Issues that I'm currently seeing:
Originally when I started my reef tank I started with dry rock, no real sources of "good" corraline algae. But I ended up getting nuisance algae over time. I had my phosphate at one point increase to > 1.0 (likely 3.0, as Hanna was going out of bounds after 30% water changes until a second or third water change at about 2 months or 3 months of me being in the hobby). This was when my nuisance algae started, but LaCl dosing + GFO + big water changes corrected the water param problem, and later cleaners (described below) I was able to actually remove nuisance algaes / cyano.
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So I've been battling nuisance algae in my reef tank for months now. I've been dosing Algae Fix, Chemiclean, and Fluconazole to keep that Algae at bay. With manual removal, I was actually able to clean up my tank to a pretty "clean" setup.
However I ended up doing a big water change before then dosing corraline algae in a bottle (purple helix and pink fusion) and the water was clean for ~ 3 days (bacteria is in the bottle). I did not redose the above cleaners. Things were looking pretty good. However I then dosed a small amount of what I thought was my Nanocloropsis culture, but I then saw a bunch of my nuisance algae come back.
At this time of dosing, Phosphate measured at about 0.14 after 2 days of dosing "phyto". I saw all my algae problems come back (Bryopsis, GHA) and black and green cyano which I think is Spirulina. This leads me to two conclusions:
1. My phytoculture has a significant amount of unconsumed fertilizer but is no longer uptaking it.
2. While I do have this green water culture going on, I no longer think I have nanocloropsis here -- I see extreme amounts of settlement on the walls of my jar
So when restarting my culture, it will start looking like a typical green water culture here: https://thumbs.dreamstime.com/b/spirulina-culture-plastic-bottle-79015527.jpg
But there is still some stringy stuff growing, and the color of my culture doesn't go from dark green -> yellow, it goes from dark green -> light green -> clear-slightly whitish, as in there is bacteria in a bottle white, eg a "culture crash" from what I've seen other people document this as.
However, my culture doesn't just crash here -- it goes into a battle for infinity between bacteria and some other green culture, which I think is how spiruliuna got into here in the first place.
Water Parameters at 4/16/2022
Phosphate: 0.07 Hanna LR Checker
Nitrates: 0.1 ~ 0.0 Salifert
KH: ~11
CA: 460
MG: 640 <- I think this might be test-kit error, this seems to test low even after doing a 40% water change, this is the rikka test kit which reviews mentioned that MG testing was usually low. I don't have much SPS in this tank, just a couple montis but mostly soft corals.
Given that I'm having the equivalent of nuisance algae here, what should my next steps here? Currently my plan is to redose the above cleaners as mentioned above, do a water change, then redose for a second dosage, and then go from there -- but is there anything else I can / should do to speed up the growth of corraline in my tank (which all this nuisance algae is extremely outcompeting?)
Originally when I started my reef tank I started with dry rock, no real sources of "good" corraline algae. But I ended up getting nuisance algae over time. I had my phosphate at one point increase to > 1.0 (likely 3.0, as Hanna was going out of bounds after 30% water changes until a second or third water change at about 2 months or 3 months of me being in the hobby). This was when my nuisance algae started, but LaCl dosing + GFO + big water changes corrected the water param problem, and later cleaners (described below) I was able to actually remove nuisance algaes / cyano.
------------------
So I've been battling nuisance algae in my reef tank for months now. I've been dosing Algae Fix, Chemiclean, and Fluconazole to keep that Algae at bay. With manual removal, I was actually able to clean up my tank to a pretty "clean" setup.
However I ended up doing a big water change before then dosing corraline algae in a bottle (purple helix and pink fusion) and the water was clean for ~ 3 days (bacteria is in the bottle). I did not redose the above cleaners. Things were looking pretty good. However I then dosed a small amount of what I thought was my Nanocloropsis culture, but I then saw a bunch of my nuisance algae come back.
At this time of dosing, Phosphate measured at about 0.14 after 2 days of dosing "phyto". I saw all my algae problems come back (Bryopsis, GHA) and black and green cyano which I think is Spirulina. This leads me to two conclusions:
1. My phytoculture has a significant amount of unconsumed fertilizer but is no longer uptaking it.
2. While I do have this green water culture going on, I no longer think I have nanocloropsis here -- I see extreme amounts of settlement on the walls of my jar
So when restarting my culture, it will start looking like a typical green water culture here: https://thumbs.dreamstime.com/b/spirulina-culture-plastic-bottle-79015527.jpg
But there is still some stringy stuff growing, and the color of my culture doesn't go from dark green -> yellow, it goes from dark green -> light green -> clear-slightly whitish, as in there is bacteria in a bottle white, eg a "culture crash" from what I've seen other people document this as.
However, my culture doesn't just crash here -- it goes into a battle for infinity between bacteria and some other green culture, which I think is how spiruliuna got into here in the first place.
Water Parameters at 4/16/2022
Phosphate: 0.07 Hanna LR Checker
Nitrates: 0.1 ~ 0.0 Salifert
KH: ~11
CA: 460
MG: 640 <- I think this might be test-kit error, this seems to test low even after doing a 40% water change, this is the rikka test kit which reviews mentioned that MG testing was usually low. I don't have much SPS in this tank, just a couple montis but mostly soft corals.
Given that I'm having the equivalent of nuisance algae here, what should my next steps here? Currently my plan is to redose the above cleaners as mentioned above, do a water change, then redose for a second dosage, and then go from there -- but is there anything else I can / should do to speed up the growth of corraline in my tank (which all this nuisance algae is extremely outcompeting?)
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