"Half baked..." hmmm, that sounds like a mental state from the earlier years.
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Bob, don't go gettin' your poop in a group...
This lava rock issue seemed to hit a nerve. I'm doin' the process of elimination thing. I have with this tank for close to a year and a half. Obviously, I'm going the slower of the two processes available. Nuke it with bleach...?
. That too is simply treating the symptoms, not the cause. However, I value the suggestion. I gather suggestions when I no longer know what to do and make an educated guess from that. Clean-up crew. Yes it helps to control but it is not a must in my opinion. Again, treating the symptoms. My 60g has two snails and 5 crabs. They do very little I think.
Carbon has been mentioned and experimented with. Mechanical pre-filter is changed every second day. Dosed kalc for two months. Coraline increased niceley but cannot compete. I'm skimming, but just "moderately" as it's a small skimmer. I've scrubbed this crap of and gave enough blood in the process to make the Red Cross envious...
Phosphates and nitrates are the same as the 60g. Minimal to nil. I figured perhaps the evil nutrient must either be Iron or silicate. Only the 90g has lava rock so thats where I conjured up a suspision Iron may be leaching...
Over the past year, I have removed "artificial" bio-filtration. (bio-balls & Fluval 404). That should have been beneficial given all the rock I presumed. I'm goona' try this: Get the foams for the fluval established in the sump for a few weeks. Run the Fluval for bio-filtration. Pull
all the rocks. Lava rock will go into storage. Live rock will be subjected to darkness for two(?) weeks in rubbermaids,(warm & wet). Hmmm, another state of mind from earlier years
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"honey, where's the Band-Aids..."
