Chaeto help

[Psychonaut]

so for some reason I can’t keep chaeto anymore. Tank finished cycle in feb, and originally I grew a huge basketball sized clump but then it just started to die off little by little. At the peak my nitrates and phosphates were both 0 or close to 0 so I chalked it up to that, by now my phosphates are all the way up to .1 and nitrates at 10. Some of my tank inhabitants are clearly ticked. I know it needs iron and other stuff, bout wouldn’t it be getting what it needs just from water changes? I grow every other type of algae in the world in the sump, but he chaeto just falls apart. So I picked out all the nasty chaeto, cleaned the sump really well to try to eliminate other types of algae, put in a new ball of chaeto the size of my fist, and 24 hours later it’s about dead

150w ufo grow light 16” from surface of water
Nitrate 10
Phos .1
Alk 10
Cal 440
Mag 1350
Temp 79
Sal 1.026

Any help would be appreciated. Should I try calurpa?

 

[Hitman]

Sounds like you need more trace elements. Very little of that in normal water changes depending on how big of a water change, try dosing ESV B-Ionic Transition Elements it fixed the same issue for me. I dose ml daily in a 300 gallon system.

 

[taricha]

Don't forget flow as well. Chaeto really likes flow.

 

[Justfebreezeit]

Brightwell makes a chaeto "fertilizer". Haven't used it myself but it makes sense.

 

[Psychonaut]

Ok. The chaeto I added the other day already completely disintegrated so I added a little pump in there to get some flow, because it was super stagnant before, and I ordered a bottle of what Hitman recommended. I also had to add a bag of phosguard because my nitrates and phosphates have been climbing steadily thru the course of all this. I’ll add some more at the end of the week when the bottle of ESV B gets here and update.

 

[Psychonaut]

Prolly do another 20% water change tomorrow too

 

[Flippers4pups]

Bio balls may have something to do with it.

 

[ScoobyFish]

Sounds like something else is out competing the chaeto. So you need to figure out your preferred method of filtration. Also whats your nitrate levels at?

 

[Psychonaut]

Scoobyfish I was thinking the same thing but.... there is still so much nitrate and phos left right? If something was outcompeting it wouldn’t those numbers be closer to 0?

 

[ScoobyFish]

Scoobyfish I was thinking the same thing but.... there is still so much nitrate and phos left right? If something was outcompeting it wouldn’t those numbers be closer to 0?

Yeah man might seem that way, but mostly i think this the case. Whatever nitrate level is there if there is something more powerful eating it up when available, it will not let your chaeto grow. Couple years ago we had similar conversation on these forums, i remember an experienced reefer ( cause back than i was a nub at this) adding tree stump remover to the tank lol to feed his chaeto. And yes it worked for me too. So yams you learn many things here.

 

[Hemmdog]

16’’ is pretty far. I have my light about 4 inches above the water.

 

[Psychonaut]

I tried lowering it for a bit but I felt like I was torching them. It’s such a powerful light ya know? Maybe I’ll drop it a couple inches again. You have a 150w UFO 4” above the water?

 

[Hitman]

That light is pretty powerful I wouldn’t recommend having it less then 12” above the water but that’s just me. My Kessil H380 is 12” above the water only because that’s all the room I have, I wish I could move it to 16”. As for your nutrients raising that’s what happens as the Chaeto dies off. How long are you running your light? I had to acclimate my Chaeto to my light. I ran it 6 hours a night for a week then 8 hours, the moved to 12 hours at the end of the 3rd week.

 

[Psychonaut]

I’m running it 12/12 alternating with the DT lights. Yea that’s why I had it so high, I was worried about burning it all up, was planning on lowering little by little but never even got the chance with round 2

 

[Hitman]

You’ll like the ESV. I’m a big fan of all their products. I dose the 2 part as well as it’s the only one that have trace elements added to its two part and Randy is a fan of it as well. It’s pretty potent stuff so follow the directions to a T and you’ll be good to go. If you have to buy Chaeto again order it from Algae Barn, their prices are high in my opinion but they grow it under high powered lights so it will take the powerful lights equation out of your worry bucket. I got mine from them 2 years ago and it grows like crazy under my light and I harvest it bi weekly otherwise I have a 20 gallon section of my sump overflowing.

 

[Psychonaut]

Thanks!

 

[SashimiTurtle]

Try dropping your light. I just moved some chaeto over to my girlfriend's new tank to try and keep it alive until we could get her a Kessil H80. It almost completely melted in a week. This was healthy chaeto that was growing profusely in my tank.

I know the H80 is a lot less powerful than that UFO thing, but I keep mine at 4" over the water and I just gave away 2 gallons of chaeto and kept about a gallon for myself.

 

[Hitman]

The H80 is 1000 par less the the light he has which is comparable to the H380. If he dropped it that low he would melt everything in that chamber.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

The H80 is 1000 par less the the light he has which is comparable to the H380. If he dropped it that low he would melt everything in that chamber.

Never said to put the UFO at 4". That would be nuclear suicide. Maybe 10". I've seen chaeto grow under pretty bright light but melt quickly without it.

Also, I've seen chaeto melt with cheap lights and as soon as they switch to a Kessil they start growing it out of their ears. Something in the spectrum is just that much better.

 

[uhgster1]

$28.00 Taotronic off Amazon. I had a MASSIVE bubble algae bloom in my display and this light has grown this chaeto from baseball size to watermelon size every three weeks on average and has decimated the bubble algae in the display. I feed very heavily and the chaeto IS my mechanical filtration. I don’t use socks and as you can see from the picture it doesn’t tumble around in the refugium. In the beginning I thought the chaeto was burning up because it floated on top and was yellow. Turns out it just keeps growing underneath. I grabbed a coffee mug (something inert), and put it in the middle of the mass to submerge it and it just keeps going. My take away from this is that my heavy feedings provide the nutrients the chaeto needs. There’s tons of life in there too. Stay the course with the simple approach.