Keeping Chaeto Alive - Supplementation?

[dragonfish]

FOLLOWING

 

[4fishies]

I had problems for awhile until I started stretching out the cheato a bit once a week. Just enough so the water flow can get through better.

 

[Fence13]

I'm battling this similar issue with my attempt at a fuge. I switched out the first and second chamber in my trigger sump and I just bought a Kessil H80 light this week. Unfortunately all I have is a small clump of caulerpa and this one weird algae that is viney and looks like gummy worms when you pull it out. No clue what it was but the LFS had it mixed in with the rest of the macros.

I'm going to try and buy another seeding of chaeto to see if I can get it to take off with the rest of the macros and not melt away. I'm currently battling a small cyano issue and hair algae is growing in my refugium so I know I have nutrients....

Here's a pic of my current fuge setup.

 

[7hogwarts]

I'm battling this similar issue with my attempt at a fuge. I switched out the first and second chamber in my trigger sump and I just bought a Kessil H80 light this week. Unfortunately all I have is a small clump of caulerpa and this one weird algae that is viney and looks like gummy worms when you pull it out. No clue what it was but the LFS had it mixed in with the rest of the macros.

I'm going to try and buy another seeding of chaeto to see if I can get it to take off with the rest of the macros and not melt away. I'm currently battling a small cyano issue and hair algae is growing in my refugium so I know I have nutrients....

Here's a pic of my current fuge setup.

Is there any flow in your system? It looks stagnant.

 

[Fence13]

There is flow, a mag 5 for the 93g cube so about 3 - 4x turnover if I remember correctly. But due to the way I changed around the chambers I'm the trigger sump there is nothing to break up the surface tension in the first section. Could that be part of my problem?

 

[Fence13]

Wondering if I should switch it back to the second chamber as it was designed

 

[K. Steven]

There is flow, a mag 5 for the 93g cube so about 3 - 4x turnover if I remember correctly. But due to the way I changed around the chambers I'm the trigger sump there is nothing to break up the surface tension in the first section. Could that be part of my problem?

What is your head height for the Mag 5? If it's any considerable distance (>4 feet), you are likely getting less than 500 gph from it. For example, at 5 feet head height, a Mag 5 will push 325 gph.

 

[Fence13]

It's about 4ft, plus or minus a few inches. But that's still 3.5x turnover?

 

[K. Steven]

Yes, but you will want more flow through your refugium. Do you have a pump in there or something providing more flow through it? I have a 90 gph pump in my refugium to help spin my macro. It tends to get slimy with only the return pump flow through it.

 

[40B Knasty]

I just started a cheato reactor as well. It has been amazing! Here is the thing. I had a large amount in there to drop the phosphates down to zero. Now that it is where I need it to be. I ripped 3/4 of it out to maintain a balance. The cheato stays alive, because there is a small amount of cheato. Now, every week I rinse it off with new saltwater and I make sure it does not have anymore than I need.

 

[Chris Villalobos]

Salty, agreed but I don't want to have to keep buying/tracking down chateo starters when I get to low nutrients and it melts. Want to keep a small amount growing.

If your running other filters like a skimmer maybe you could turn it off? Or maybe you could add more livestock?

 

[dmw913]

If your running other filters like a skimmer maybe you could turn it off? Or maybe you could add more livestock?

I ultimately added another fish and really upped my feeding. Seems like I’m finding a decent balance.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Adding I to your tank helps keep chaeto growing.

That was not my experience. I found no statistical benefit to iodine supplementation to growing chaeto or caulerpa.

Chemistry And The Aquarium: Iodine In Reef Tanks 2: Effects On Macroalgae Growth ? Advanced Aquarist | Aquarist Magazine and Blog
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/april2003/chem.htm

Figure 2. The growth of Chaetomorpha sp. samples as a function of position across the test apparatus.

Iron, on the other hand, can make an immediate effect (visually, even) on macroalgae if it is deficient. The owner of a big reef board found his macroalgae greened up a lot after dosing iron for the first time.

 

[BigJohnny]

Once your reactor or refugium is doing its job and your nutrients are going down, at some point, do you need to supplement to keep the macro algae alive and doesn’t melt into nothingness? I know the folks at Pax Bellum have supplements that they recommend.

It makes sense to me that eventually the algae will use up the nutrients and you’ll need to feed it.

Thoughts?

Thanks!

D

Just reduce your refugium photoperiod or intensity to find a balance. You and your livestock are constantly adding nutrients to the system, so you can't use them all up. The supplements are to make the algae grow faster, not to keep it growing if it doesn't have enough nutrients coming in.

 

[cjb428]

My tank runs ultra low nutrients but my chaeto outgrows my sump within a few months, so I assume the chaeto is responsible for the nutrient export. I have a lot of pods as I purchased a Thisbe and app cyclops starter kit from marine depot early in the game and reproduction seem pretty good. My chaeto is full of pods ranging from nearly microscopic to adult sizes. I removed 3/4 of my chaeto yesterday and put it in a 10 gallon tank to see if I couldn’t get a pod culture going but there are no fish in there so I’m guessing I’m going to have to dose some kind of nutrients to keep the chaeto alive?

 

[BeejReef]

Chaeto does best in high flow. I don't understand why so often it is put into a low flow compartment.
It's hard to balance multiple factors like gfo, chaeto, N and P dosing. Someone has to be top dog in the sump export business. If it's chaeto for you, then give it the love it needs.. lol

I agree with your basic assumption that you may have to "feed it" if it is your main method of exporting nutrients. Those who carbon dose or run denitrator reactors feed them. As was mentioned, not all systems are perfectly balanced with N and P. If your chaeto depletes all your P, you may have to dose it, or N will continue to rise.

Likewise with trace elements. Apparently, various macro-algaes deplete these faster or slower and may outstrip the trace's in your water changes or dosing regiment. Still would not dose anything I'm not testing for.

If you happen to have a pretty balanced system and your chaeto lowers your levels to a range you like and they stay there, I'd leave it be. You don't need it to grow explosively. It just needs to stay alive and keep pace with what your fish are putting out. If you've zeroed your N and P, first move would be to reduce your photoperiod... probably can get away with as little as 4 hours a day.

 

[cjb428]

never thought of reducing the photo period, im running 24 hrs right now on my fuge. i dont seem to have a problem growing chaeto in my fuge which i would consider to be a higher flow area i was just looking for something productive to use the excess chaeto removed from my sump. that chaeto is packed full of copepods and i didnt want to just throw it away which was the resoning behind putting it into a 10 gal. obviously tho its recommended for very little flow for pod cultivations and the 10 gal has no fish in it so there is no waste production for the chaeto to consume. i did go aheah and take new test reading of my display this morning after removing about a basketball sized ball of chaeto from the fuge and they are as follows

Cal 460 ppm Red Sea test kit
phos 12 ppb Hanah ULR conversion to ppm via a chart from their website is 0.03 ppm
Alk 9.4 dKH Hanah tester
Mag 1450 ppm Salifert
Nitrate 0.2 ppm Salifert
Amonia 0 Salifert
Ph 8.0 Hanah Probe
Potassium 390 ppm Salifert
Salinity 1.025 Ice Cap Test Probe
Temp 77.3 F via Ice Cap Test probe

I'm looking to maximize coral growth and was concerned these low level may inhibit rapid growth.
this system is still pretty young and the majority of my corals are all frags. It is a 120 gal tank with aprox 12 gallon fuge. the system is 8 months old and the majority of the growth i am noticing is my zoas seem to be doing well. I see alot of people posting that they are having to trim stuffback monthly and i have a few frags ive had for a few months and dont seem to notice any growth out of. coloration looks good but that is all.

 

[Enigma84]

So in my case I have 50ppm nitrate and it's got up to 0.6 phosphate before I had to take action and carbon dose a little vodka. I have a h380 lighting it for 8 hours a day, and have just raised it up and used a diffuser plate as I figured I might be giving it too much light. Now it's around 1000 par on the surface and 300 on the bottom of my red sea reefer 625xxl sump.
My potassium is 390 and reasonable consistent. Kh 10. Calc 460. Mag 1400.

I did have some growth but it's tappered off to almost none now. Admittedly it's still dark green and the tank is only 8 months old due to a fluconazole overdose on my 8 year reef.

I have previously grown chaeto in a reactor in rediculously consistent amounts and Ulva in an algae scrubber for well over a year adding only a little randy recipe iron, but this was on the established tank.

I would consider myself a relatively experienced aquarist at running an established tank, with what I know but this is new territory for me. Everything I can test for doesn't throw up any problems. An ICP says a few things were out, but I've effectively replaced the whole tank with small 8 percent water changes to try and level out any issues with trace elements the past few months.

For those saying you don't have the nutrients, so don't run chaeto, this is quite frustrating. It may be some of the trace elements I'm missing, but this is preventing my chaeto from pulling down no3 and po4. My pH doesn't really go above 8.1 to 8.2 either.

On my previous tank, I was running the same outdoor drawn air into a co2 scrubber and getting 8.4-8.5 consistently.

I would suggest my my is so low as the chaeto ain't growing. I have the light, the right chemistry, a 4000 lph pump of its own tumbling the chaeto and everything I can test for is in the correct range.

The only thing I can think is the following:
1) I'm missing a magic element such as mobdylenyum, manganese, cobalt, zinc, copper... Where does it stop
2) my co2 scrubber is taking away the co2 needed for the chaeto to grow. I doubt this as I grew it well when the tank was running a few months and I have tried it without for a few days with no change.
3) something to do with my systems bacterial immaturity is holding back some vitamins they would normally produce such as vitamin b12?

On paper it should be going mental. I am guessing it's one trace element I'm missing, so I've ordered some Kent marine iron and manganese to see if this helps.
Other than that, I'm £380 down for a light that doesn't help me...

 

[William Robinson]

I've had chaeto growing in my refugium a long time now (years) sometime it grows fairly quickly and sometime it just stalls out and maintains its size for weeks. When it grows I trim it down to a baseball size and sale it to my LFS for credit. I've never dosed or supplemented anything to the tank for it's benefit. I am a heavy feeder so it probably likes that.

 

[evan47]

Many run a reverse cycle from the DT to keep the overall ph more stable.

Yes running a reverse cycle does help as chaeto will benefit with a regular dark period.
Also, there are dedicated macro growing lamps on the market with white/red/blue leds that are quite effective.
Manually turning over your chaeto as well as rinsing it in tank water during water changes is a good practice (unless your are growing pods in there.