LF Skimmer Advice

[Aquattro]

Originally Posted by jostafew

Sorry Brad, just want to make sure that I understand. Are you suggesting that I just increase the water changes or also change the skimmer for something else?

I would A, increase water changes just as a practice. B, I would consider bigger water changes to make up for poorer performance from the skimmer. Honestly, I found the biggest thing you can do to fix almost anything is change water. Some exceptions, but in your case, I'd be doing some 50% changes.

[reef-keeper]

I have just a quick question.... Have you been testing your water parameters to see if everything is within the desired levels? If you have how often and did you record it? Recording just show when everything went Ka-flewie and can set you on the right path.

[jostafew]

Hey Reefkeeper, here's a rundown of the mess

Back when the DT was 70 gal and I had less nuisance issues (aside from the dino) and was growing LPS and SPS and my clam was happy I was watching params every 2-4 weeks and working on methods to maintain them, usual reef keeping stuff. Then over the course of a year things started to go sideways, water changes weren't helping, livestock suffered... I downsized the DT to 35 gal to get more light for the clam. Shortly afterward we sold the condo, so I picked everything up and moved in with my mom in Abby while we waited to take possession of the house. By this point pretty much all livestock was gone, and most corals. It was at this point that I finally nailed down the cause of the illness as a bad batch of salt, but by that time it was too late. It seems extremely obvious to test the new water being put into the tank, but you just take it for granted that fresh RO water with salt = AOK... Won't make that mistake again.

Month or so later we moved into the house and set up as it is now. As part of the previous troubleshooting I was now on 100% new water and new sand (same LR). It was at this point that the nuisance problems started to get bad but I didn't have the time or the funds to do much about it. The one thing I could attribute to the sudden mess was my TDS meter reporting about ten times the amount of junk in the tapwater in Abbotsford as compared to Langley, and for the first time was actually reading something on the output side of my RODI system. Occasional param checks showed everything in line in the tank (pretty much no coral growth to move them) and never any detectable Nitrate or Silicate. Still 1ppm is not huge and I've heard of people running their tank on tap water in the GVRD which is about 15ish ppm TDS. This continued for about a year. Along the way I also had a bacterial bloom which had never happened before. A month or so with a UV sterilizer took care of that.

Fast forward to about 6 months ago and I can finally refresh my RODI cartridges. I hit the tank with a Chemiclean treatment and a 20% WC with the new filters. Tank cleaned up, but shortly thereafter algae grew like mad, followed by a slower but still very heavy growth of Cyano. Now I'm making a better effort to remove as much crap as I can when I do the regular water changes, which is slowing the regrowth of the Cyano, but hair algae is still there (buried under Cyano)....

[hfp75]

Originally Posted by Aquattro

I came home from out of town to a tank full of hair algae.

Originally Posted by Aquattro

Oh, and I get 3 hours of direct sunlight every day in the tank. It does not pose any problems.

Really....

I do agree that if you are having water problems start with water changes.

[Aquattro]

Originally Posted by hfp75

Really....

Ya, really The algae was due to things dying. Water changes cleared it up.

[hfp75]

Originally Posted by jostafew

- 75% of the year there is no direct sunlight on the tank, though in mid summer it does get about 15 min in the evening
Indirect sunlight can also have a negative impact.... 15 mins though isn't anything to worry about.

- skim darker skimate... Not sure how to address that one, my Aqua C Remora's only adjustment is the height of the collection cup, and that pretty much only changes how much water it pulls out of the system. Lower and I get more watered down skimate, higher and it really doesn't pull much of anything.
I'd error & have it on the higher side than the lower side....

- the Rowa I'm experimenting with. Currently running a TLF 150 half full, this is the 3rd batch that I've put in it in a few months. I'm still learning about measuring and removing phosphates, hence my other post regarding measuring phosphates for the purpose of algae prevention.
Stick with it and change the Rowa every month until your PO4 is down... then let the PO4 direct your changes.
Fozdown might be a consideration if your PO4 is super high (go slow with FD), but Foz Down doesn't actually get PO4 out of your tank. When you change the Rowa the PO4 is being physically pulled out of your tank - I like knowing that.

- I will look at red slime remover. If its anything like chemiclean I have done a couple treatments of that, the first one cleaned up my tank very nicely but despite big water changes after it turned into wicked algae growth followed by more cyano.
I have not used chemiclean - they might be basically the same thing.

- yes I have a sand bed, fine sand (but not the sugar), about 1-1/2" deep on average. There is not a lot of turnover there, only really done by a few smaller nassarius snails and the occasional mischievous fish. I would love to have a sand sifting star but I don't believe the system is big enough to support one. Same thing with a sand sifting goby, the display tank is about 35 gal (30" x 24" x 12") so I worry about starvation.
Initially I was worried about the same thing. I put a small sand star in my old 50g tank (36x18=648sq in) @ 1.5" sand and it did fine - its now in my larger tank it hasnt even grown much in 2 years. What you need to find is a small sand star not more than 2" across. The Goby will end up moving sand and also eating food you dump in the tank. Get a small Orange Diamond Goby. (30x24=720 sq in, the star will do fine)

- no I've never considered running a bio pellet reactor, but I will now
Or anything like sugar/vodka/biopellets/ect, it is denitrifying bacteria on steroids. I like biopellets as I don't have to dose it daily. I set it and forget it. Once a month with my "Rowa swap" I examine the pellet reactor and make sure its looking OK - sometimes I top it up but not that often. It just does its own thing & my NO3 sits at <10 probably even <5

- snails have always been a challenge for me. The most success I've had have been with the nassarius snails who live in the sandbed unless they smell food, followed by astrea and cerith snails, but it seems in both my tanks the astrea and cerith eventually die off after a few months presumable due to lack of food (because the algae gets covered in some other pest).
I like Nassarius & Cerith (prefer the back ones) they live in the sand and stir it constantly. A Turbo & Astrea/Turbins are good but they live in the rockwork and graze the rocks - two different jobs here. Once a week or two weeks (7-12 days) at night (lights out) I put 2-4 silversides into my sand sticking up 1/2 way (95 gal) and the snails and crabs go crazzy and eat them up. By morning the silver sides are completely gone. My CUC isn't starving and I don't have any algae to worry about (they eat that too) - as I said beforeI get a red Cyano once a year'ish and that gets the RSR with great results. Dont forget that snails are a nice treat for many things in the tank - you always need to be topping them back up.
After the recent outbreak of hair algea I brought in a lawnmower blenny which gorged itself on the algae at first, then slowly was eating less and less and eventually perished after about 6 wks, approx. the same time the latest wave of cyano came on again. The latest wave, more brown color, didn't respond to the Chemiclean like the first and heavier reddish wave did.
Algae eaters are a great type of fish. Before you take them home see if they eat normal food - if they wont, skip that one. They might starve out without the algae to eat.

- lighting consists of a 250w halide and 2 24" t5's. I've been running a couple different 10k MH lamps because I like the mid-sunny day look (reminds be of being under the wanter in Hawaii), but recently changed back to a 14k lamp, though it still looks pretty close to 10k. The T5's are on for 12hrs a day, the halide about 8. The fixture is a good 18" above the tank at the moment. 300w is a lot of light over a 35gal shallow reef but I wanted to have a lot of light for when I could get things back in order and safe to have clams again. The tank used to be the same footprint at 30" x 24" but it was 24" tall and when I downsized I re-used the light fixture and just lifted it higher above the tank to reduce intensity.
Old lights huw can degrade with time. I'd swap for new at least once a year & maybe more often. I was running T5s but switched to LEDs (Kessils) to get away from the bulb switches. There are Pros and Cons, I miss the light from the T5s but my lights are hassle free.

- yes I run RO/DI, but if I skip the carbon isn't that just asking for premature wear on the more expensive RO membrane?
Leave the carbon in the RO/DI. I thought you were talking about running carbon in the sump. Carbon in the RODI cleans the water just fine. You don't need to add anymore after that unless you are specifically cleaning something from the water in the tank. Old ro/di membranes can become problematic I hope they aren't all that old.

Hope these details will be helpful. I've been at this so long it would be nice to finally have a clean tank to work with again.
Stick with it and trouble shoot it....
Ironically I've got a RO 110 and it skims like a champ. I have looked at upgrading to other types (which are all probably good) but my RO has convinced me to try to stay with them. Being frugal with this hobby is important, I am on the hunt for a larger RO.

Thanks again

Hope that helps?

[hfp75]

Originally Posted by Aquattro

Ya, really The algae was due to things dying. Water changes cleared it up.

IC, so the GHA was from excess nutrients in the water then.

[reef-keeper]

I would try a product called Re-Fresh from DrTim'saquatics.com. It is a bacteria to fight the Cyanobacteria. We all know that algae is a high nutrients problem and when you kill the Cyano you create more organic nutrients that cause a never ending cycle. So water changes more frequently and testing the phosphates every couple days. Will help lots. Re-Fresh is what I found help my massive 9 month ordeal with algae. All this with a phosphate reactor should do the trick I believe. Hope this helps.

[Aquattro]

Originally Posted by hfp75

IC, so the GHA was from excess nutrients in the water then.

Correct. sunlight has hit my tanks for 5 years, I had HA for 2 weeks after a large loss of fish

[jostafew]

hfp75 thank you very much for all the info it is very helpful, and to the other replies as well. I've got a good idea where I need to go from here, will report back with results after some time.