My NIGHTMARE!

[Tamberav]

Peroxide will kill flatworms that get exposed to it. Some may hide deep in a crevice though but that is an issue with any dip. 

[Oldsalt01]

I've been thinking of adding a six-line wrasse. Do they eat flatties?

[Tamberav]

They should but also can mature into a mean fish. I was thinking about adding one someday as the last fish but am taking pre-cautions, got my clownfish a bubbletip. 

 

I have an 8line in a tank by himself and their personality is similar to a sixline and after 1 day in the tank he was trying to murder a goby that was there before him. A clown may fair better though since they are not so passive. Each fish is different too and juvi's should be peaceful but could mature into devil's.

 

Just warning ya, I understand the lure of this fish entirely. Just know that if it does not work, you may have remove the rock to catch him.

 

Also a 14g cube is generally considered too small for a sixline. My 8line is in a 10g though... so ya... he is being rehabilitated from a bad petco experience, then I need to figure out what to do with him. Maybe need a future frag tank to put him in...

[seabass]

Like Ray said, no need to worry about the clear flatworms.  A six line would probably eat them, but it's probably not the best fish for a 14 gallon tank.

[Tamberav]

Oh and if you ever want small cute inverts like porcelain crabs or pom pom crabs, sexy shrimp, or peterson shrimp, ect. Then definitely no to a sixline.

[Oldsalt01]

Well, maybe not. I've been also thinking about a BTA for my clowns and would love to get another porcelain crab to replace the one that died when my tank temps went into the low 70's. I love to watch them seine the water when they eat. Decision made! Thanks.

[Oldsalt01]

I checked my water parameters this morning and still "0" for Nitrate's and Phosphates so am hoping I dodged the mini-cycle bullet. I'll wait until Friday but if my parameters keep staying at "0" I'm gonna trap out the Blenny and pop him back into the DT. I think I'll also add some 'pods before I add the fish. Been looking at night but don't see any. Going on-line tonight to look for a small BTA. Hope that will please the clowns. 

[seabass]

24 minutes ago, Oldsalt01 said:

Going on-line tonight to look for a small BTA.

I'd hold off for a few months.  Your clownfish will be fine without a host anemone for awhile.

[Oldsalt01]

23 minutes ago, seabass said:

I'd hold off for a few months.  Your clownfish will be fine without a host anemone for awhile.

Sure! Bust my bubble (tip).    Yah. Ur probably right. I should wait until the tank is stable.

 

[Oldsalt01]

This question is strictly for my own edification. Last night I was looking at the mushroom rock under uv/moonlight LED's when I noticed a small nem nestled in a crevice in the rock. Looking closer, I found a total of 7 spread across one face of the rock, the biggest being 1/4". I don't think they're Aptasia, although they are clear. But around the mouth there's a broken ring of florescent green and the tentacle tips are light iridescent blue. Do Aptasia normally floresce under UV? I tried to take pics this a.m. but am not happy with the results. Maybe tonight.

[seabass]

We might need a pic for an ID.  Aiptasia looks like this:

[Oldsalt01]

1 hour ago, seabass said:

We might need a pic for an ID.  Aiptasia looks like this:

Yah, they don't look anything like that. They're glass clear and actually quite beautiful. I'm pretty sure they're not Mojanos either. They do have long sweeper tentacles  for their size. They seem to retract a bit with the white lights on. I'll try to get a decent pic tonight with my macro if I can figure out my exposure settings. 

[RayWhisperer]

Try searching ball anemone

[Oldsalt01]

I will do that RayW. In the meantime, I managed to get some shots of them tonight both under white and under blue. Unfortunately, they're very small with very short stalks so the angle on them is not good, and the color under the blues washes out. But here they are, the best I could do.

 

 

[Oldsalt01]

3 hours ago, RayWhisperer said:

Try searching ball anemone

Spot on, RayW!!!! That's exactly what they are. I even found a pic on-line of an exact twin of mine. Apparently they're from the Pacific, don't move much if at all, won't get over 1/2" in diameter, and are fairly innocuous. I'll try feeding them tomorrow night when I feed my people eaters. Thanks

[Oldsalt01]

New water parameters; NO3: 0, NH3/4: 0, PO4: 0.5.  Are my phosphates a little high? I'd like to move the mushroom rock into the DT tonight, but if that reading is high I won't do it. Regardless, the Blenny's going in this weekend, after I dose some pods.

[RayWhisperer]

0.5 is a bit high. It won't phase the mushrooms, though. Ideally you want em down to around .002. However, with easy softies & LPS, I think .02 would be a good balance between enough nutrients to get growth, and keeping pest algae at bay.

[Oldsalt01]

I suspect high PO4 was why my previous set-up had so much nuisance algae and why the bubble algae absolutely exploded. Unfortunately I had a high range kit which kept showing "0" for PO4. So how do I get it down and keep it down?

[Tamberav]

I use phosphate remover, GFO when I had a reactor, phosguard but I ran out and am now using Xport PO4. They all seemed to work.

[seabass]

33 minutes ago, Oldsalt01 said:

Unfortunately I had a high range kit which kept showing "0" for PO4. So how do I get it down and keep it down?

It's actually a complicated topic.  A good low range phosphate kit is needed to monitor phosphate.  And like Ray mentioned, you don't want to get rid of it altogether because corals (or at least the symbiotic algae in corals) use it to produce energy (benefiting both health and growth).  Of course too much can lead to unwanted algae blooms.

 

So as part of how to keep them down, you should figure out what the cause might be.  Is it the source water, the rocks, or overfeeding?  I suspect it's leaching from your rocks.  If it is, it might be more difficult to get rid of.  A good test kit, like a Hanna ULR Phosphorus Checker, is a good tool when trying to determine the source.

 

I'd test the water first.  Then I'd put one of your rocks in a 5 gallon bucket, with 0 phosphate saltwater and a powerhead.  After a day or two, test the water in the bucket for phosphate.  If it's leaching a lot of phosphate, I would even consider replacing the rock.

 

A 100% water change will get rid of all of the phosphate in the water column.  Unfortunately, phosphate binds to calcium (in the rock and sand), so any phosphate bound to the rock and/or sand will start leaching back into the water.

 

PhosGuard is a popular reducing media that can be used in a HOB filter or back chambers of an AIO.  For those with a sump, a GFO reactor can be another method to reduce phosphate.  Then there are macro algae refugiums, carbon dosing, ATS, and dosing Kalkwasser.

[Oldsalt01]

58 minutes ago, seabass said:

It's actually a complicated topic.  A good low range phosphate kit is needed to monitor phosphate.  And like Ray mentioned, you don't want to get rid of it altogether because corals (or at least the symbiotic algae in corals) use it to produce energy (benefiting both health and growth).  Of course too much can lead to unwanted algae blooms.

 

So as part of how to keep them down, you should figure out what the cause might be.  Is it the source water, the rocks, or overfeeding?  I suspect it's leaching from your rocks.  If it is, it might be more difficult to get rid of.  A good test kit, like a Hanna ULR Phosphorus Checker, is a good tool when trying to determine the source.

 

I'd test the water first.  Then I'd put one of your rocks in a 5 gallon bucket, with 0 phosphate saltwater and a powerhead.  After a day or two, test the water in the bucket for phosphate.  If it's leaching a lot of phosphate, I would even consider replacing the rock.

 

A 100% water change will get rid of all of the phosphate in the water column.  Unfortunately, phosphate binds to calcium (in the rock and sand), so any phosphate bound to the rock and/or sand will start leaching back into the water.

 

PhosGuard is a popular reducing media that can be used in a HOB filter or back chambers of an AIO.  For those with a sump, a GFO reactor can be another method to reduce phosphate.  Then there are macro algae refugiums, carbon dosing, ATS, and dosing Kalkwasser.

I was running GFO but it didn't appear to be working although that was when I didn't have a low range kit. It also seemed to strip my Alk and Ca. I am considering a 'fuge with macro but not right now. Maybe I'll go to Phosban and see if that helps, at least temporarily. I don't have a reactor but I can put it in the second chamber in an eggcrate stand.

[RayWhisperer]

Gfo is touchy stuff. Too much and you'll strip cal and alk. Dosing won't even maintain it. It's always better to err on the side of caution and use too little. 

 

Ive never used the aluminium based stuff, but I suspect it'll do much the same.

 

 

[seabass]

12 minutes ago, Oldsalt01 said:

Maybe I'll go to Phosban and see if that helps

PhosBan is GFO.

 

PhosGuard is the aluminum based stuff that Ray referred to.  I'm pretty sure that it doesn't affect alkalinity as GFO does.

[Tamberav]

Did you use a reactor with the GFO? I would think the passive stuff wouldn't be as aggressive. I stopped using GFO because even in the reactor, it was dusty. 

 

I find Phosguard to work great but it strips PO4 faster than GFO so you need to be careful with it when you have corals and don't add too much. I had to change it more often too. I used it after my initial tank set up to quickly strip all the PO4 left over from decaying organics then swapped to XPORT. Xport probably works just like GFO but I run it passively, have not seen any issues with Ca/Alk but would suspect its possible if a person ran too much. I use test kits to keep it around 0.002. 

 

I am not saying XPORT is any better though, both worked for me. I swapped because I used up the rest of my Phosguard and still have XPORT left over from when I had a 75g. Phosguard is easier to measure for small tanks. 

 

 

 

 

[Oldsalt01]

2 hours ago, RayWhisperer said:

Gfo is touchy stuff. Too much and you'll strip cal and alk. Dosing won't even maintain it. It's always better to err on the side of caution and use too little.

 

 

It was definitely stripping my Alk/Can. The end result was I ended up over-due, but didn't know it until I cleaned out what little sand I had, last weekend, and discovered a white chalky precipitate underneath it. That's when the light went on!!!!! An Ah-Ha moment for sure. Now I have to decide between Xport and Phosguard. I'm a little leary of an aluminum based product simply because saltwater can corrode aluminum rather badly and that oxide has to go somewhere, like into the water column. Of course my weekly water changes (10-15%) may be sufficient to remove it. More research is indicated.