Gha has won tank breakdown

[WallyB]

I would not call it quits! You have been given some great advice so far. Many have gone thru this before you and successfully won the GHA battle, myself included. Basically your chain of events seems to me like you were chasing numbers and making too many adjustments. As others have already stated, below is what I have done and recommend:

1. Do Not use any algae removing chemicals
2. Get your phosphate & nitrate in check with GFO and carbon dosing and regular water changes. Phosphate below .08, Nitrate 5ppm or less
3. If you feel your SPS are starving dose some Reef Energy or equivalent
4. Once nitrate and phosphate levels are in check, remove the rock and scrub all the gha off. Also give your sand bed a good siphoning.
5. Continue to keep nitrate and phosphate low and the gha will run its course. You may have to repeat step 4 one or more times. But if you keep your nitrate and phosphate in check it will run its course
6. In the future I would never ever dose nutrients, I would simply feed more.

Good luck and dont get discouraged. The bottom line is if you control your nutrient levels the gha will run its course.

Hi again,

I general agree with referenced post.

100% agree on No Chemicals to treat GHA, since you are not removing the GHA (and what it's composed of), in your closed system. And whatever is in the Chemical is more things you don't need in your water. (maybe frequent water changes, and a super skimmer might remove something...only IF you do things right)

Any treatment (other then physically REMOVING GHA FROM TANK) will leave something in your system (like Phosphates in GHA Die Off).
And since OP has SPS....... any swings due to Phosphate Rise, then Drop using GFO or similar products could cause damage to sensitive SPS.

This Following is important to know about PHOSPHATE READINGS....

When you have a GHA/Algae outbreak, your Phosphate testing is totally off.
When Algae is rapidly consuming Phosphates from the Water Colum, the phosphate in Rocks/Sand is much higher than picked up by the test kits.
Rocks are actually slowly leaching out Phosphate (that is why rock are growing algae close to them)

So you will most likely see a P=0 or very close. That is why OP made a BIG mistake of adding Phosphates, when there was no need in increase phosphates.
Adding phosphate fueled/accelerated the GHA.

Only when the Algae Bloom is over can you get an proper phosphate reading.

I also don't believe in too much CUC during Major GHA outbreak. Not many critters will touch the GHA Long Strands. I know I tested every snail species.
If GHA is groomed short (maybe some critters will consider a bite, but not much to help a large coverage)
The problem with Hermits, is they rip the Long GHA strands, and let them go, tangling into SPS.
The only thing that will eat Long Strands of GHA (cleanly) is a Sea Hare, and certain Large Cowrie Snails (Caution on Tiger Cowrie Species since they eat Corals)
And if you overload CUC and Algae Goes away, a good portion will die, leading to other problems, like another Algae Bloom, etc.

 

[Scott's reef]

I went through the same battle, try'd everything and found that 12% food grade h2o2 was my fix. I use 1 ml p/ gal daily and i apply to the patches of gha. Rotter tube reef on Youtube has vids about it.

 

[Ling_Thing]

Maybe I missed it. But did OP ever mention what kind of rock was used to start the tank? Pukani, Macro, Haitian, etc. and then dry dead rock, dry live rock, real live rock etc.

Sorry I forgot to mention that! 80 lbs of Carib sea life rock shapes.

 

[IslandLifeReef]

Sorry I forgot to mention that! 80 lbs of Carib sea life rock shapes.

Have you decided on how to proceed? If you don't have any corals encrusting on your rock, I would really consider following @brandon429's method. I followed it as close as I could, but I couldn't take any extreme measures on the rock since I had coral encrusting it. I just did a thorough scrubbing where I could and it seems to have worked. I did have a little cyano for about a week after, but not more than I could syphon with a baster. Even that has gone now.

 

[shollis2814]

I am not saying don't do H2O2. I am saying be careful. It can make your tank a little more volatile. I lost everything after I dosed alk too close to my peroxide dosing.

 

[WallyB]

Sorry I forgot to mention that! 80 lbs of Carib sea life rock shapes.

Interesting.
Was your whole Tank started with Dead Carib Sea Argonite Artificial rock?
Did you seed your tank with Coraline with incoming Frags, Corals, or other Live Rock pieces.
The Caribsea rock is treated with something to activate it after going into your tank.... to become live. (Not sure what they coat with...some kind of BioFood-powder)
The purple coloration on the New Dead pieces isn't Coraline, it's (I think) artificial coloration to get a great looking start.
As I mentioned I added my first Caribsea Arch rock months ago and it went thru an real ugly brown algae stage. Only after Coraline took over did it stabilize and look good.
Don't get me wrong. I love the Man made Caribsea rock for the shapes you get, that you would have a hard time finding naturally.
Since I wanted to complete my rockscape I actually added another CaribSea ARCH rock a week ago. Again like last time it just starting to turn brown, and will probably go through another ugly stage (till it comes to life). I expect that to take about 2 months to fully clear up.

I personally can't imagine what a whole tank of CaribSea rock would go through to become stabilized and clean. Even longer to become fully live.

 

[coezy2]

I know this may no be an answer, however I had it start in my 180 display after about 10 months! I fought it and then gave up! Left the tank alone other that feeding my fish and after 3 months it ran its cycle and is totally gone! Coraline is growing crazy again! It was so bad, you couldn't see the rock, sand or thru the glass! You can't always fight mother nature! Granted, everyone won't deal with a green tank for a few months but I had another display tank that was older to look at and watch things grow!

 

[Ling_Thing]

Update after a little over a week...

 

[Ling_Thing]

Update after a little over a week...

Most of the gha melted and turned into cyano so I’ll wait another week and blast it with chemi clean and I should be good to go?

 

[Mical]

I had a GHA problem a couple of years ago, while I was visiting relatives in Denver I stopped by Neptunes Tropical Fish store and the owner told me to use Kents Tech M and raise my magnesium up to 1500. Tried it and within 10 days GHA was gone never to return.

Btw - Neptunes Tropical Fish store has the largest Hammer coral in captivity -

 

[Ling_Thing]

I had a GHA problem a couple of years ago, while I was visiting relatives in Denver I stopped by Neptunes Tropical Fish store and the owner told me to use Kents Tech M and raise my magnesium up to 1500. Tried it and within 10 days GHA was gone never to return.

Btw - Neptunes Tropical Fish store has the largest Hammer coral in captivity -

I was thinking of trying that but I went with Algaefix instead it’s like magic in a bottle

 

[Ling_Thing]

I had a GHA problem a couple of years ago, while I was visiting relatives in Denver I stopped by Neptunes Tropical Fish store and the owner told me to use Kents Tech M and raise my magnesium up to 1500. Tried it and within 10 days GHA was gone never to return.

Btw - Neptunes Tropical Fish store has the largest Hammer coral in captivity -

I heard from Randy Holmes Farley the only reason Kent’s tech m worked at 1500 ppm is because it had a pollutant in the early recipe with lithium and that was what supposedly killed the algae but I can’t confirm this.

 

[DanConnor]

Looking great!

 

[Ling_Thing]

Here’s an update...gha is about 99% gone and 1 round of chemi clean cleaned up the cyano. I think we’re back on track...

 

[Skynyrd Fish]

Looking good.

 

[pickupman66]

Add in some Dr Tim's or some other bacteria in a bottle as well now to help keep that cyano in check. It is a bacteria so let some better ones our compete it.

 

[Ling_Thing]

Add in some Dr Tim's or some other bacteria in a bottle as well now to help keep that cyano in check. It is a bacteria so let some better ones our compete it.

I just got a bottle of dt. Tims waste away what do you think about that? Or should i use the regular nitrifying bacteria from dr. Tim?

 

[pickupman66]

This