Help please... Stuck in an unbreakable cycle.

[brandon429]

Ok good on lights, I expect a cuc to do nothing

any remediation taken that leaves the sand full of clouding and the rocks stacked back in full is nearly certain to regrow in a month, only some form of luck can make the partial effort attempt work. If you are able to reach in there and grab sand and drop it now as a test, and a big cloud erupts from anywhere it’s grabbed which I predict will happen, that’s permanent algae feed. Even if the cuc went right to work on point, they merely translocate plant into pellet and then pellet into sand, to degrade into clouding. Scrubbing rocks is 1/5th of the predicted required job based on linked works. None of the links above were fixed with a cuc, it’s honestly why I don’t bank on them


the new cuc skipped fallow is a direct velvet fish disease vector for potential fish harm, posts in the disease forum show.

plus that’s a fourth repeat of rock scrubbing which
hasn’t worked, you’ll need to test model to get off this loop. The loop consists of partial work only on the tank and most of the eutrophic supports remain so the invasion just cycles among genera

if you want off the loop I predict you need at least 50% rock reduction, spaced open accessible bommies and no sand and some form of test modeling you know will work ahead of time.

 

[Gobi-Wan]

Ok good on lights, I expect a cuc to do nothing

any remediation taken that leaves the sand full of clouding and the rocks stacked back in full is nearly certain to regrow in a month, only some form of luck can make the partial effort attempt work. If you are able to reach in there and grab sand and drop it now as a test, and a big cloud erupts from anywhere it’s grabbed which I predict will happen, that’s permanent algae feed. Even if the cuc went right to work on point, they merely translocate plant into pellet and then pellet into sand, to degrade into clouding. Scrubbing rocks is 1/5th of the predicted required job based on linked works. None of the links above were fixed with a cuc, it’s honestly why I don’t bank on them


the new cuc skipped fallow is a direct velvet fish disease vector for potential fish harm, posts in the disease forum show.

plus that’s a fourth repeat of rock scrubbing which
hasn’t worked, you’ll need to test model to get off this loop. The loop consists of partial work only on the tank and most of the eutrophic supports remain so the invasion just cycles among genera

if you want off the loop I predict you need at least 50% rock reduction, spaced open accessible bommies and no sand and some form of test modeling you know will work ahead of time.

well, rock scrubbing and then abandoning the tank didnt work. lol

 

[Gobi-Wan]

I know you love the process and experimenting and gathering data but i'm a rip-the-bandaid-off kind of guy. If all this is eventually leading to a full rip-clean i'd rather just set aside a day and make it happen.

 

[brandon429]

I am 120% sure that’s awesome plan

the green will come back in a few waves but rip cleaned / no feed stores in place will lessen it. I’d choose fluconazole vs vibrant or anything for that job. Post rip clean, when the tank shines, add the dose of fluc that people recommend for that volume and align it as a growback preventer

still test model one or two rocks for practice rasping and spot peroxide


if you use brushing of algae it’s pestling it into the cracks for speedy regrowth, rasping is a knife tip (like an urchins rasp) digging in, lifting up, saltwater rinsed down the sink gone. The peroxide on the cleaned spots, where there are no longer any tufts, burns trace leftovers and even still some will come back but in my opinion this is a winning attitude above and fluc is the helper we want for this job


right now this thread here has a fine fine rip clean in planning but his invasion won’t respond to fluc this isn’t a green plant job. His planning steps sure are nice and orderly

At a loss after our tank almost crashed.. now battling... well, what is it?

First things first ;) T = 25°C +- 0.1°C Salinity = 35 psu Ammonium = 0 Nitrate =0-1 ppm Nitrite = 0 Phosphate almost zero pH = 8.2 3 months ago, just when we thought we were through the "ugly phase", our 250l tank almost crashed because the sump overfilled and caused 3 weeks of skimmed fish...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Gobi-Wan]

I am 120% sure that’s awesome plan

the green will come back in a few waves but rip cleaned / no feed stores in place will lessen it. I’d choose fluconazole vs vibrant or anything for that job. Post rip clean, when the tank shines, add the dose of fluc that people recommend for that volume and align it as a growback preventer

still test model one or two rocks for practice rasping and spot peroxide


if you use brushing of algae it’s pestling it into the cracks for speedy regrowth, rasping is a knife tip (like an urchins rasp) digging in, lifting up, saltwater rinsed down the sink gone. The peroxide on the cleaned spots, where there are no longer any tufts, burns trace leftovers and even still some will come back but in my opinion this is a winning attitude above and fluc is the helper we want for this job


right now this thread here has a fine fine rip clean in planning but his invasion won’t respond to fluc this isn’t a green plant job. His planning steps sure are nice and orderly

At a loss after our tank almost crashed.. now battling... well, what is it?

First things first ;) T = 25°C +- 0.1°C Salinity = 35 psu Ammonium = 0 Nitrate =0-1 ppm Nitrite = 0 Phosphate almost zero pH = 8.2 3 months ago, just when we thought we were through the "ugly phase", our 250l tank almost crashed because the sump overfilled and caused 3 weeks of skimmed fish...

www.reef2reef.com

Is there a video of how to rasp with a knife tip? I don't mind a little algae for my tang and foxface as long as it doesn't grow so fast it gets long and then they won't eat it.

 

[Gobi-Wan]

Also how is the best way to apply peroxide and how long do you leave it? Most of my rocks with the most algae also have large colonies of button polyps growing on them and a few monti's

 

[brandon429]

No but that’s a good idea we can get one some day. It’s going to take a while to work the rocks but there isn’t a better way I’ve seen, this action is modeled from nature

when a parrotfish bites off a chunk of algae rock that’s rasping to the extreme, he leaves a scarred bite mark where there’s base rock and not one spec of algae in that bite hole

a bit extreme agreed, so we stepped down one trophic level and modeled the beak of an urchin same action but only peels off the top layer without a three inch dig mark, I can’t think of anything better than a steak knife and you leaving small dig scars in the rock, that algae is boring and seats into surfaces a little bit that’s why this semi damaging action needs running as it hopefully removes anchors/ holdfasts for the algae to lessen regrowth. Pre test a rock or two using different dig pressures to get an idea

 

[brandon429]

Those corals can sit attached to rocks in the air in the kitchen sink empty as you work, easily half hour but you can pour saltwater across them to keep moist as you rinse away the rasped plants. I have a video of my own nano reef with those corals being drained in the cold living room air for 33 mins straight as an airtime test from years ago.

the peroxide goes on a few minutes, efficacy is unknown it’s why test models are ideal. One section gets rasped rough with a 3 minute peroxide contact delay before final rinse, another section of the rock might get a ten minute burn time. Placing it on the spots with a dropper seems ideal to avoid the coral areas. It does not kill the cycle from the rock even though it seems it would. If going all in at once id do the meanest mode possible to try and lessen regrowth coming, say perhaps rasped rocks get spot applied twice with peroxide on the scraped spots over ten minutes delay, rinsed in saltwater, then set aside for reinstallation. From a mister bottle saltwater can be sprayed on corals to keep wet for the hold/ work time

your main safety risk on a job that huge (Jon shows above in study prep on the 120 rip clean thread) is cloudless reassembly. If the rocks or sand put back have any degree of clouding in the new setup, that’s a mini cycle risk. But if clean, truly clean, zero risk. A hidden detail in Jon’s post is that’s not one rip clean of a 120 it’s ***four*** back to back rip cleans of the same tank. That man was NOT joking around lol that’s why it’s a winners reference thread


@Jon Malkerson forcing the reef tank into compliance

 

[Gobi-Wan]

alright I let er rip today. All my friends are in my footlocker from Afghanistan except the 2” mantis shrimp that came out of a rock that was sitting sprayed with peroxide… what??? I wondered why a couple small fish have disappeared… normally I have very good luck with fish.

 

[Gobi-Wan]

Rasping with the steak knife proved near impossible because of how porous my rock it. For the sake of time I ended up going to town on them with a steel bristle brush. It dig in though with a little work to take the rock back down to white in many places. The rest I put peroxide in a spray bottle and coated it all and let it sit 5 minutes then rinsed in the old saltwater. I am on my 6th bucket of sand washing and it looks like the 7th will finish it out.

 

[brandon429]

Gobi

my gosh that’s a huge job. Hey those rocks in the fish holder look already cleaned and cleared of the attached algae is that right? They look perfect/ free of algae


plus that’s a massive surgical rip clean over very nice hardwood/ lam flooring um bro thats a huge job teetering on the edge of you better not spill a drop that’s solid commit. solid, hammer time commitment


be sure and cup test the sand in a clear glass, it took Shadow_k 100 rinses to get a quarter that much sand clean
looking at a handful of rinsed sand in a clear drinking glass filled roughly with water tells you if it’s all laser clean sand



cloudy sand is literally the top risk aspect to prevent, and it all looks clean and clear so far. The water in the fish tank/ the rocks holding them are laser clear per pics

 

[Gobi-Wan]

 

[brandon429]

Oh wow

I honestly was wondering about that many pounds of sand, you have 100% rip cleaned a massive system

thank you for your documentation, its laser clear barely overnite and your scape is accessible for any follow up guidance. smaller increments of fluconazole can now be considered for growback prevention, I'd choose it over vibrant for this particular challenge

Gobi thank you very much for posting this hard work job you commanded compliance above.

 

[Gobi-Wan]

Gobi

my gosh that’s a huge job. Hey those rocks in the fish holder look already cleaned and cleared of the attached algae is that right? They look perfect/ free of algae


plus that’s a massive surgical rip clean over very nice hardwood/ lam flooring um bro thats a huge job teetering on the edge of you better not spill a drop that’s solid commit. solid, hammer time commitment


be sure and cup test the sand in a clear glass, it took Shadow_k 100 rinses to get a quarter that much sand clean
looking at a handful of rinsed sand in a clear drinking glass filled roughly with water tells you if it’s all laser clean sand



cloudy sand is literally the top risk aspect to prevent, and it all looks clean and clear so far. The water in the fish tank/ the rocks holding them are laser clear per pics

Haha it’s cheap laminate flooring.

 

[Gobi-Wan]

Oh wow

I honestly was wondering about that many pounds of sand, you have 100% rip cleaned a massive system

thank you for your documentation, its laser clear barely overnite and your scape is accessible for any follow up guidance. smaller increments of fluconazole can now be considered for growback prevention, I'd choose it over vibrant for this particular challenge

Gobi thank you very much for posting this hard work job you commanded compliance above.

Thanks I’m pretty sure Dino’s will come back but we will see. There was also a lot of algae around the polyps I couldn’t remove and the big rock on the right has 2 anemones on it and it weights 50# alone so cleanup in that one was very limited

 

[Logical_Plan]

Looks amazing! The rock work placement looks great too! Nice job, I hope this makes tank maintenance much easier and the cycle is broken. Cool to see!

 

[brandon429]

Anticipating their return vs being disheartened by it is ideal


until the magic cure is found it is no rip clean required a long time now

its three gallon incremental siphons. No strands are allowed to mass because 3 gallons is easy work to stick a hose in and siphon them out, or if it presents as anchored algae any rock you lift out specifically doesn’t leave a wake behind of algae feed mixed with invasions. That beautiful tank is primed for access now I think you just commanded back the investment


#1 gear for sure that reduces gardening work in this clean condition is a cheap jebao pond sterilizer off Amazon. They won’t last forever at $120 but they’ll get you two years of reducing your workload about 60% lol not joking. Cheat tool time in my opinion.

 

[Gobi-Wan]

I have one of those jebao pond UV sterilizers. I used to use it for Dino’s, but I would get the kind that go into the water column at night and that sterilizer would zap them in 2 days. But the last few times I’ve been getting the Dino’s that stay on the sand and rocks. A couple months ago I hooked up the Uv sterilizer on a permanent loop in the sump and for a long time the glass stayed clear of film algae pretty well but I think the cheap sterilizer is getting worn out. Either it’s rusting or the lights are encrusted with gunk or whatever eventually happens to the cheap ones. What I really need is a plan to keep the water under control. I don’t know if that means dosing nitrate and phosphate, or just doing water changes or what. When I upgraded to the 125, I really wanted to keep nitrate and phosphate controlled with the ATS and start dosing micronutrients back in with a doser so I could do less water changes. But you saw how that worked out. In the previous setup I basically had the same types of filtration and corals grew like crazy. I had massive chunks of birds nest and monti digitata that were filling up the space. Then I don’t know how it changed so much with the new setup. Both setups had a hand-made ATS as the main source of nutrient reduction. I went through a long period of depression and wasn’t doing much of anything as far as tank maintenance and that’s for the most part probably how it got to the point where it was. But it’s hard to know what’s exactly going on when you can’t measure phosphate and nitrate. I was afraid to do big water changes because it t made the Dino’s come back. I have a 4 part doser but I don’t know where to start with it. What to measure, how to know what I need to dose etc.

 

[brandon429]

That is great input.

I think there's a strong crowd segment who lets the tank cycle among these alternating generations of cover naturally.

I see what you did as directly willing a new look on a new timescale vs the tank selects its own shift timescale and is left alone to all manner of variance and delay.

one thing is certain, live rock is a structure and presentation in a reef tank that is craggy, creviced, pointy, very hard and high surface area but as soon as plants overtake it all the outcome is round, low surface area, containment, soft, extremes of oxygen in diurnal cycles, captures waste vs allows pass over. the high speed jet over surfaces has specific chemistry impacts that will be beneficial and use less oxygen in your system in competition with fish.

cleaned tanks specifically do better in power outage scenarios than old aged tanks because of oxygen demand chemically and biologically. this is a very breathing model to reef select vs wheezy/planted.

when offenders grow back that using up merely 1x regrouping mass, its not bad when they begin its a time to rob that energy. that can't remass forever off a population drop of 99% I have seen all types of blanket invasions stop after some force was applied, and applied thrice if required

 

[Gobi-Wan]

That is great input.

I think there's a strong crowd segment who lets the tank cycle among these alternating generations of cover naturally.

I see what you did as directly willing a new look on a new timescale vs the tank selects its own shift timescale and is left alone to all manner of variance and delay.

one thing is certain, live rock is a structure and presentation in a reef tank that is craggy, creviced, pointy, very hard and high surface area but as soon as plants overtake it all the outcome is round, low surface area, containment, soft, extremes of oxygen in diurnal cycles, captures waste vs allows pass over. the high speed jet over surfaces has specific chemistry impacts that will be beneficial and use less oxygen in your system in competition with fish.

cleaned tanks specifically do better in power outage scenarios than old aged tanks because of oxygen demand chemically and biologically. this is a very breathing model to reef select vs wheezy/planted.

when offenders grow back that using up merely 1x regrouping mass, its not bad when they begin its a time to rob that energy. that can't remass forever off a population drop of 99% I have seen all types of blanket invasions stop after some force was applied, and applied thrice if required

Thank you and everyone else for the advice and prodding me to move forward on a big project. I probably could have done a better job but I didn’t want to leave everything disassembled overnight as some of the containers were not heated and I didn’t want them to drop all the way to room temp before mixing it all back together. So I did the best I could in a single day project. Hoping that a 90% reduction and dosing a good bacteria starting today is enough to tip the scales back in favor of the correct microfauna and allow some nutrients to build back up. The one good thing about all that algae was the tank was covered on every square inch with copepods. Now there’s nothing left for my mandarin. Luckily he is very very fat right now.