Coloring up Dilemma

[Andrews_aquarium]

I’ve come to a recent problem with loosing some color on my higher end SPS Acros. I’ve been battling hair algae for just over a month now, my NO3 was very low so i’ve been dosing for 2 months to keep it at 10ppm. I’ve recently stopped dosing and it’s been sitting at 5ppm.

PO4 was .05-.08ppm but then I added a refugium and it’s gotten it down .00-.03. It has helped the algae problem slowly but surely. I have also added some turbo snails which have been doing a number on the hair algae but it’s taking awhile.

The only problem is i’ve lost some of the intense colors the acros had. They are still growing well but getting more dull.

Wondering what people’s thoughts are, battle the algae with just snails and higher nutrients or let the nutrients stay down and deal with paler corals?

 

[Ron Reefman]

Deal with the algae in the tank first. Once you have it under control (as in all gone) you can start raising the nutrient levels and the refugium should pull the excess out rather than starting more algae in the tank.

 

[Epic Aquaculture]

Use grazers such as Mexican Turbo snails, urchins, and depending on the size of the tank some herbivorous fish like tangs and foxface. Some algae in the tank is normal and a sign of a healthy reef, it just needs to be kept under control. Bottoming out your PO4 is the most likely culprit for your loss of color.

 

[jda]

Are you still feeding enough? Most people make the mistake of cutting back on feeding when they are battling algae, but the fish still need fed a good amount so that they can nourish the corals with ammonium/ammonium and poo. You can take care of the back end in other ways by upping the export, but the import should stay the same. The corals are not using the residual N and P like many would have you believe and availability is the prize that you are after... you can still have very nice looking corals with lower N and P if you feed and keep stuff available to them.

If you are still feeding well, then look to lighting (daylight for color rendering and then blue it up for viewing), consistency of parameters and double check all of your big stuff like recalibrate your refractometer and check the temp and all of that to make sure that your parameters are in a solid range.

I keep N about .1 to .2 and P of .005 to .01 and my colors are not dull or anything. I do feed a ton and export a ton, so there is always plenty of availability. There are recent photos in my rebuild thread (build thread) - if you want click and look. I follow what I type - feed a lot, export a lot with lots of full spectrum lighting (350 to 850nm).