slimes up pretty well, so I would think it would be able to shed off the peroxide if it wasn't in constant contact with it like tank dosing does.

 

If you want to get rid of xenia, you could try H2O2, but I have had luck cutting it off and rubbing any residual tissue off of the rock with my finger. It didn't come back after that.

 

 

I have pink pulsing xenia. I have it in several spots that I don't want it to be. One spot has orange zoas that it is growing in. I get in there and scrape with a guitar pick and it seems like I get it all but it always grows back. I think I will try scraping and then spot treating there with a litte H2O2. Seems like zoas deal with the peroxide well. I'll try this weekend and report results.

[Reef Miser]

Cool. let us know if it works.^

[alfiefive]

Good to hear. What type of Xenia do you have? I am the one that had my xenia melt with H2O2. It was the white/pink pom-pom type, not the brown longer wavy kind. It died when I dosed the tank (which I do not recommend). I don't know how well it would hold up to residual peroxide from the dip/spray technique, but it sounds like from your experience, pretty well. Xenia slimes up pretty well, so I would think it would be able to shed off the peroxide if it wasn't in constant contact with it like tank dosing does.

 

If you want to get rid of xenia, you could try H2O2, but I have had luck cutting it off and rubbing any residual tissue off of the rock with my finger. It didn't come back after that.

 

i don't know enough about the species to be particularly specific, but it is white and pulsates.

 

i notice all types of changes to my xenia even when i do things like change my chemi-pure (without any other treatment) or do other things that clean my water. it's one of the plants that seems to thrive off nutrient-rich water/untreated water and definitely "thins out" (although it doesn't stop pulsing) when i do things that remove nutrients from my tank.

 

i note, though, that i did a spray treatment on the rock only while the tank was 80% drained, so any effect that the h202 would have had on the xenia would have been a result on what remaining peroxide leeched into the post-change water column of the tank, which probably contributed to it not have adverse effects.

 

when i initially read through this post i considered the xenia the only thing that might go ape and die on me (and i wasn't too worried about it! grows like crazy), but i don't think enough h2o2 entered the water column in a way to significantly affect that particular stock in my tank.

[captainbastard]

So sunday I went and drained the tank and sprayed with a 50/50 peroxide and tank water mix. I did let the peroxide soak for a little while. The first pics are right after I filled the tank back up. You can see how bad it was before as well as the peroxide starting to go to work. The second pics are from earlier today. As you can see the algae is almost completely gone. Also in the last pic you can see my xenia has partially shriveled up but is still mostly OK. I also took a short video of the peroxide bubbles rising from the algae after filling the tank back up. One funny thing is the fish were actually trying to go after the bubbles like they were food, which didn't seem to hurt them

 

I didn't post directly, upload wasn't working for me for some reason

 

http://i.imgur.com/IQRBO.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/L4wmo.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/YhEvi.jpg

 

http://i.imgur.com/qoHjs.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/j7iuX.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/PAfKF.jpg

 

Edited June 22, 2011 by captainbastard

[brandon429]

that is an extremely helpful post wow

[MedRed]

So sunday I went and drained the tank and sprayed with a 50/50 peroxide and tank water mix. I did let the peroxide soak for a little while. The first pics are right after I filled the tank back up. You can see how bad it was before as well as the peroxide starting to go to work. The second pics are from earlier today. As you can see the algae is almost completely gone. Also in the last pic you can see my xenia has partially shriveled up but is still mostly OK. I also took a short video of the peroxide bubbles rising from the algae after filling the tank back up. One funny thing is the fish were actually trying to go after the bubbles like they were food, which didn't seem to hurt them

 

I didn't post directly, upload wasn't working for me for some reason

 

 

 

 

Here you go

[damage31]

I'm interested to see if your shrimp in the picture makes it or not.. I lost 2 cleaner shrimp (two different shrimp at two different times) when using peroxide. I hope yours makes it.

[brandon429]

you must have been systemically dosing, cuz spot treatments won't kill accessory animals or corals

[captainbastard]

Np brandon, thanks medred. One other thing, that last pic with the xenia, that algae looks like its still there but it actually was easily plucked off, the roots had no hold anymore. Also I don't think that shrimp is going anywhere, I've had him for years and he actually been through worse lol. Glad this was helpful

Edited June 22, 2011 by captainbastard

[MedRed]

one note, light breaks down peroxide. if you're treating in the tank, i'd treat early in the morning/day to ease prolonged peroxide stress in the tank.