Saltwater ****es me off

[Digger19]

I have run over the years 3 size tanks. A 12, a 75, and my current 28. After many frustrating years I think I finally have things figured out. I have run the 28 now for 3 years and have never had a problem. (Knock on wood)

My routine involves a 30-40% water change(RODI) every 8-12 days. I add nothing else, I have never used a test kit of any sorts on this tank. Only livestock loss was one fish.

My other secret. I have always run a phosban reactor in the tank from day one. My idea is to prevent phosphates etc from overwhelming the water column and live rock rather than reacting to it after it becomes a problem.

Ridding a tank of hair algae once it takes hold is a frustrating task. Water changes by them self dont take all of the phosphate and other nutrient out of the tank as much of it still dwells in the sand and live rock. Until that is removed the hair algae will persist.

In the past i have dealt with the problem using a 3 fold approach.
1) Try to deal with the excess nutrient issue. Phosban reactors with GFO or any other phosphate sponge will do. Have also used a liquid tank additive Phosphat-E by brightwell aquatics with good success.

2) Frequent water changes with RODI water while pulling as much of the hair algae off in between

3) Removing the liverock 1 piece at a time and scrubbing teh hair lagae off with a stiff brush it while submersed in fresh salt water with a rinse in clean saltwater after the scrubbing. While it is not always possible to scrub all the rock I do as much as I can

If you have sand in the tank, I might also suggest going bare bottom as this is also a nutrient trap.

In any case, this wont cure itself overnight and without some effort. Once you do though I still recommend running a phosphate sponge as a prevention measure.

[canadianbudz604]

Once I get home from work I will do the huge water change. At my lfs they have green phosphate sponges that come in a big pad. Will these work or do I have to buy something like rowaphos? Like I said before I had huge success with this tank, so I gotta just fix this problem and go back to the exact way I was doing things before. Now with barebottom do I need a huge skimmer? Or do I need a skimmer at all? I'm liking the look of the tiles that ppl are using

[mrhasan]

Originally Posted by canadianbudz604

Once I get home from work I will do the huge water change. At my lfs they have green phosphate sponges that come in a big pad. Will these work or do I have to buy something like rowaphos? Like I said before I had huge success with this tank, so I gotta just fix this problem and go back to the exact way I was doing things before. Now with barebottom do I need a huge skimmer? Or do I need a skimmer at all? I'm liking the look of the tiles that ppl are using

Don't disrupt the system that is working for you. Disturbing the sand bed now means releasing all sort of bad stuffs into the tank unless you are willing to take out everything and practically restart the system. Sponges will not do anything. If you can, start a phosban reactor with gfo. But don't shock the system with full dose of gfo. If you can't accommodate gfo and reactor, try using phosguard, works good. And like the previous poster said, keep up the water change. And I personally don't like the borrowing game but you can try to borrow a sea hare or something to mow down the hair algae. Will take couple of days for your tank size for a sea hare to whip out the hair algae. Alongside, just keep up with the methods for reducing phosphates.

[Digger19]

Siphoning out the sanded without stirring it up is easily accomplished. Siphon over the surface gently and it can be removed with spewing a whole lot of bad nasty stuff into the water column.Most of it should go up the pipe with the sand. I have done it twice before and have not had an issue. This shouldnt be your first step but might be something you want to consider.

I do large water changes for two reasons. First to replenish goodies used in the reef that are consumed during the biosphere's cycle. I use a good quality salt although there will be some debate as to what that constitutes. Secondly, because I have no protein skimmer, I need a method of reducing other bad stuff from the water that skimming may remove and that the phosban reactor doesnt. I dont worry about phosphates because I run Rhowphos in my tank full time. At some point in this process you are going to measure very low levels of phosphates in the tank but the hair algae will keep on trucking. This is because the hair algae is consuming it as fast as it can be produced leaving little measurable in the water. The real key is getting rid of as much of the hair algae as possible and keeping it under control until the phosphates are completely removed from the tank. That is why I remove the live rock(the stuff covered in hair algae) and scrub it vigorously as practical.
It will take weeks for the algae to attempt a comeback and it will but by then you will have removed much of the remainder of the phosphate from the tank.

Repeat until you have won the battle. A Sea hare will eat a lot of it but once its gone you will need to find a new home for it. They are hardy eaters and once the algae is gone they will starve.

Any phosphate removal solution will work. Some better than others, some more expensive than others in the short term but not necessarily over the long haul.

[canadianbudz604]

Ill buy a small reactor when I get paid. In the meantime ill change a bunch of the water and go from there. I've always stirred my sand bed at water change time so no problems there. Anyone who seen my little tank before this all happened knows it was pretty nice. Also have some fairly expensive corals in there so I'm defiantly not wanting to start over. The way the rock is in my tank it's going to be very hard pulling it out and cleaning it. Maybe a sea hare is my only option for the algae.

[canadianbudz604]

K I've got the water changed, new carbon going, scraped a bit of hair algae off and sucked it up immediately. Put my turbo snail right on the patch of hair algae and he seems to be eating it. Things are somewhat looking up.

[greyreef]

Tagging along to see if canadian bud will get control of his algae...
Looks like your winning, keep up the battle!!
Debating myself between api filter and importing culligan from down the street...
Might want to start with that culligan

[Proteus]

Originally Posted by canadianbudz604

Once I get home from work I will do the huge water change. At my lfs they have green phosphate sponges that come in a big pad. Will these work or do I have to buy something like rowaphos? Like I said before I had huge success with this tank, so I gotta just fix this problem and go back to the exact way I was doing things before. Now with barebottom do I need a huge skimmer? Or do I need a skimmer at all? I'm liking the look of the tiles that ppl are using

I still would use a skimmer but the bonus of BB is a turkey Baster will clean the bottom