Help on an ID and solution

[toybox22]

Hey guys. I'm dealing with this right now. I think it's green turf algae. I'm not sure how to get rid of it.

Levels are:
Alk- 9
Cal- 450
Mag- 1500
Nitrate - 10
Phosphate - .03

40% water change once a week. It's only a IM40.

I haven't been feeding the because I haven't had any fish in the tank. I've only been dosing Fuel.

 

[reeferfoxx]

I'd stop dosing Fuel for awhile till this is under control. What's your filtration?

 

[toybox22]

I'd stop dosing Fuel for awhile till this is under control. What's your filtration?

I just put a bag of GFO in. Its been running with purigen and marinepure. I have an HOB 1.5 skimmer. And a Santa Monica algae scrubber thats been in the tank for like a month.

I should note I have an AP700 over this tank. But its been at 30% intensity with diffusers.

 

[reeferfoxx]

I just put a bag of GFO in. Its been running with purigen and marinepure. I have an HOB 1.5 skimmer. And a Santa Monica algae scrubber thats been in the tank for like a month.

I should note I have an AP700 over this tank. But its been at 30% intensity with diffusers.

How long has the tank been running? How many fish?

 

[toybox22]

Been running since August. So it is still kinda new. But the tank had been running for a year before that and I redid my rock work in August. Added a some new dry rock which could be the issue.

No fish so I haven't been feeding. Maybe the low nutrients is the cause?

 

[reeferfoxx]

Ok, I did some thread stalking ;Lurking. Looks like the tank hasn't been running long. Honestly, you have a lot of ways to export nutrients and what really needs to happen is the tank needs to mature. The nutrients need to kind of fester in the water for awhile to establish its bacterial and microbial defenses. At this point in the stage you need to not run marine pure or GFO. The purigen is fine but messing with the nutrients will create more issues down the road. The new dry rock will leech some PO4 but that is ok. Keep your clean up crew high in numbers. Maybe think about herbivores like a lawnmower blennie, more turbo snails and maybe an urchin.

 

[reeferfoxx]

Oh and the turf scrubber should be fine too.

 

[toybox22]

haha. Well I haven't updated my thread since I redid the rock work. So it's more or less a new tank as of August. But what you're saying makes sense. It is still a new tank. And I think because I didn't deal with algae when I first set it up a year ago, I'm just thinking something is wrong now.

I actually grabbed two urchins today to try and help. So that's good to know.

Pulling the marinepure isn't cause a cycle?

 

[reeferfoxx]

Pulling the marinepure isn't cause a cycle?

Well it really depends on its intended use. It can be used for denitrification or basically like live rock. What we don't want is denitrification.

 

[toybox22]

It was intended as extra live rock for biological filtration since I have an all in one tank. I have a chamber in the back full of spheres.

 

[reeferfoxx]

I have a chamber in the back full of spheres.

Double post

 

[reeferfoxx]

I have a chamber in the back full of spheres.

Yeah, this type of use is for denitrification. Once the bacteria grows more, you'll start seeing a nitrate imbalance causing cyano and other unwanted algae issues. Best to keep it simple. Your WCs alone will be fine till the bioload from fish and more coral increases.

 

[toybox22]

I was actually dealing with red cyano on my sand bed about a month ago.

Alright. I'll pull the GFO and marinepure and keep up on my water changes. Hopefully between that and my CUC it'll get taken care of.

 

[toybox22]

I appreciate the help!

 

[reeferfoxx]

I appreciate the help!

Trust me. I've made my fair share of mistakes. Only here to keep from seeing it again

And you're welcome.