Eclipse 12 - Having Trouble....need advice

[metrokat]

Bump for updated pics, especially of that rose coral

This

[pufferboy]

Well, it has been some time since I posted. Here is where I am. To say that I need some help or assurance is an understatement. Let me know what you think. And, if you have answers to my questions, that would be great.

 

Why will he not open that much? He is in a high flow area, does that matter. I am currently trying to adjust him to the light.

 

I just added 12 snails and some crabs.....will they take care of the abundance of foliage?

 

Here is my favorite.

 

Like this guy too!

 

Green Mush waiting to be placed.

 

Some Nuc boys.....waiting as well.

 

More pics soon of my Porc Crab, Peppermint Shrimp, Scarlet Crabs, and Ricordia.

 

So, big questions are as follows.

 

1. I have three snails that have spent the last few days above the water line.....is there something wrong?

 

2. Too much algae? If so, what do I do?

 

3. Zoa won't open up......should I move them to less flow, or less light, feed them?

 

4. Is it possible to have too much live rock?

 

5. My shrimp and crab hide in this branching huge rock.....should i get rid of it, so I can see them? What would you do?

 

Thanks for your help. I am a noob!

[metrokat]

oh boy. you have a serious algae problem. I hope you ordered a whole pack from reefcleaners of the standard crew? I also see bryopsis which it a major PITA and very hard to get rid of. It needs immediate action. Did you get Astrea snails? Nerites?

 

There is a thread on here about hydrogen peroxide dips for bryopsis. I would take each rock, one at a time and cook it in the peroxide. As for the sand, pull out what you can by hand and right away.

 

Zoas can sometimes close for days, you could try an iodine dip, if you dont have iodine, try a fresh water (RO) dip for a couple of minutes to make sure any pests are gone. The frag looks cruddy.

 

If you got Astrea snails, they sometimes like to sit outside water, so do nerites, perfectly normal.

[pufferboy]

Metrokat help me some....and as many of you probably can see I have a major Bryopsis issue. I am doing the Peroxide dip. Did the first two rocks yesterday. I am using 1/8 cup of peroxide to one gallon of water. We will see how it goes.

[metrokat]

Any updates?

[pufferboy]

I have done a couple cleanings will give pictorial and process updates in a few days. In the meantime I have lost some friends.....my porcalain crab was killed when he hit builds a rock I was cleaning without knowing. A scarlet died shortly after introduction and a zoa never took. On a positive side I think we may have a solution to the bryopsis. Question of the day....my snails keep leaving the tank....I see people without tops, how do they keep them in? What do I do... I do not want my toddler eating escargo this early in life.

[metrokat]

lol. With the species that "leave" the tank, and go on unauthorized walks and vacations, and there are several species that do this, it is recommended to have a tank with a rim or lid.

If you cannot have a rim or lid, consider swapping them out at the LFS or selling/trading them for snails that like to stay in in the tank.

[FlCandy]

I have a few Certh Snails and they climb the glass but stay in the tank.

 

They and my little Blue Hermits completely wiped my tank clean of GHA in about a week. Then I thought I was in the clear but I had a water column algae bloom, which is now almost done! LMAO

 

Good luck, the Phosphates and Nitrates are not helping your situation either, are you running any Chaeto or GFO/Carbon anything? Need to step up the Water Changes I am doing 2 a week, one 10 gallon and then 2-3 days later a 5 gallon, so over the course of 2 weeks I change out 30 gallons of water in my 46 gallon tank. Nearly a 100% WC slowly over the course of 2 weeks has me looking at the last of those frequent changes for a while!

[ZandEDad]

I got bryopsis at the end of my cycle. All I had were a few snails and crabs so I dumped in Kent Tech M to raise the Mg - I didn't "dose" per the instructions, I just kept adding it until I saw a change. Killed off the bryopsis within days and it never came back. My snails, crabs and hitchikers all survived. Good luck

[redfishsc]

As far as I know there are only 2 ways to kill bryopsis and only 1 is guaranteed that is's actually permanently dead.

 

1) Kent Tech M

2) Bleach.

 

 

No joking really. I tore down an 80g system (3 tanks +sump and fuge) partly because of bryopsis. Even with super low nutrient levels (undetectable nitrate/phosphate on Salifert and Seachem kits).

 

 

Try the Tech M first. If that doesn't work, frag out any corals VERY CAUTIOUSLY while making sure you don't get even the first shard of bryo in your tank. THEN-- remove all animals, keeping same caution regarding bryo shards. Then, dump in bleach for a couple days worth of cooking. Rinse out 100% water change, hit with double-dose of dechlorinator, and then refill with new salt water and start over.

 

 

Please do not ever let anything from your tank be put in someone elses tank, that stuff is basically the AIDS of the reef keeping world---- nearly impossible to kill and when you give someone a frag that has it, it may only be a matter of time before the tank has to be tore down.

 

 

The occasional tang eats it, but not usually, and that's no good for you in your tank. No other commonly available cleanup crew or fish will eat it.

[pufferboy]

The Bryopsis War Recap....battle to me, war may not be over.

 

Well, here is the update. Done with the second cleaning and I am hoping this works. Thank you to all those that have helped me get past the Bryopsis invasion. The big question is "will it stick". This is what I did.

 

Step 1 - Get freaked out! (Did you see the picture on how bad it was?)

 

Step 2 - Ask smarter people than me. (Little less freaked out)

 

Step 3 - Take out about half of the rock. Spray with 70% peroxide heavy. Hit just the areas with the bryopsis. Cover things I wanted to protect....if I could. Do not spray entire rock if possible. Let it sit 3 to 4 minutes.

 

Step 4 - Dip in old water change water and pull up making bryopsis hang. Cut off as short as I can to limit die-off in tank.

 

Step 5 - Do a quick shake in the same water to remove any lose bryopsis and partially clean rocks of extra peroxide.

 

Step 6 - While rocks are out clean sand by hand and turkey baster.

 

Step 7 - Put everything back and wait. (as i am doing this accidently killed my Anemone Crab....my girls were not happy with me.)

 

Step 8 - Repeat Steps 1 through 7. This time dipped my intake, outtake, and heater.

 

We will see if it works. Will spot treat if something comes back.

Thanks again for those that have helped me. Maybe did this a little fast, but so far things seem stable.

 

Ok, now to the pics....Looking to identify....if you can help that would be great. Care tips are welcome.

 

Ok, Here is the new Clean Look

 

Best Crab in the Land (Halloween Crab)

 

Green Mushrooms Splitting and Hopefully will Grow

 

Green Polys, What do I feed them?

 

Have No Idea, Maybe a Blasto....came on the rock? Anyone?

 

Feel free to give me those ideas of how to best care for them. On a sad note, my peppermint shrimp and porcelain crab just hide all the time. Is that normal?

 

Hope you enjoy these pics.

[pufferboy]

I am going to wait a week or two then add some more frags. Question is....what should I get?

[Bill Nye]

Wow that is a lucky hitch hiker you have in the last pic. It looks like a mini mini anemone to me (stichodactyla tapetum). They split readily in aquariums so if all goes well youll have a bunch of them running (I guess crawling) around.

[brandon429]

that is one h of a clean up. Wow Im shocked. this is great for linking to the peroxide thread as one heck of a rehab run on a tank, its just like ReefMiser's reef which is the guy who started the peroxide thread.

 

 

reduction of the primary biomass is just as insulting as removing the nutrient in the water when dealing with plant pests of any kind I have seen. rather than wait for a slow return, I always like the quick rip change look how shockingly clean that is now!

[pufferboy]

Reefmiser is the guy who helped me....he was the brains behind most of it.

[brandon429]

what a great outcome for your tank I went ahead and linked it

 

isnt it nice to have total control over the tank, not having to stock this or that animal to eat it and wait weeks and weeks for it to re balance? pics look like a brand new tank.

[pufferboy]

what a great outcome for your tank I went ahead and linked it

 

isnt it nice to have total control over the tank, not having to stock this or that animal to eat it and wait weeks and weeks for it to re balance? pics look like a brand new tank.

 

Thanks for the encouragement. Hopefully this will take.

 

On a fun note, my peppermint shrimp are letting me feed them with the tweezers. Now, I may be a dork, but that is just plain fun!

[brandon429]

I agree it is cool. just the other day I saw a video of divers taking out their regulators underwater and opening up for tiny coral banded cleaners to poke around in their mouth, thats next level ~

[RooKi3]

Nice looking tank keep posting updates please!

[pufferboy]

I will, thanks for the encouragement. I am trying to figure out the best way to take pics

[Reef Miser]

That is an awesome turn around. It really is amazing that what would have certainly ended in frustration and possibly stopping the hobby could turn around so quickly.

 

Your tank is looking good. Thanks for posting the progress.

 

BTW, great idea about cutting the biomass off prior to replacing in the tank. You get to take the credit for that.

[pufferboy]

Thanks reefmiser.

[pufferboy]

Well, all is not good in the tank my friends. I see signs of algae growth. To be honest, I don't understand. Perams are good. Nites are low. A have a smaller but active cleaning crew. I am running both Puregen and ChemiPure. UGGGGGGGGG!!!! Talk to me people, why so much green?

[brandon429]

not a problem. now your growth is under control and normal for your size tank. post more pics of the regrowth.

 

 

algae belongs in our tanks at any nutrient level, its one of the most adaptive life forms on the reef. One treatment of anything won't keep it at bay, its ongoing however you choose to approach it. You are either removing the biomass or spending time trying to slow regrowth or both, its a cycle. algae spores and cyano spores come in from the air in your room as well, its truly never ending.

 

Bryopsis however isn't ubiquitous like that, once you kill the holdfasts it will be gone until your next frag imports a new round.

 

 

Plus its your first treatment. Ive been using it for 6 months and its still occasionally required for maintenance, have done about 5 different spot treatments to hit my problem spots. its far preferable to any method of algae control ive ever seen.

 

remember that in months of doing nothing effective to the algae holdfasts, spores, fragments etc were cast into your rock, its the normal life cycle of anything in our tanks. One treatment rarely removes all progenerative bits, this is all very normal what you've posted.

 

If it was me, Id take the rocks back out and direct spot treat, wait three mins, rinse and reinstall. Repeat as needed. your work load will lessen in time as you get at the last pieces of mass left in the tank. if you dont want to use peroxide, there's always the trusty clean up crew that has let millions of people down on internet posts.

 

You can hook up a GFO filter and strip your water of all measurable phosphorous if you'd like, that'll work too you'll just have a new item to maintain. I find peroxide occasionally much easier but if I ever get a tank larger than the palm of my hand I could see using GFO, peroxide and UV light because I hate algae that bad!

[tylernt]

Supposedly, nitrates, phosphates, etc can permeate your live rock. If the algae is growing on your rock, it can access those nutrients before the Purigen can remove it.

 

You may need to go through a few cycles of physical algae removal until your rock is exhausted.