i need help

[yudruln8]

hi guys I don't know what I should do but here goes. I have a 40 gallon breeder frag tank with 20 gallon sump. my filtration is one piece of live rock and cheato in the sump with a 300 watte led light for it. i have 4 corals sps ive had for a month and my lights on the tank is a mars aqua 300w mounted 17' above the water. one sps has some pe and the others don't at all. the one with the pe green slimmer is turning pale up top but the bottem half is dark green other have turned brown. when i first got the led light i didn't have a par meter so i bought one and took reading top of the corals were at 400ish i lower par to about 300ish top of corals and 200 bottem of the corals they are on a egg crate. i brunt the tips on them i was guessing it was because it was low nutrents heres why.
mag-1400
alk-8.2-7.7
cal-425
salinity-1.026
nitrate ive been dosing to keep 2.5-5.0
phos with Hannah-0.00 also dosing with seachem florush
temp-76-79
my cheato stop growing even with dosing and i went from 3 fish to 16 fish still have to dose nitrates with feeding 3-4 times a day i feed them flakes,pellets and algae sheets
tank is also bare bottem i don't know what to do salt mix is ritz pro and i do 10% weekly water changes
i get brown algae growing in the tank and now cynao is almost gone i vac it out when i see it grow lights are on blue 10hrs white 8 or 9hrs

 

[RobZilla04]

Several possibilities here. First without pictures, it is very hard to tell the extent of your algae growth. If there is a lot, chances are the algae is consuming the nutrients (Nitrate & Phosphate) before the corals. Also the algae could be driving your pH down. No mention of a skimmer. If you do not have one, get one. With 16 fish you should have plenty of bio load to maintain positive phosphates and nitrates without dosing. Especially if the only filtration is a single rock in the sump.

You can send a sample of water for testing either to Triton or ATI to get more accurate and full results.

Cyano is bacterial. That's a tell tale sign that something is outta whack. I suspect low Po4 due to algae and chaeto coupled with high nitrates from dosing, bio load, and likely test kit error.

 

[yudruln8]

Several possibilities here. First without pictures, it is very hard to tell the extent of your algae growth. If there is a lot, chances are the algae is consuming the nutrients (Nitrate & Phosphate) before the corals. Also the algae could be driving your pH down. No mention of a skimmer. If you do not have one, get one. With 16 fish you should have plenty of bio load to maintain positive phosphates and nitrates without dosing. Especially if the only filtration is a single rock in the sump.

You can send a sample of water for testing either to Triton or ATI to get more accurate and full results.

Cyano is bacterial. That's a tell tale sign that something is outta whack. I suspect low Po4 due to algae and chaeto coupled with high nitrates from dosing, bio load, and likely test kit error.

hi thanks for the reply I have no skimmer nitrates drop from 5 to 2.5 salifert test kit new and Hannah packets are also new I clean the walls of the algae in the tank it takes more then a few days to start seeing a light brown algae film

 

[yudruln8]

whats weird is the cheato hasn't grown in two months it just stays dark green before I cut it it grow from a small ball to 5 gallon bucket amount

 

[RobZilla04]

hi thanks for the reply I have no skimmer nitrates drop from 5 to 2.5 salifert test kit new and Hannah packets are also new I clean the walls of the algae in the tank it takes more then a few days to start seeing a light brown algae film

How old is the tank and how much rock is in it total would you say?

 

[yudruln8]

How old is the tank and how much rock is in it total would you say?

tank is at least 3 or more years old and only one live rock about 5 lbs it has a coral on it that's why its in there

 

[yudruln8]

gonna do a 20% water change today

 

[RobZilla04]

tank is at least 3 or more years old and only one live rock about 5 lbs it has a coral on it that's why its in there

Anything else for bacteria to grow/live on such as Marine Pure bricks, balls, bio balls, etc?

That's a big bio load for not a lot of surface area to contain bacteria. Possible that there could be enough to consume all those excess nutrients from the 16 fish waste, extra food, & any coral food you feed. Possibly, but cannot be certain. If you trust your test results then it is what it is.

Dust algae on the glass is much different than turf, GHA, diatoms, etc. Everyone gets dust algae that needs to be cleaned off now and then.