Peroxide saves my Tank! With pics to Prove It!

[ashfordL]

Heres to the start of my peroxide treatment! I will be getting some peroxide to dip my rocks in later the afternoon.

 

[Nizztos]

I'm about to "restart" a tank that has been sitting with little care and no liv estock. Still has a few corals (and lots of aiptasia) mixed with some algea and red slime.

 

Before I start to stock it up again I figured I'd get rid of algea, slime and aiptasia. Peroxide looks like an option for the first two.

 

Just curious about what to look for in the peroxide though. What stabilizier is used in the peroxide you buy in the states? I prefer to not get one with a stabilizer that is harmful....

 

PS Yes, I'm also making sure that the tank is otherwise healthy. PO4, NO3 etc are basically zero. Ca and Alk are almost where I want it. Doing this the slow way and treating it pretty much like the start up of a new tank.

[albertthiel]

I'm about to "restart" a tank that has been sitting with little care and no liv estock. Still has a few corals (and lots of aiptasia) mixed with some algea and red slime.

 

Before I start to stock it up again I figured I'd get rid of algea, slime and aiptasia. Peroxide looks like an option for the first two.

 

Just curious about what to look for in the peroxide though. What stabilizier is used in the peroxide you buy in the states? I prefer to not get one with a stabilizer that is harmful....

 

PS Yes, I'm also making sure that the tank is otherwise healthy. PO4, NO3 etc are basically zero. Ca and Alk are almost where I want it. Doing this the slow way and treating it pretty much like the start up of a new tank.

 

There is a large thread on Peroxide here in this Forum in the Disease and Pest Treatment section where you can find a lot of information on how to use

 

Looking at a Bottle of it sold here in the US it says contains 3% Hydrogen Peroxide and Purified water. I cannot find a listing of anything else that is in the solution but there may be a stabilizer used like EDTA ...

[jahoban]

Has the peroxide method been used successfully on rhodactis mushrooms?

I have two amazing baby blue and orange rhodactis shrooms with a leafy red macro growing all over the rock they are mounted on and would like to get rid of it

 

Thanks

Jason

[brandon429]

Not specifically, but I bet its ok. Like all other treatments we think its best to not dip the rock/polyps as compared to the external spot treatment...lift out frag, apply straight 3% to the area/target a little bit at a time to keep the peroxide off the polyps. With a little precision application it will be fine, post pics!

[Nizztos]

There is a large thread on Peroxide here in this Forum in the Disease and Pest Treatment section where you can find a lot of information on how to use

 

Looking at a Bottle of it sold here in the US it says contains 3% Hydrogen Peroxide and Purified water. I cannot find a listing of anything else that is in the solution but there may be a stabilizer used like EDTA ...

 

 

Thanks.

 

Here there are pretty much always a stabilizer in peroxide. Don't think it is even possible to get it without it. One of the stabilizers used is acetofenetidin which I think might be considered harmful. Hence my question.

Usually hard to find out what stabilizer is used as it is not always listed though.

[brandon429]

Food grade is free of them. The 3% off the shelf regardless of stabilizers has not been harmful outside of the scope of treatment.

[Joe Pusdesris]

Peroxide is an inducer of pedal fission in mushroom corallimorphs

Over time with constant exposure they seem to reproduce out of stress...could be helpful in aquaculture settings.

 

Interesting. Do you have anywhere else I can read about this?

[brandon429]

Nope we are making most if not all of the present documentation on peroxide here and at reef central

 

I wish there was more to read, try to google anything. we'd be stabbing less in the dark if someone had paved the way earlier lol

 

 

in my tank its a notable growth inducer, and I mean notable. From 2007 to 2010 1/2 I had one single red mushroom down low in the tank I couldn't get to with fire to zap, he stayed there alone for years. Once I started peroxide dosing in other areas of the tank he split into two/three

 

then in my most recent video in my youtube list called 35% peroxide in the pico reef it shows me actually dousing the mushroom directly, with undiluted 35%. freakishly strong stuff. make you permanently blind instantly with no recourse if you get it in your eye strong...

 

 

the mushrooms are totally immune to it

 

absolutely fascinating. They don't have dermal layers like we do so Id guess them to be more easily burned, and this stuff can burn the crap out of our stratum corneum etc in two seconds, yet that video shows a frothing mushroom and then couple weeks later it splits into four and the treated mushroom is bigger.

 

The genetic complements that allow certain marine animals to tolerate hideous levels of peroxide never found in nature is truly fascinating, I have no idea how it works. Based on general readings they might have some heritable gifting if they naturally produce peroxide in metabolic pathways like a majority of photosynthesizing creatures, land or marine. some of the dismutases or catalases are sufficient to even prevent a 35% burn even though that would never be found in nature.

 

I bet someone will do formal studies after we create a movement with a bazillion people using it...but in the meantime, what you are reading is the startup of the peroxide revolution lol however long thats destined to last heh

Edited August 25, 2012 by brandon429

[Joe Pusdesris]

Has anyone else observed this on mushrooms? Anyone on reefcentral? I tend to experiment on my tanks a lot and decided to try it earlier today as I read that post. I don't really find the algae killing bit terribly interesting, but a mushroom growth stimulant.. Wow, that could be incredible.

 

I tried it on a rock with a few small blue mushrooms. They spit their guts out for a few minutes, and now seem to have bubbles inside of them, but other than that I see no ill effects. I prize the xenia in my tank, but I don't think there was enough on this rock to affect them.

 

This is making me wonder about sodium percarbonate and other chlorine free bleaches. I suppose if peroxide is cheap and effective, not much reason to try the others. Hmm....

[brandon429]

I have no idea! but let me know what you find. I also don't know if a one off treatment will work, maybe it will.

 

 

per gallon there isn't a tank on this planet that gets more peroxide input than mine, sometimes I overdo it just to see how the animals will continually adapt. this constant barrage of poweroxygenliquid is somehow sensitizing my mushrooms I think it will be interesting to see how it compares to a treatment like yours where they get the initial zap and then maybe a few follow ups.

 

if I had money to blow and could experiment w this is a real corallimorph pedal laceration/asexual budding booster Id set up several shallow tanks with my favorite mushroom variants and begin dosing the whole tank weekly with whatever guesstimate amount. Id compare that in 3 months to an undosed tank of similar variants

 

Mine don't even extrude the mesenteries anymore, but they did in the beginning. Now they are just like bring it on and get me some pretzels beyotch while you are at it.

Edited August 25, 2012 by brandon429

[Joe Pusdesris]

I remember reading from garf and other sources which I do not consider reputable that mushrooms in particular are very sensitive to the strain of zooxanthellae which lives in them. Apparently wild mushrooms will not grow well under artificial lights for a year or more until the proper strain becomes dominant. The peroxide can act to kill weak zooxanthellae.

 

I don't know if that theory holds water. I always assumed garf was wrong and the reason that the reasons mushrooms randomly thrived in some tanks was a result of metals in the water. It is well documented that mushrooms will naturally thrive in water with metals where other corals will die. This has been observed around ship wrecks and by academics in the lab if I remember correctly.

 

If I like the trial results, perhaps I will set up an experimental 10 gallon or 2. I would love to do a follow on to my xenia reef with a mushroom one.

[Joe Pusdesris]

Here is one of the examples I was referring to. Maybe I will compare a tank with peroxide to a tank with a few rusty nails.

 

http://www.marine-conservation.org/media/f...tsheet2013_.pdf

[brandon429]

ok thats neat if I had to brainstorm further on the metals aspect it might be this. TMZ is a really smart chemist that posts in Randy's Chem forum on RC. he's unrelenting that systemic dosing of peroxide, even though we got a thousand people doing it now with pics, is cleaving metals out of ligand complexes/ and all kinds of chemist speak...ie its bad. He says the peroxide acts on organic complexes to cleave them and it frees up metal ions in solution and this must be bad even though all our photographs don't show dead corals, I don't really know enough to battle him at that level I just speak for the pics weve collected

 

 

but if metals are being liberated, and all these corals can indeed deal with it which is why we aren't getting mass death, perhaps thats the actual booster aspect for the corallimorphs if you've read they like metal.

 

I've asked both him and Randy Holmes-Farley if there are specific ways to measure these impacts and they say no, and they remain against applying to a full tank

 

to me its a thousand pictures showing something repetitive, statistically significant enough to press further

Edited August 25, 2012 by brandon429

[Joe Pusdesris]

Interesting!

 

If I do the experiment, I will probably put it on RC under corallimorphs. I wouldn't have time until after I move in a few weeks. I also did put up that recovery thread I mentioned I would do in another thread under soft corals on RC. It is just too much work to update multiple forums. I didn't have much hair algae, but there are a few other types of algae growing, which I still intend to kill the way I have done traditionally rather than with peroxide. After reading this thread, that confirms my decision since I really do like my xenia.

[Joe Pusdesris]

Also, this isn't totally new by the way. I remember when I was very small my dad would bleach coral skeletons when they got green, that was back before we got our first reef. But I think back then no one considered low dose, or even using a chlorine free bleach.

[albertthiel]

Has anyone else observed this on mushrooms? Anyone on reefcentral? I tend to experiment on my tanks a lot and decided to try it earlier today as I read that post. I don't really find the algae killing bit terribly interesting, but a mushroom growth stimulant.. Wow, that could be incredible.

 

I tried it on a rock with a few small blue mushrooms. They spit their guts out for a few minutes, and now seem to have bubbles inside of them, but other than that I see no ill effects. I prize the xenia in my tank, but I don't think there was enough on this rock to affect them.

 

This is making me wonder about sodium percarbonate and other chlorine free bleaches. I suppose if peroxide is cheap and effective, not much reason to try the others. Hmm....

 

Actually when mixed with water sodium percarbonate yields a mixture of hydrogen peroxide (which eventually decomposes to water and oxygen) and sodium carbonate. So even if you use that compound you are in reality using H2O2, but I do not know what the strength of the H2O2 is when the percarbonate decomposes.

[Joe Pusdesris]

Actually when mixed with water sodium percarbonate yields a mixture of hydrogen peroxide (which eventually decomposes to water and oxygen) and sodium carbonate. So even if you use that compound you are in reality using H2O2, but I do not know what the strength of the H2O2 is when the percarbonate decomposes.

 

Correct, though I think there are other chlorine free bleaches that do not do this. I was suggesting it because earlier there was mention of interest in a paste that can be used instead of the liquid.

[Joe Pusdesris]

I have no idea! but let me know what you find. I also don't know if a one off treatment will work, maybe it will.

 

 

per gallon there isn't a tank on this planet that gets more peroxide input than mine, sometimes I overdo it just to see how the animals will continually adapt. this constant barrage of poweroxygenliquid is somehow sensitizing my mushrooms I think it will be interesting to see how it compares to a treatment like yours where they get the initial zap and then maybe a few follow ups.

 

if I had money to blow and could experiment w this is a real corallimorph pedal laceration/asexual budding booster Id set up several shallow tanks with my favorite mushroom variants and begin dosing the whole tank weekly with whatever guesstimate amount. Id compare that in 3 months to an undosed tank of similar variants

 

Mine don't even extrude the mesenteries anymore, but they did in the beginning. Now they are just like bring it on and get me some pretzels beyotch while you are at it.

 

 

I am really quite impressed. It has been 1 day and 5 polyps has become 6... This seems to fast to be true! I am wondering if perhaps I didn't see the other polyp before... But I distinctly remember no polyps touching before and now there are two large polyps occupying the same space on the rock.

 

I also notice that Pollock in Post #603 had one mushroom become 2 in 3 days!

 

Unfortunately the rock is in a position that is quite difficult to photograph... My next trial will be more visible and I will get good pictures for that one.

 

I have also noticed the increase in herbivore interest. There were some small bits of caulerpa, and now both my long spine urchins and my new kole tang have been eating away at this rock. Both of these species are noted as not eating caulerpa...

 

This rock also has an extremely small xenia, like virtually all the rocks in my tank do. It has not died off yet, but I don't have much hope for it.

[slickwill613]

Wondering if anyone has dipped their lps with a 50/50 mix. I have a favia frag I can't treat without exposing the coral itself to the dip. Anyone have any experience dipping these?

[brandon429]

Why not just use any tool to dropper the peroxide onto the target and not get the coral wet? Can you post pics

 

I've yet to see a rock that was removable that couldn't be spot treated...its the ones left in tank that have to endure a whole treatment but i'm hoping your pics will show a way we can spot treat

[Joe Pusdesris]

Here is a day 0 and day 3 of that rock I mentioned. It is too bad I didn't clean the class before taking the day 0 picture... My xenia frag is still alive. O.o

 

From Neglect

 

From Neglect

Edited August 27, 2012 by Joe Pusdesris

[slickwill613]

Why not just use any tool to dropper the peroxide onto the target and not get the coral wet? Can you post pics

 

I've yet to see a rock that was removable that couldn't be spot treated...its the ones left in tank that have to endure a whole treatment but i'm hoping your pics will show a way we can spot treat

Work out of town mon to fri. so no pics. tried my best but I know I got some some on the coral flesh. It was still pissed when I left sunday night. Hope it does ok.

[metrokat]

Since peroxide has been so successful for me for pest algae, I thought I would try it on a patch of palys that I want to get rid of. I injected said palys with undiluted peroxide using a needle and syringe. Sadly Palys are immune.

[brandon429]

do you mean not immune and the peroxide melted them! or it didn't kill the algae?