At wits end with GHA

justinm · Dec 3, 2017

Hey all,

I received a RBTA for free so I set up a spare 40 breeder for him and two clowns that host in it. In my 120, I had a Potter’s start nipping so I figured I would put my clam in there and all LPS that were being nipped at.

Well this GHA is crazy, I can’t take it anymore. I took out all the rock today, placed it in a 10 gallon with a Powerbeats and placed a black trash bag over it. I will let the rock sit in darkness for the next week and do a water change or two on it in the mean time. I scrubbed everything I could in the 40 and removed 95% of the algae. I am worried the remaining algae with still take off in the tank.

Nitrate and phosphate are all coming up 0.

I am not using GFO or anything, just skimming wet and have chaeto in the fuge. I am thinking about dosing algaefix marine or peroxide to make sure it all dies. I am just worried for the clam and the anemone and would love some input on this.

I am open to all suggestions too!

Thanks!

Justin

JaimeAdams · Dec 3, 2017

I would simply pull the rock out and use a spray bottle and sprite it down with hydrogen peroxide, let sit for a minute and put back in the tank. Than increase you CUC. Once 90%+ of it is gone your herbivores should be able to keep it controlled.

justinm · Dec 3, 2017

JaimeAdams said:
I would simply pull the rock out and use a spray bottle and sprite it down with hydrogen peroxide, let sit for a minute and put back in the tank. Than increase you CUC. Once 90%+ of it is gone your herbivores should be able to keep it controlled.

I have done this before. I removed 90 percent of it off the rocks, didn’t scrub the tank like I did today, but it all came back.

I did up my CUC, but I probably need a bit more. Thanks.

Skynyrd Fish · Dec 3, 2017

Try a stronger fuge light. It worked for me. I put a red led screw in par 30?? bulb off eBay, 30 watt. It was $20. I got so fed up I decided to make my fuge the ultimate place to grow hair algae and slime. I could see a difference in the main tank after a week. Give it some time. You are detecting 0 PO4 and Nitrate due to the GHA up taking it.

mcarroll · Dec 4, 2017

Are you sure this is not bryopsis or similar?

It sounds like you just dumped too much livestock into a new tank too fast – a good way to make a big algae bloom (easy to avoid in the future!) but not the end of the world by any stretch.

As long as it's NOT bryopsis or similar keep following the advice here and you'll get ahead of it. More grazers. More manual removal.

I would be a little careful about peroxide treatments – especially if you've already done one or more.

Peroxide is very non-specific and you're not trying to make dead rock. ;Dead Dead rock is a whole different kettle of fish.

2¢

justinm · Dec 4, 2017

Definitely not bryopsis, I tried fluconazole hoping it would knock it back. The rock is probably 5 years old so very cycled and was full of algae before(thinking the rock just needs cured, it was in my 120 sump and never really was ever blown off or anything. Maybe it’s leeching PO4. I’ll test the water it is in now for PO4) Besides the anemone and the two clowns, the bio load is minimal. Just a few pellets a day and I don’t feed the anemone.

I have a red light for the fuge but it’s a bare bottom tank so I haven’t been using it as the light spills out into the DT. I’ll find a way to cover the bottom of the DT and use it. The light from the tank spilling into the sump has been growing the chaeto in the sump.

Thanks for the suggestions!

laverda · Dec 4, 2017

Clearly your nitrate and phosphate are not zero. Just the GHA is using it to grow. How are you filtering your tank? Any sort of mechanical filter should be cleaned at least weekly to keep nitrates and phosphates in check. Cleaning your filtration twice a week will over time reduce both.

justinm · Dec 4, 2017

I know nitrate and phosphate are being used by the GHA. As for mechanical filtration, this is just a bare bones system. I clean the skimmer weekly with a toothbrush, and empty the cup as needed. I don’t have any mechanical filtration besides the sump. It’s all refugium. There really is nothing to clean besides the skimmer and harvesting chaeto(and GHA).

brandon429 · Dec 4, 2017

in no way does peroxide make dead rock, we have five thousand examples when needed from threads on google / pest algae challenge thread(s)

the right way to wield peroxide here isn't the way its been done, its one 1 single test rock with rasping first, then peroxide, then check for growback.

Currently we have scrubbing, but that's not rasping. we have full tank work then check for growback, but that's not test modeling before the upscale

order of ops changeup gets the after pics gold

of course there are any number of ways to starve it out too, over months, and hope corals don't die. I hate to see GHA battles persist they're easy to beat given a certain order of ops from huge threads with tons of after pics. This one can be beaten as soon as you will it using the right resources, how could it proceed invaded given the thousands of after pics we'll add it to

brandon429 · Dec 4, 2017

If this tank is a 40 then Ill call it fixed site unseen not knowing any of your nutrient profiles (and not needing them)

lets run test -- we can fix your issue without knowing or testing for nutrients in your tank.

complete the sandbed rinse thread/technique along the way. you will have no gha and no feed for it.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/t...a-one-against-many.230281/page-7#post-4107442
because its a nano, its easy to make invader free. We didn't need to know anything other than gallonage which is neat. the only reason large tankers get the volume cutoff is because they must choose water only actions (subject to bleaching your whole tank and not winning) since they can't access substrates, like a 40 sure can.

the only thing we needed to produce a fixed tank was a before pic do post

mcarroll · Dec 4, 2017

What do you have now for a CUC, BTW?

justinm said:
The rock is probably 5 years old

justinm said:
it was in my 120 sump

I think I'm already with you. But what was it like when you removed those rocks from the 120's sump?

Did it appear at that time to be loaded with detritus? Did it make a mess when you moved all that rock out? Had you been doing anything to keep detritus from settling on it over the years?

justinm · Dec 4, 2017

brandon429 said:
If this tank is a 40 then Ill call it fixed site unseen not knowing any of your nutrient profiles (and not needing them)

lets run test -- we can fix your issue without knowing or testing for nutrients in your tank.

complete the sandbed rinse thread/technique along the way. you will have no gha and no feed for it.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/t...a-one-against-many.230281/page-7#post-4107442
because its a nano, its easy to make invader free. We didn't need to know anything other than gallonage which is neat. the only reason large tankers get the volume cutoff is because they must choose water only actions (subject to bleaching your whole tank and not winning) since they can't access substrates, like a 40 sure can.

the only thing we needed to produce a fixed tank was a before pic do post

Well the rock is in a 10 gallon now with a black trash bag over it. When I get home from work tomorrow, might not be till Wednesday I will take a pic. Though it will have been in total darkness for 3 days by then. The only rock left in the DT at the moment is the one with the anemone attached to it.

I removed the sand bed prior as an attempt to get some of the algae.

justinm · Dec 4, 2017

mcarroll said:
What do you have now for a CUC, BTW?

I think I'm already with you. But what was it like when you removed those rocks from the 120's sump?

Did it appear at that time to be loaded with detritus? Did it make a mess when you moved all that rock out? Had you been doing anything to keep detritus from settling on it over the years?

As for a clean up crew, I have a handful of trochus, nassarius, and a few turbos. Probably 20 total snails. The rock was definitely full of detritus and all I did was shake it off. As for algae on it, little bits and pieces. What phosphate was in the tank must have fed that algae. I was at 1 tds on my Ro/Di for about a month. Wouldn’t think that would contribute too much though.

mcarroll · Dec 5, 2017

Handful of trochus to me says....maybe 5?
A few turbos....maybe 3?

Nassarius don't count here.

Did the trochus and turbos seem to actually be eating the algae before you removed the rocks?

Did they seem lethargic? Any problems with snails upside down on the bottom of the tank?

justinm · Dec 5, 2017

No, they’re all fine, the trochus were definitely eating some. I have more trochus in my 120(had a lot more but my Tusk really liked snails) I could grab but there really isn’t much algae in the tank right now since I scrubbed the heck out of it.

Need to get my QT set back up because I QT everything. I will get more snails.

40B Knasty · Dec 5, 2017

Only thing I can think of is.
1) Lights and run time.
2) Using a toothbrush to scrub the rocks is just sending more spores to seed your tank.
3) To much of a clean up crew dying off and there is some snails rotting feeding your GHA.
4) Dead GHA that you scrub off also becomes a nutrients for GHA if it is not exported via filter floss, filter socks, or sponge and water change during the scrubbing of the rocks.
5) Not enough cheato in refugium.
6) Some kind of carbon in the air like a sented candle.
7) Low pH making your tank more CO².
8) NOT shutting off your lights for your refugium turning your cheato into an asexual cheato which makes it release CO² constantly. Cheato needs a non photosynthesis period. That is why you should run reverse photocycle.
9) Silicates in your water. Phosguard can help with that.
Baxter Clean M works too. Look it up. Plenty of videos on YouTube. I even did one. It does work.

VietExtender · Dec 5, 2017

I’d recommend reefhd reef flux. There are people who’ve used it here on the forum as well and its a fairly inexpensive way to get rid of it. My first dose of it took about seven days to start killing the gha. About day fourteen, only had a bit of dead hair algae where the light couldn’t penetrate so I’m doing a second dose. I’m a happy camper so far after spending hundreds on other things trying to get rid of it.

justinm · Dec 8, 2017

Well, I haven’t been home all week because of work. Checked on the rock that was in the 10 gallon in a blackout, it is still the same. 5 days of a total blackout and this algae won’t go away.