DrGibbys 10g shutting them down :(

[drgibby]

So i did an experiment to see if i could help get the algae under better control. I turned the lights off for 3 days. Didn't seem to make a difference at all. Also i bought a thermometer to see if my temp was correct as im only trusting my cobalt neotherm heater. which says its around 78-80. The temperature on the standard thermometer was 84. Now i don't know which one to trust.

 

On a side note my tailspot blenny loves mysis .... wish he would just eat all the lovely algae in the tank.

[dferrari13]

My blenny eats algae which is weird but cool

[drgibby]

My blenny eats algae which is weird but cool

They are suppose to eat algae! They are herbivores. Mines the oddball

[teenyreef]

Do you have any hermit crabs or emerald crabs? It's hard to say what will work best without knowing what kind of algae it is. My tsb likes algae but I don't think he would eat enough of it to qualify as a clean up crew member

 

On the temperature, pick up a cheap digital one just to have a third point of comparison. Hopefully two will agree and you can ignore the third. Generally, the neotherm's are pretty accurate.

[drgibby]

Do you have any hermit crabs or emerald crabs? It's hard to say what will work best without knowing what kind of algae it is. My tsb likes algae but I don't think he would eat enough of it to qualify as a clean up crew member

 

On the temperature, pick up a cheap digital one just to have a third point of comparison. Hopefully two will agree and you can ignore the third. Generally, the neotherm's are pretty accurate.

My tank would be qualified as an all you can eat buffet for my tsb. I currently have 4-6 blue legged hermits plus a standard 10 cut from reef cleaners and 2 Mexican turbo snails. I post a picture of the forest of green when I get one

 

Here is a picture taken last night with lime at 100 and blue at 100 so you can see

20160509_210705 by drgibby, on Flickr

 

20160509_210700 by drgibby, on Flickr

[drgibby]

So its been a week since update. This is normal yes but a lot has happened in those 6 days. For starters i decided i was sick of the algae and wanted it gone. so i thought i would try to scrub some off of the rocks in the more heavily covered areas. It was going fine until I bumped my rocks and knocked it over. I took out some rock then to try and fix it and ended up dropping one all the way to the floor and shattered it . It was late at night and i should have known better to start that project then so i threw everything back in and said i would fix it later.

 

3 days later i took on the task. I took out 3 gallons of water for some room to work around and dug at it. I ended up taking out 3 smaller rocks and moved some corals around. Its good enough for now. I will post a picture at the end of this post.

 

I ordered some frag racks from ocean box and they are great. one broke in shipping but was promptly replaced.

 

lastly i picked up some new frags which i am very happy about. Ok here you go the part everyone wants!

[

 

FTS 5/15/16

[drgibby]

So where to start. I added gfo to help with the phosphates which measured .1ppm. I also added an mp10 which everything in the tank is liking the extra flow but the frogspawn.

 

That leads to my delima what to do with the frogspawn... do i try to find a lower flow area which would be really difficult or do i frag it sell the pieces and get a new piece of something that can tolerate flow.

[teenyreef]

Or you could frag it, sell all but one of the pieces, and put the little piece in a different spot in your tank with lower flow

[drgibby]

So i will post pictures later but for now I have a random acan and a bowerbanki on the sand next to each other. The acan is puffy and happy but the bowerbanki is not. I was reading somewhere that they don't get puffy? Is that true. Hopefully some experienced reefer can come drop some knowledge.

[drgibby]

Heres some pictures.. You can see how the acan on the right looks nice and puffy but the left bowerbanki still looks hard

 

Also since we went to the Newport aquarium this weekend here are a few of my favorite shots.

[drgibby]

So i guess things will be ok so i will share my embarrassing story.. i decided the frogspawn was a monster and was shading the monti to much and it wasn't getting enough light. I decided to frag on of the heads. I pulled out my felt where it was harder and changing color. and cut him. Well i think i should have used a saw because while cutting i think i cracked the skeleton and everything was very loose and was starting to crumble. so i grabbed some putty rolled it in a ball flattened it out and made a quick cast. I applied glue and all for quicker bonding and holding. It looked very sad heres a pick of it in its cast and the old piece

20160530_160541_001 by drgibby, on Flickr

 

Today they are both looking much better getting puffy and spreading out. Here is a top down shot

20160607_114225 by drgibby, on Flickr

 

And the monti i did this to save is looking much more green then ever!! In the end i think i should have waited a bit longer to cut it or cut it with a saw of sometype. im happy to save the frag but it looks so ugly with that plaster putty stock. maybe sometime ill get the curage to trim it...

20160607_114231 by drgibby, on Flickr

[Droy008]

Yay, looks like everything is back on track!

I know how trying algae can be.

Unfortunately it can take people out of the hobby due to its persistents.

I'm happy to see you stuck with it.

Also your scape looks great! Even with the rock "accident" it looks great in there.

[drgibby]

Im not out of the algae issue yet. im just more diligent about blowing off rocks and pulling stuff out. I have added an MP10 for flow, GFO to reduce phosphates and 3 small astrae turbo snails. Yes i know that the rule of thumb is 1 per 10g but i wanted this gone and will give 2 away when its under control. I have also thought about adding a nudi branch but haven't done enough research on it yet to be ok with it. Still fighting the good battle though..

 

I wish the cyano would go away though the red algae irritates me..

[drgibby]

Im still fighting algae i have turned up the flow now on the MP10 to about 40% and added 2 mexican turbos.. lets see the crabs eat them..

 

The random acan and bowerbanki are doing great this is them after feeding.

20160622_113819 by drgibby, on Flickr

 

Heres a FTS Look at that green in the acan!

 

20160622_091004 by drgibby, on Flickr

[teenyreef]

That FTS looks great, I really like the scape! Good luck with the algae, don't get discouraged and keep up with what you're doing

[dferrari13]

I agree with teeny....keep up the fight....I'm having a Cyano outbreak myself...proly due to being without a skimmer for two or three months ( mine broke and it took Innovative Marine a long time to send me a replacement)

I just keep sucking it out with a turkey batter everyday (with the ATO shut off ofcourse to not effect the salinity and then topping off with saltwater) and I'm doing 30% water changes every Sunday and it seems to be dieing off...I'm also wondering if my use of reed energy has anything to do this the outbreak

[drgibby]

Yeah my algae is a mixture of hair and cyano where the flow isn't that good. Ill keep battling but man its frustrating. especially when all the tests come back negative for po4 and nitrates. I figure they are negative just because the algae has been consuming them. Im running mechanical GFO but i wish i knew it was working.

[HarryPotter]

Yeah my algae is a mixture of hair and cyano where the flow isn't that good. Ill keep battling but man its frustrating. especially when all the tests come back negative for po4 and nitrates. I figure they are negative just because the algae has been consuming them. Im running mechanical GFO but i wish i knew it was working.

Over feeding? Maybe you mentioned it before but where are your rocks from?

[drgibby]

Over feeding? Maybe you mentioned it before but where are your rocks from?

I have been only feeding once a day. just frozen mysis. I do reef roids once a week spot feeding. I worry about the bioload being to high. I have 2 clowns and a tailspot blenny and of course the snails and blue legged hermits.

 

The rocks were all dry rock from reefcleaners.

[drgibby]

Where to start.... i guess i can start by saying it was my fault and i should have been more patient. I caused a crash this weekend on Saturday in my 10. I noticed that both of the margarita snails hadn't moved for a week so i decided to pry my hands into the tank and see if they were alive. Well as i picked them up they basically melted and so much black gunk and stank poured out of them. It was a very noxious smell and i did my best to not pour it into the tank but flip the snail and discard them. I figured i would then go and do a 2 gallon water change to combat the excess waste because i was noticing more algae which i just cant stand.

 

Did the water change and while i was sitting there looking at all that waving algae i decided to go do some research on how to eradicate it. I decided on peroxide. So i took out some rocks did peroxide on them and put them back in. the algae was bubbling and dying off and i thought i was going to at least slow down and win this fight.

 

Turns out i killed a lot more then the algae. Im not entirely sure what happened whether it was just to much dieing off at once or the to much peroxide leached into the water but im almost positive i killed off the monticap, my letpo, and bowerbanki acan. The zoas were tightly closed and haven't done much since. Im so angry at myself for doing this to the tank because the corals were all doing great but i couldn't let that algae live.

 

Anyway i have taken what frags i could get lose from that tank and moved them into the 4g as a rescue. All are doing well except the bowerbanki which melted away. The rics are recovering well and all those zoas have opened.

 

In the 10g the frogspawn is tightly closed, the monti is a grayish and the lepto is well just bad. On sunday i did another gallon water change and replaced all the media.

 

Later in the day some of the zoas opened up in the tank so i think things are more stable.

 

Oh and i cleaned my skimmer after the crash which needed to be done anyway

 

I hate posting these pictures but needs to be done..

Here is a picture of the tank right after the peroxide you can see the bowerbanki starting to melt. I wish i would have pulled it and rinsed it quicker might have saved it.

 

20160625_094753 by drgibby, on Flickr

 

The monti and lepto on sunday

20160626_165504 by drgibby, on Flickr

 

my clean skimmer is good..

20160625_094734 by drgibby, on Flickr

 

Im confused as to why the fish were never affected but they seem to be just fine and never once showed like something was happening.

 

and since i was in a grumpy mood all weekend i can thank my kitties for trying to cheer me up.

20160626_214920 by drgibby, on Flickr

20160625_111741 by drgibby, on Flickr

[teenyreef]

Oh no! I'm so sorry to hear about the crash

 

Your zoas should recover, they can handle a lot of peroxide. SPS, especially acros and montis, are very sensitive to peroxide, though. Hopefully the frogspawn will recover! I'm glad the kitties are cheering you up, those are some cute pictures

[ReefWeeds]

Oh I'm so sorry to hear about the crash HolyCarp had something similar happen I think.

 

I agree with teeny - those cats and the photos are adorable!

[Droy008]

Noooooo. I'm so sorry.

 

Don't be discouraged by this incident, just learn and move forward.

 

I look forward to seeing the recovery pics, I imagine they'll be up shortly.

[drgibby]

Noooooo. I'm so sorry.

 

Don't be discouraged by this incident, just learn and move forward.

 

I look forward to seeing the recovery pics, I imagine they'll be up shortly.

 

Oh no! I'm so sorry to hear about the crash

 

Your zoas should recover, they can handle a lot of peroxide. SPS, especially acros and montis, are very sensitive to peroxide, though. Hopefully the frogspawn will recover! I'm glad the kitties are cheering you up, those are some cute pictures

 

Oh I'm so sorry to hear about the crash HolyCarp had something similar happen I think.

 

I agree with teeny - those cats and the photos are adorable!

 

Thanks guys everything i pulled from the 10 seems to be doing great in the 4 so im very happy. The monti still is very pale and if i was guessing id guess its dead but ill give it some time to see if it colors back up. The lepto still has the slightest bit of color so its a toss up. 2 of the three zoas left in the tank have opened so im guessing things are stabilizing up. the GSP is still closed. Frogspawn looks ok.

 

I have not totally given up on this tank but i will be changing scap slightly moving the mp10 and rearranging placement. i think im going to make this more into an sps tank with those random zoas in it still. Im going to basically let it sit for a month or so to do another soft cycle i have no doubt when i dosed i probably killed a lot of good bacteria to. so ill do a fish in cycle and keep an eye on parameters. Also nothing more is going in this tank until i know i can keep it algae free and dont have the temptation hit me again. Great news is there is very little algae in it already and the sand is spotless.

 

I love my kitties.. there more like dogs to be honest. Heres a picture of the 4g so you can see how things are doing

20160627_112351 by drgibby, on Flickr

[drgibby]

Water change day on the road to recovery. I think the monti is dead someone feel free to chime in so i know for sure. Gray in color no green sighted. The GSP has has some polyps poke out not as flourishing as it has been but good none the less. all zoas are out and about, and the frogspawn seems to be ok. I have changed the scape and moved what was in there around. will continue to wait and see what happens with it

20160629_105353 by drgibby, on Flickr