Cycling Levels

brandon429

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Agreed to that, cycle is on.

Let's preempt an algae plan

I'll be sad if this, or any other tank goes through an uglies phase, how do you like to handle early algae challenges to avoid them becoming long term issues
 
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brandon429

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I'm 20 chats in the hole :) but one heck of an opinion answer plus thread reference is coming that's for sure. I have a custom idea where that ats will be great.
 
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I'm 20 chats in the hole :) but one heck of an opinion answer plus thread reference is coming that's for sure. I have a custom idea where that ats will be great.
Looking forward to it.
 

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Want to show you where my opinions on algae control come from. The years.

Quick scan these for before and after pics. Don’t get too caught on reading mass volume type some of this stuff is outdated peroxide work, we’re in this to see how invasions -present- not what I thought would help.

Look at the vast array, cost, value, volume contained, clam systems, sps systems fish systems on and on. ****nearly every one of them with parameter management in place for nutrients before, during and after invasion****

I wasn’t getting people who jacked their N and P sky high. Back then, nobody would’ve dreamed to dose N or P directly. We were all removing them then, you recall :)

And, some were higher N and P reported measures, just so we don’t claim that nutrients one way or another have a big effect on being algae invaded. Poor nutrients only mean you work harder to maintain surfaces. Ideal nutrients squelch algae and still maintain corals, you work less.


I’ll tell in a sec what patterns I think stand out. Set up your tank oppositely and we should be gtg

Works:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2082359

https://www.nano-reef.com/forums/topic/268706-peroxide-saves-my-tank-with-pics-to-prove-it/?page=62

Just those two threads alone is enough, five yrs or so worth. All in one thread for sifting. Skip my typing just thumb before and after page after page to see the breadth of presentations=ATS, gfo, tang grazers, snail grazers *perfect* top off water still invaded, sunlight or no direct sunlight still invaded, deep sand bed or no deep sand bed invaded, chaeto refugium and still invaded, new tanks and old tanks invaded.

Remember there’s always the sages, artists who command stellar tanks in their living room and they may indeed be very old, and uninvaded.

******we have people replicating their methods who are invaded*****

I’m not trying to debate anyone about philosophy of algae. Am simply relaying the patterns I feel can be validated above, someone let me know if I’m off base claiming, based on those threads, these high points:

Preventatives are not removers

Preventative steps for algae invasion are wonderful, and they’re not intended to be what removes an invader when you see it right there in your tank in spite of things being perfect already. Preventatives include ATS, gfo, all clean up crew members, param tuning for nitrate and phosphate levels of the decade, perfect lighting PAR and any other form of light tuning, using plants to offset waste as in reactors, using UV and and any other method we’ve read in a book is a *preventative* and not a remover.


Since most reefing authors didn’t differentiate between preventatives and removers, they turned out thousands of aquariums destined to seek back- alley science one day to save their five thousand dollar clam tank when preventative approach #8 didn’t work. It’s also the authors fault they don’t run cure threads to evolve their method, heh, but that’s -stinging- accountability we can only ask so much.

Please let me introduce what a remover is, it comes in many forms. What did spiritwalker employ as a remover here? I hadn’t even thought of this idea:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/beeping-green-hair-algae.527285/

I would read his five pages, not quick scan.

A remover is something that takes green hair algae off your rocks yesterday. **not just brushing it off that’s guaranteed growback*** a perfect remover has a kill step, a sustain step. We don’t care what the mechanism is, but kill the algae don’t just brush it off. Spiritwalker used HEAT to denature/dissolve the algae clean off the rocks. The fact he took back ground vs ceding it is the ENTIRE trick to owning a reef tank that is NEVER invaded. He used boiling water. He could have used a blue jet torch lighter and a knife, doesn’t matter, a kill step has a sustaining action beyond just a topical remove that’s very important so that growback is minimized.

He burned the crap out of his GHA, he worried about preventatives after. He ordered the ops vs haphazarding them, this thread is the best recent example I’ve seen for large tank algae control and here’s why:

It’s repeatable.

I myself am a 35% peroxide burner. I don’t use boiling water but the attitude is all that matters, these people aren’t giving up ground anymore. To any excuse. That’s the secret. If you get lucky in preventing, you’ll work less killing the crap out of the target to force compliance in your aquarium, as we do.

Not that I have to treat my tank for algae in years :) but when I used to do it (part of early hand guiding of surfaces to only allow coralline to take over, and never a plant) I would apply 35% peroxide outside of water to the target and toast it gone. Rasp off the surface, refill. Plant a new coral on the spot so it’s flesh creeps over cleared ground and permanently excludes algae (how many of those tanks above had algae ON on a mushroom coral, or on a living brain coral polyp in the oral zone- right on the flesh? Zero. Not one. Flesh is algae excluding and so is coralline, algae grows on anchor points not on rejecting surfaces)

How many times did I need to know someone’s nutrient params in order to get the tank back in line? I struggle to find any times we measured nitrate and phosphate, yet those are algae cure threads. Hmm.

Nutrients affect how often you must employ the remover/burn/kill/destroy method of your choosing, and, since an ocean likes to grow plants- we expect preventatives to NEED HELP sometimes but as you can see, the aquarists above were told that the nutrient tuning and fine preventative alone would work. It doesn’t for the vast majority although a sage is never going to have trouble reefing no matter the setting.

We want to relay information the masses can replicate right now, or report back in an accountability thread that something didn’t work.

The best information is to not stack your initial aquascape with an inaccessible wall of rocks. Create no reason at all you can’t get in there, yank those initial structures out even if coated in live SPS corals, and stab out with a knife any organism that wants to take your tank away from you.

Worried about accessing your tank due to its delicate sandbed? We knew that was a massive source of hesitation (the cause for all mass tank invasions is simply hesitating past day one, when the invader was controllable) so the last set of pages to offer is the sand rinse thread aka the cure to all cyano invasions.

Sandbedders also read from authors who don’t have to stick around to do the cleanup, by all means please consider how following normal sandbed rules works for the masses here:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/t...ead-aka-one-against-many.230281/#post-2681445



When I see someone with an invasion then I know they chose it.

They think something happened outside their control, and if you tell them they wanted to be invaded and then became that way, flames ensue

But did spiritwalker entertain his invader? Did he -hesitate- for nine days on an ID thread, buying scopes from amazon, while the invasion spread rock to rock? No, he opted out and so did I and I hope you do as well


We think that to allow an uglies phase in your new tank, again this is something authors promulgate but never stick around to clean, is to purposefully seed and fragment your tank with items that can one day kill it, or cause you to need irregular means. We think the opposite is what saves tanks and causes compliance for all new reefs setup: hand guide then like our grandmas did for dandelions until the garden grew dense enough to crowd out invaders pretty well on its own. Start busy, lessen off as coral loading and coralline increases. All those tanks above purposefully seeded themselves during hands off periods and -limited- *themselves* to water only action. I have to sell most people on why they should directly kill algae, as needed, independent of preventatives, and they consider the notion a fully foreign concept. It should be expected.


Have a clean sandbed at the start so that silt doesn’t set you back. Have a rock structure that is removable, accessible, in some creative way. Expect to have an uglies phase, especially if you buy non live white rock, and work that reef into compliance don’t ever will it into an invaded condition like so many have, do, and will.

Set your water params to what corals want. Not what it takes to starve algae. this correctly positions how we should manage nutrient levels in a successful, uninvaded reef tank. We don’t alter nutrients around an invader, reactively, we are consistent because corals are our focus and they like consistency.

Remember there are some people who feel that algae and initial invasion aren’t bad, or that theyre not ‘invaders’ which I consider any organism associated with loss examples above.

They will never adhere to hand guiding and especially harsh burning, so I’m not trying to win them over in debate (do they run cure threads??)
I wanted to show you how people were just sure their preventatives were gonna work and when they didn’t, the whole plan fell apart but the fix was there all along.
Have a scape/max tank volume set by the degree you are able and willing to access any nook or any cranny including a full water change if required, this is the secret to being algae free. It is a will, a mindset. To be the owner of an invaded reef tank is a matter of psychology not biology. Growback control is the biology portion. the resolved are never invaded day one to day 4000

B
 
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Philipgonzales3

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Want to show you where my opinions on algae control come from. The years.

Quick scan these for before and after pics. Don’t get too caught on reading mass volume type some of this stuff is outdated peroxide work, we’re in this to see how invasions -present- not what I thought would help.

Look at the vast array, cost, value, volume contained, clam systems, sps systems fish systems on and on. ****nearly every one of them with parameter management in place for nutrients before, during and after invasion****

I wasn’t getting people who jacked their N and P sky high. Back then, nobody would’ve dreamed to dose N or P directly. We were all removing them then, you recall :)

And, some were higher N and P reported measures, just so we don’t claim that nutrients one way or another have a big effect on being algae invaded. Poor nutrients only mean you work harder to maintain surfaces. Ideal nutrients squelch algae and still maintain corals, you work less.


I’ll tell in a sec what patterns I think stand out. Set up your tank oppositely and we should be gtg

Works:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2082359

https://www.nano-reef.com/forums/topic/268706-peroxide-saves-my-tank-with-pics-to-prove-it/?page=62

Just those two threads alone is enough, five yrs or so worth. All in one thread for sifting. Skip my typing just thumb before and after page after page to see the breadth of presentations=ATS, gfo, tang grazers, snail grazers *perfect* top off water still invaded, sunlight or no direct sunlight still invaded, deep sand bed or no deep sand bed invaded, chaeto refugium and still invaded, new tanks and old tanks invaded.

Remember there’s always the sages, artists who command stellar tanks in their living room and they may indeed be very old, and uninvaded.

******we have people replicating their methods who are invaded*****

I’m not trying to debate anyone about philosophy of algae. Am simply relaying the patterns I feel can be validated above, someone let me know if I’m off base claiming, based on those threads, these high points:

Preventatives are not removers

Preventative steps for algae invasion are wonderful, and they’re not intended to be what removes an invader when you see it right there in your tank in spite of things being perfect already. Preventatives include ATS, gfo, all clean up crew members, param tuning for nitrate and phosphate levels of the decade, perfect lighting PAR and any other form of light tuning, using plants to offset waste as in reactors, using UV and and any other method we’ve read in a book is a *preventative* and not a remover.


Since those authors didn’t differentiate between preventatives and removers, they turned out thousands of aquariums destined to seek back- alley science one day to save their five thousand dollar clam tank when preventative approach #8 didn’t work. It’s also the authors fault they don’t run cure threads to evolve their method, heh, but that’s -stinging- accountability we can only ask so much.

Please let me introduce what a remover is, it comes in many forms. What did spiritwalker employ as a remover here? I hadn’t even thought of this idea:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/beeping-green-hair-algae.527285/

I would read his five pages, not quick scan.

A remover is something that takes green hair algae off your rocks yesterday. **not just brushing it off that’s guaranteed growback*** a perfect remover has a kill step, a sustain step. We don’t care what the mechanism is, but kill the algae don’t just brush it off. Spiritwalker used HEAT to denature/dissolve the algae clean off the rocks. The fact he took back ground vs ceding it is the ENTIRE trick to owning a reef tank that is NEVER invaded. He used boiling water. He could have used a blue jet torch lighter and a knife, doesn’t matter, a kill step has a sustaining action beyond just a topical remove that’s very important so that growback is minimized.

He burned the crap out of his GHA, he worried about preventatives after. He ordered the ops vs haphazarding them, this thread is the best recent example I’ve seen for large tank algae control and here’s why:

It’s repeatable.

I myself am a 35% peroxide burner. I don’t use boiling water but the attitude is all that matters, these people aren’t giving up ground anymore. To any excuse. That’s the secret. If you get lucky in preventing, you’ll work less killing the crap out of the target to force compliance in your aquarium, as we do.

Not that I have to treat my tank for algae in years :) but when I used to do it (part of early hand guiding of surfaces to only allow coralline to take over, and never a plant) I would apply 35% peroxide outside of water to the target and toast it gone. Rasp off the surface, refill. Plant a new coral on the spot so it’s flesh creeps over cleared ground and permanently excludes algae (how many of those tanks above had algae ON on a mushroom coral, or on a living brain coral polyp in the oral zone- right on the flesh? Zero. Not one. Flesh is algae excluding and so is coralline, algae grows on anchor points not on rejecting surfaces)

How many times did I need to know someone’s nutrient params in order to get the tank back in line? I struggle to find any times we measured nitrate and phosphate, yet those are algae cure threads. Hmm.

Nutrients affect how often you must employ the remover/burn/kill/destroy method of your choosing, and, since an ocean likes to grow plants- we expect preventatives to NEED HELP sometimes but as you can see, the aquarists above were told that the nutrient tuning and fine preventative alone would work. It doesn’t for the vast majority although a sage is never going to have trouble reefing no matter the setting.

We want to relay information the masses can replicate right now, or report back in an accountability thread that something didn’t work.

The best information is to not stack your initial aquascape with an inaccessible wall of rocks. Create no reason at all you can’t get in there, yank those initial structures out even if coated in live SPS corals, and stab out with a knife any organism that wants to take your tank away from you.

Worried about accessing your tank due to its delicate sandbed? We knew that was a massive source of hesitation (the cause for all mass tank invasions is simply hesitating past day one, when the invader was controllable) so the last set of pages to offer is the sand rinse thread aka the cure to all cyano invasions.

Sandbedders also read from authors who don’t have to stick around to do the cleanup, by all means please consider how following normal sandbed rules works for the masses here:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/t...ead-aka-one-against-many.230281/#post-2681445



When I see someone with an invasion then I know they chose it.

They think something happened outside their control, and if you tell them they wanted to be invaded and then became that way, flames ensue

But did spiritwalker entertain his invader? Did he -hesitate- for nine days on an ID thread, buying scopes from amazon, while the invasion spread rock to rock? No, he opted out and so did I and I hope you do as well


We think that to allow an uglies phase in your new tank, again this is something authors promulgate but never stick around to clean, is to purposefully seed and fragment your tank with items that can one day kill it, or cause you to need irregular means. We think the opposite is what saves tanks and causes compliance for all new reefs setup: hand guide then like our grandmas did for dandelions until the garden grew dense enough to crowd out invaders pretty well on its own. Start busy, lessen off as coral loading and coralline increases. All those tanks above purposefully seeded themselves during hands off periods and -limited- *themselves* to water only action. I have to sell most people on why they should directly kill algae, as needed, independent of preventatives, and they consider the notion a fully foreign concept. It should be expected.


Have a clean sandbed at the start so that silt doesn’t set you back. Have a rock structure that is removable, accessible, in some creative way. Expect to have an uglies phase, especially if you buy non live white rock, and work that reef into compliance don’t ever will it into an invaded condition like so many have, do, and will.

Set your water params to what corals want. Not what it takes to starve algae. Make that occur in the condition of perfect coral params and this correctly positions how we should manage nutrient levels in a successful, uninvaded reef tank.

B

Nice post @brandon429

I've been reading some of your posts regarding cycling and your thoughts on sand. I haven't decided whether you are a genius or just crazy yet! (Halfway kidding).

I've noticed you mentioning silt and rinsing sand before in the sand rinsing thread. I tried to decipher some of it and honestly some posts are over my head.

So I already have sand in my tank. What is your advice moving forward? I did initially fill the tank with fresh RODI water before adding salt. Not sure if that matters at all.

I don't know what silt is, but will water changes and sand agitation remove it?

I only have 9 watts of lighting as I currently have a FOWLR for now. Will likely to venture into corals eventually. Do you think anything bad will grow with this lighting?

My nitrates are also at 5 and I do weekly water changes. Is this too low or is it OK?

Also what is your QT stance out of curiosity? Is it prophylacticly QT, observational QT, or no QT with high quality food?

I'll take the short version if possible lol. No need for long explanation or proof, just looking for general advice.
 

brandon429

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Want to show you where my opinions on algae control come from. The years.

Quick scan these for before and after pics. Don’t get too caught on reading mass volume type some of this stuff is outdated peroxide work, we’re in this to see how invasions -present- not what I thought would help.

Look at the vast array, cost, value, volume contained, clam systems, sps systems fish systems on and on. ****nearly every one of them with parameter management in place for nutrients before, during and after invasion****

I wasn’t getting people who jacked their N and P sky high. Back then, nobody would’ve dreamed to dose N or P directly. We were all removing them then, you recall :)

And, some were higher N and P reported measures, just so we don’t claim that nutrients one way or another have a big effect on being algae invaded. Poor nutrients only mean you work harder to maintain surfaces. Ideal nutrients squelch algae and still maintain corals, you work less.


I’ll tell in a sec what patterns I think stand out. Set up your tank oppositely and we should be gtg

Works:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2082359

https://www.nano-reef.com/forums/topic/268706-peroxide-saves-my-tank-with-pics-to-prove-it/?page=62

Just those two threads alone is enough, five yrs or so worth. All in one thread for sifting. Skip my typing just thumb before and after page after page to see the breadth of presentations=ATS, gfo, tang grazers, snail grazers *perfect* top off water still invaded, sunlight or no direct sunlight still invaded, deep sand bed or no deep sand bed invaded, chaeto refugium and still invaded, new tanks and old tanks invaded.

Remember there’s always the sages, artists who command stellar tanks in their living room and they may indeed be very old, and uninvaded.

******we have people replicating their methods who are invaded*****

I’m not trying to debate anyone about philosophy of algae. Am simply relaying the patterns I feel can be validated above, someone let me know if I’m off base claiming, based on those threads, these high points:

Preventatives are not removers

Preventative steps for algae invasion are wonderful, and they’re not intended to be what removes an invader when you see it right there in your tank in spite of things being perfect already. Preventatives include ATS, gfo, all clean up crew members, param tuning for nitrate and phosphate levels of the decade, perfect lighting PAR and any other form of light tuning, using plants to offset waste as in reactors, using UV and and any other method we’ve read in a book is a *preventative* and not a remover.


Since most reefing authors didn’t differentiate between preventatives and removers, they turned out thousands of aquariums destined to seek back- alley science one day to save their five thousand dollar clam tank when preventative approach #8 didn’t work. It’s also the authors fault they don’t run cure threads to evolve their method, heh, but that’s -stinging- accountability we can only ask so much.

Please let me introduce what a remover is, it comes in many forms. What did spiritwalker employ as a remover here? I hadn’t even thought of this idea:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/beeping-green-hair-algae.527285/

I would read his five pages, not quick scan.

A remover is something that takes green hair algae off your rocks yesterday. **not just brushing it off that’s guaranteed growback*** a perfect remover has a kill step, a sustain step. We don’t care what the mechanism is, but kill the algae don’t just brush it off. Spiritwalker used HEAT to denature/dissolve the algae clean off the rocks. The fact he took back ground vs ceding it is the ENTIRE trick to owning a reef tank that is NEVER invaded. He used boiling water. He could have used a blue jet torch lighter and a knife, doesn’t matter, a kill step has a sustaining action beyond just a topical remove that’s very important so that growback is minimized.

He burned the crap out of his GHA, he worried about preventatives after. He ordered the ops vs haphazarding them, this thread is the best recent example I’ve seen for large tank algae control and here’s why:

It’s repeatable.

I myself am a 35% peroxide burner. I don’t use boiling water but the attitude is all that matters, these people aren’t giving up ground anymore. To any excuse. That’s the secret. If you get lucky in preventing, you’ll work less killing the crap out of the target to force compliance in your aquarium, as we do.

Not that I have to treat my tank for algae in years :) but when I used to do it (part of early hand guiding of surfaces to only allow coralline to take over, and never a plant) I would apply 35% peroxide outside of water to the target and toast it gone. Rasp off the surface, refill. Plant a new coral on the spot so it’s flesh creeps over cleared ground and permanently excludes algae (how many of those tanks above had algae ON on a mushroom coral, or on a living brain coral polyp in the oral zone- right on the flesh? Zero. Not one. Flesh is algae excluding and so is coralline, algae grows on anchor points not on rejecting surfaces)

How many times did I need to know someone’s nutrient params in order to get the tank back in line? I struggle to find any times we measured nitrate and phosphate, yet those are algae cure threads. Hmm.

Nutrients affect how often you must employ the remover/burn/kill/destroy method of your choosing, and, since an ocean likes to grow plants- we expect preventatives to NEED HELP sometimes but as you can see, the aquarists above were told that the nutrient tuning and fine preventative alone would work. It doesn’t for the vast majority although a sage is never going to have trouble reefing no matter the setting.

We want to relay information the masses can replicate right now, or report back in an accountability thread that something didn’t work.

The best information is to not stack your initial aquascape with an inaccessible wall of rocks. Create no reason at all you can’t get in there, yank those initial structures out even if coated in live SPS corals, and stab out with a knife any organism that wants to take your tank away from you.

Worried about accessing your tank due to its delicate sandbed? We knew that was a massive source of hesitation (the cause for all mass tank invasions is simply hesitating past day one, when the invader was controllable) so the last set of pages to offer is the sand rinse thread aka the cure to all cyano invasions.

Sandbedders also read from authors who don’t have to stick around to do the cleanup, by all means please consider how following normal sandbed rules works for the masses here:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/t...ead-aka-one-against-many.230281/#post-2681445



When I see someone with an invasion then I know they chose it.

They think something happened outside their control, and if you tell them they wanted to be invaded and then became that way, flames ensue

But did spiritwalker entertain his invader? Did he -hesitate- for nine days on an ID thread, buying scopes from amazon, while the invasion spread rock to rock? No, he opted out and so did I and I hope you do as well


We think that to allow an uglies phase in your new tank, again this is something authors promulgate but never stick around to clean, is to purposefully seed and fragment your tank with items that can one day kill it, or cause you to need irregular means. We think the opposite is what saves tanks and causes compliance for all new reefs setup: hand guide then like our grandmas did for dandelions until the garden grew dense enough to crowd out invaders pretty well on its own. Start busy, lessen off as coral loading and coralline increases. All those tanks above purposefully seeded themselves during hands off periods and -limited- *themselves* to water only action. I have to sell most people on why they should directly kill algae, as needed, independent of preventatives, and they consider the notion a fully foreign concept. It should be expected.


Have a clean sandbed at the start so that silt doesn’t set you back. Have a rock structure that is removable, accessible, in some creative way. Expect to have an uglies phase, especially if you buy non live white rock, and work that reef into compliance don’t ever will it into an invaded condition like so many have, do, and will.

Set your water params to what corals want. Not what it takes to starve algae. this correctly positions how we should manage nutrient levels in a successful, uninvaded reef tank. We don’t alter nutrients around an invader, reactively, we are consistent because corals are our focus and they like consistency.

Remember there are some people who feel that algae and initial invasion aren’t bad, or that they're not ‘invaders’ which I consider any organism associated with loss examples above.

They will never adhere to hand guiding and especially harsh burning, so I’m not trying to win them over in debate (do they run cure threads??)
I wanted to show you how people were just sure their preventatives were gonna work and when they didn’t, the whole plan fell apart but the fix was there all along.
Have a scape/max tank volume set by the degree you are able and willing to access any nook or any cranny including a full water change if required, this is the secret to being algae free. It is a will, a mindset. To be the owner of an invaded reef tank is a matter of psychology not biology. Growback control is the biology portion. the resolved are never invaded day one to day 4000

B

WOW!! A lot to digest. First off the sand was rinsed. The face I made while rinsing live sand was awful. Didn't understand it but did it.

In my little nano I used the peroxide in a syringe to kill off algae as it showed up and I have had good luck with that. Plan on doing the same to the new 54 corner tank. Is that what your thoughts are or you suggesting I literally pull the rock out everytime algae shows up and pour boiling water on it and put it back in?
 

brandon429

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It's that you are choosing among kill options, whichever one won't matter. It's all about the attitude that nothing exists you don't will into the setting :)

I agree that almost nobody who has been referring a long time agrees with this way, they wanted natural approaches where you sit and let things cycle in and out as they may.

The problem with that type of approach is some tanks comply and some tanks do not we can see in my threads


Placing manual control over what grows on your rocks like we do is a lot of work compared to their method but it has a 100% compliance outcome


So the truth is it's ideal not to have to reach in in peroxide or boil the rocks or scrape them with a knife or shoot them with a fire lighter LOL

But that's really the only way you can guarantee compliance out of an early system until maturity guides it into the way you want it to be where you don't have to be so harsh later on, that's my trick for never being invaded

This type of hand guiding doesn't last forever, it ends eventually when the rocks are covered in coral and coralline. I haven't treated my actual rock surfaces for algae since probably 2010. The glass needs cleaning every once in awhile since there's nothing on the actual glass to be rejecting of algae

If you notice patterns it's not uncommon for people to take their rocks out and brush off algae it's been that way for years

The problem with that approach is there's no kill step for the algae, brushing is lawn mowing, mowing doesn't kill a lawn... but they displayed great attitude in assessing the rocks. With a kill step in place, growback lessens or stops.

See this very live action kill target, force control thread. The outcome does not vary when removers are applied first, and preventative steps after.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/the-red-turf-algae-battle.365765/page-2#post-5627188

We are allowed to choose the day that we take decisive action on algae that can become invasive. It can either be day one that it's noticed or deeply into the takeover. A choice of action. the work is the same procedure regardless of the size of tank or the depth of the invasion
 
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Randy Holmes-Farley

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Back to the original question, I’d ignore nitrite and focus on ammonia only. Nitrite is not worth measuring, except for fun. It is not toxic in marine systems. [emoji3]
 
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Back to the original question, I’d ignore nitrite and focus on ammonia only. Nitrite is not worth measuring, except for fun. It is not toxic in marine systems. [emoji3]

Thank you @Randy Holmes-Farley! I have dosed ammonia up to 2ppm two nights in a row and it’s at zero the next day so I’m feeling good about that. Nitrites are still at 10+ and the Nitrates are over 200.

Plan is as follows:
  • 25% water change in a week. Put the sock in the sump and fire up the skimmer to start breaking it in.
  • Week later throw some snail and hermits in there.
  • Let it grow for a couple more weeks and start the livestock in March.
During this process and after, peroxide kill any algae that pops up with syringe.

Anything in that plan sound off?
 

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Not everyone agrees with peroxide use, choices vary there. Some people choose to accept early growths as part of the normal alternation of organisms for a new tank

We show threads of peroxide being used when selected, however.

Peroxide may not be indicated for use depending on what shows up, right now in the main forum a brand new six thousand dollar setup allowed to amass shortly after cycling has early dino invasion onset. We wouldn't have used peroxide on that tank to head off its current track- he needed intervention right when the first spot arrived in the tank (and a quarantine protocol is handy for large tankers vs randomly vectoring every invader into a tank/see if things work out by luck)

Peroxide has very specific times it's used, if ever.
 
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Not everyone agrees with peroxide use, choices vary there. Some people choose to accept early growths as part of the normal alternation of organisms for a new tank

We show threads of peroxide being used when selected, however.

Peroxide may not be indicated for use depending on what shows up, right now in the main forum a brand new six thousand dollar setup allowed to amass shortly after cycling has early dino invasion onset. We wouldn't have used peroxide on that tank to head off its current track- he needed intervention right when the first spot arrived in the tank (and a quarantine protocol is handy for large tankers vs randomly vectoring every invader into a tank/see if things work out by luck)

Peroxide has very specific times it's used, if ever.

Well dang it @brandon429 now you have me second guessing my plan of attack. LOL

Tell you what, when something pops up (let’s be honest something always does) I’ll post a pic and we can discuss the plan at that time.

Does the plan above in post #34 sound good to you?
 

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Thank you @Randy Holmes-Farley! I have dosed ammonia up to 2ppm two nights in a row and it’s at zero the next day so I’m feeling good about that. Nitrites are still at 10+ and the Nitrates are over 200.

Plan is as follows:
  • 25% water change in a week. Put the sock in the sump and fire up the skimmer to start breaking it in.
  • Week later throw some snail and hermits in there.
  • Let it grow for a couple more weeks and start the livestock in March.
During this process and after, peroxide kill any algae that pops up with syringe.

Anything in that plan sound off?
\
The cycling sounds good. Not a big fan of peroxide for algae, but I know many folks like that approach.
 
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why did you put a reef in that
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Yes it will work to both cycle and prevent early invasion. Most of the algae work if any is done outside of tank, without getting any into the main display.
 

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