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Thread: Algae take over!

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    Algae take over!

    Man, I had this tank for about two years and just recently I bought this new lamp fixture that holds T-5's, 5ft long with 4 - 80W bulbs. Right when I plugged in the new lights, this algae took over the whole aquarium.

    Before I got this new fixture my aquarium had really bad lighting for about two months that barely lit the tank. The algae has been in my tank for like three months now and I have no idea how to get it out. Another reason why I think it's the lighting is because if you flip the rocks, you can see absolutely no algae under them or where light is not showing.

    The problem is, is that I still have a yellow tang, and a sail fin that somehow managed to stay alive lol.. And some corals that are kick'n. I was wondering if I could get some help here.. Would I need to shut off the lights for a long period of time? Any kind of help would be appreciated, thanks!

    It also seems to be really foggy in the aquarium after I turn off lights for a day.
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    Crispy Reef Monkey **MOD** Phurst's Avatar
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    If you turn off the lights to kill the algae, it's just going to come back when you turn them back on. I'm sure the huge increase in lighting is whats causing it to grow faster that it was before. The long and the short of it is, algae comes from execs nutrients. Tell us about your setup and water quality. What gear are you running? How big is the tank? Using a skimmer? Using RO/DI water? What do your water tests show? How often and how much do you feed? How often do you do water changes and how much do you change? Algae outbreaks suck, but they can be resolved.
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    Ok I just did a water test, but these results are a lot higher than two weeks ago:
    Nitrite: 0.25 ppm mg/L (0.0 - 5.0)
    Ammonia: 0.25 ppm mg/L (0.0 - 8.0)
    Nitrate: 20.0 ppm mg/L (0.0 - 160)
    High Range pH: 8.4 (7.4 - 8.8)

    Salinity: 27 ppt
    Tank: 125 gal

    The only gear that I have is a skimmer inside a sump, it's actually like half a sump lol..
    It's a MSX-200 skimmer with an italian made Sicce PSK-2500 pump, and I think its meant to filter like a 200 gal aquarium if I'm not wrong.

    Setup: I have a 25 gallon tank under the aquarium that the water goes into, gets filtered by the skimmer, then goes back up. And I have like 4 power heads that make the tank spin counter-clock wise and that's it. :/

    I have no idea what RO/DI water is. I feed the fish a cube of brine shrimp every morning, and try to keep seaweed on a clip. I don't do much water changes either.

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    Crispy Reef Monkey **MOD** Phurst's Avatar
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    What size is your main tank, and what do you have in it (fish, inverts, cleanup crew, etc). I think we can look at a couple of things here already. Your nitrates are high, and that's contributing significantly to the problem. You don't list your phosphate readings, but I'm betting they're high as well. A cube of brine, plus nori every day is a good bit of food. it will of course depend on how big your tank is, and what's living in it, but it's very easy to overfeed. Excess food rots and creates ammonia, then nitrite, then nitrates. You say you don't know what RO/DI water is, so that leads me to believe you are probably using tap water to top off your tank, and to mix up new salt water. This is a definite no no. Tap water has all kinds of crap in it that is bad for your animals, but really got for growing algae. RO/DI units are not the cheapest things in the world, but they're worth their weight in gold as far as producing very pure water to use in your tank. Few water changes is also a contributing factor. Wastes build up in the tank water, and the only way they are removed is through water changes. idealy you'll want to do a 10%-20% water change every week. This helps remove built up waste, dilutes the waste still in the water, and replenishes trace elements in the water your animals need. A mature, properly functioning tank should show no ammonia or nitrite. Something is up here...
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    http://cgi.ebay.com/REVERSE-OSMOSIS-...item4152aadaf3

    Not too bad for a starter RODI. How are you making your water or do you buy from LFS.

    What do you have in your clean up crew? You can back of the lighting for a while, but depending on what it is, you need a clean up crew to slowly munch away. What are your phosphate levels?
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    It would be helpful to pull the algae if you can. That will export the nutrients that it is taking up. The cloudiness is probably from algae dying off. Then when it dies it releases the nutrients it has sequestered back into the tank. You have a 125 gallon tank, right? Do you just have the 2 fish? How big are they? What inverts and corals do you have in it?

    The other thing that I see is that your salinity is pretty low. Usually you want to run it at 35ppm.
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    Also, what are you using to test the salinity? I recommend a refractometer. Much easier than the hydrometers and less likely to be wrong. http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trk...All-Categories
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    Sorry wasn't able to reply for a while hehe. Well I get my water from the grocery store from this big water purification system thing, but I do use tap water sometimes :/ Yea it's a 125 gallon tank, and I don't know what the Phosphate levels are.

    My clean up crew is like 3 snails lol.. I use to have a Goby but it died and now I have a Sailfin which is like 6 inches and a yellow tank that id say is about 4-5 inches. I couldn't tell you exactly what corals I have, I got two leather coral. This fire looking coral which is just about dead. And the one's in the picture, and some mushroom coral.

    I'm gonna have to buy more salt so that I can do them water changes. What if I pull some rocks out that don't have any coral on them and like power wash them down?

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    First thing is you need to buy an RODI unit and start making water yourself (ebay link above). You need to get a test kit for all the basics ( http://www.petsolutions.com/API-Reef...13402+C46.aspx ) What I have but others have different preferences. The main concern is to get all the tests that are in this kit regardless of brand. Stay away from "Strips". Once you have the test kit, check your levels then start changing water. 10 to 20% every week for a while to take out the phosphate load you likely have. You have to be careful about taking out the rock. You lose significant bio filtration when you do that, but it may survive. You can power wash but the "roots" will still be there. Depending on what it is, you may have to boil it off or let it completely dry to die out. Also, need to drop in a bag of PhosBan or similar product to help maintain phosphate levels. Have that in the water flow to make sure the water is moving over if not getting a reactor. You need to load up on hermits and snails. Some people say 1 snail & hermit per gallon. Regarding the "cloudy" water when you turn off the lights. I think your tank is doing a crash diet so very bad, spore release. So every time you turn the lights off for a while and it clouds up, the algea is doing a last ditch survival mech and releasing spores making the situation worse. Plus the die off is creating more nutrients in the water. So it will need to be starved and eaten at the same time. If you see it cloud up, do a significant water change to get those spores out of the water.

    Now, on the lights, what brand is the fixture and what are the bulbs? (10000K/6000K/Actinic(420/460nm)?) The wrong lights will produce the wrong growth. Also, what is the lighting schedule. you may want to pull back without doing full days off. say 6 hours rather than 8. Drop by 15 minutes each day for a week or two and see how that changes things. Hopefully without the spore release.

    Anyway, RODI & tests. Start changing out the water. Load up with Hermits and maybe 4 or 5 emeralds. Maybe 20 hermits and 2 Emeralds every 4 days until you get your desired number. Get some turbo snails for the glass. Some people think snails and crabs add essentially no bio load while others do. But get them in there to start munching away. I would only say take it slowly to watch the number you get and their progress so you do not over load and end up with tons of dead crabs. On the fish, if you have only 2, then you are likely overfeeding. How much do they eat and how much is "lost" in the tank. You may want to step back on the food and make sure that what you feed is eaten and at that, feed twice a day if not already but in smaller amounts to make sure no food is left. If they eat it all real fast, then increase but be careful to not have left overs. Oh, on that note, get a brittle star and see if your LFS has micro stars they can provide. The brittle will help with the excess food. Anyway, that should be enough of a shopping list for the weekend.

    RODI
    Refractometer
    Reef Test kit (Ammonia 2part test, Nitrate, Nitrite, Phosphate, Calcium Carbonate, PH, KH)
    20-30 Hermit crabs
    2-4 Emerald crabs
    PhosBan/Pura Phoslock
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    Alright here's the new lighting system that I got.

    Fixture: 60 Inch 4x80W Sunlight Supply Tek Light High Output Fluorescent Lighting Fixture

    Bulbs: 2x D-D Giesemann Powerchrome AquaBlue+ 80W 60 inch T5 High Output Fluorescent Lamp
    - 60:40 combination of 6000K and 22000K (approx) phosphor blend

    2x D-D Giesemann Powerchrome Actinc+ T5 High Output Fluorescent Lamp
    - 60:40 combination of deep blue and actinic

    I had all four of them working together, and now I've only been leaving on the two Actinic+ bulbs on during the day for the last 5 months.

    http://www.marinedepot.com/D_D_Giese...BUT5HO-vi.html

    http://www.marinedepot.com/D_D_Giese...BUT5HO-vi.html

    http://www.marinedepot.com/60_Inch_4...FIT5SI-vi.html


    http://www.theaquariumsolution.com/t...erchrome-bulbs
    http://www.theaquariumsolution.com/t...erchrome-bulbs

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    Grand Master Reefer CarmieJo's Avatar
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    If you have a TDS meter you can test the water from the grocery. It is probably RO water and is MUCH better than using tap water. But I think that an RO/DI system of your own would pay for itself in a short time. Here is a good article on RO/DI http://www.talkingreef.com/forums/co...st-Episode-106
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    Alright, I'm definitely gonna get a an RO/DI system, and the tank is looking a lot better for some reason lol.. But im not gonna take any chances, so I'm gonna get like 20 snails and 20 hermit craps for the aquarium. And I think I already have a phosban. i'm gonna have to check that out. Well thanks for the help!

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    I have hermits in my tanks because they are fun to watch but I don't think that they are good for algae control. Despite what the vendors say all the kinds I've ever had are scavengers and studiously ignore algae.
    Carmie


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