Phosphate and algae issues, cant grow chaeto

[Gobi-Wan]

I have a 6 month old reef tank with some issues I cant understand. I haven't been able to grow chaeto no matter what I try, but my phosphate is over 2ppm and green hair algae has been going nuts in the display for months. Nitrate about 5ppm. I have a 10g refugium with a par36 led grow light. When I first tried growing chaeto I just dropped it in with the sand and rock rubble and it grew slimy gunk on top of it. Then I tried separating it into it's own bare bottom section of the fuge with tons of flow and I tumbled it. That didnt work. Lighting it more than 12 hours a day didnt work. Dosing iron didnt help. The owner of my LFS (the one with best practices in the area IMO) said using biopellets as a form of carbon dosing would help get the "redfield ratio" in check, simultaneously lowering phosphate and nitrate and somehow promoting the growth of my chaeto. Does this make sense to anyone? Or are there other ways to get my hair algae under control in the display and grow chaeto in the fuge? Also if I use a biopellet reactor, I'm not sure if the discharge can be hooked to my octo 110 skimmer- it just has a pump sticking off the side... not really an "intake"
I'm so sick of scrubbing this crap off the rocks every week!
Thanks in advance!

 

[Crabs McJones]

Are you running gfo or anything similar in the system now? Can you link the grow light you're using? And what lighting are you using over the display tank?

 

[ca1ore]

Chaeto can be temperamental sometimes. Dosing iron is always my first piece of advice, but you’ve already tried that. Light is probably not the problem, as chaeto is usually undemanding (though some lights will grow it better than others). I have had recent similar issues. After years of robust growth, my chaeto decided to stop growing. Coincided with higher than normal phosphate levels, though maybe correlation rather than causation. Regardless, I decided to start running GFO again. I also use an ATS, have you considered that?

 

[nereefpat]

Sorry the chaeto isn't growing.

With phosphate that high, I would try more aggressive methods to get that down. GFO in a reactor is the standard. Have you thought about lanthanum chloride?

Once you get the phosphate under control, the hair should go away.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Chaeto requires light, iron supplement and soft water flow to thrive. Todays chaeto lights does wonders and produces masses of thick green balls which people often have to give away.
You will have to use a combo of carbon and GFO to reduce the nitrate levels to provide an ideal water environment for chaeto.....however use GFO sparingly as it is strong working ferric oxide.

 

[Gobi-Wan]

Only thing I have is a bag of carbon in one of the tubes that my display overflow dumps into. Overflow dumps into 2 tubes, one has carbon one has polyfil, then goes through the skimmer chamber, then the return chamber, the return splits and goes to the display and the fuge, then the fuge dumps back into the return chamber. The display light was a Current Orbit Marine LED- it had 1/2watt LEDs and was just enough to grow my LPS (frogspawn torch hammer and duncan). For Christmas I got a viparspectra 300w black box. Just mounted it yesterday so a lot more light in the display now. I'm afraid it's going to make the whole situation worse. The fuge light is a thinklux led bulb. I cant find it on Amazon anymore but I'll put up a pic. It's a single par36 or par38 diode.

 

[vetteguy53081]

That light should work. You have water flowing thru the chaeto - Yes??

 

[fish farmer]

What is your WC schedual like? Do you have a cleanup crew?

I had/have a similar GHA issue with high PO4(2ppm) and nitrates around 20ppm. I started with 10% WC every other week, pulled what I could, added a CUC and once the GHA was under control after several months, I added chaeto to the sump with a small plant bulb from Home Depot and it grows well. It is in a section before my skimmer and it gets some flow. It hasn't completely fixed my nutrient issues, but is a start.

 

[BuvRahl]

I'm not an expert as some of the others, but ran into this issue as well. What was my fix? C02 levels were to high which kept my ph on the lower side and the abnormal gas exchange didn't allow the chaeto to grow. Once I realized my apartment had to much CO2, opened a window about 2 inches and allowed the tank to release it's extra CO2, not only did it fix my chaeto problem, but also my pH

 

[Chris Villalobos]

You might try putting in a lower par bulb. I bought an expensive grow light but ended up using a cheap Home Depot LED.

 

[Chris Villalobos]

Or are there other ways to get my hair algae under control in the display and grow chaeto in the fuge?

Hair algae will out compete Chaeto every time. The best way to get rid of hair algae is to scrub your rocks with H2O2.

 

[mamedina]

Had the exact same issue. Hand remove as much algae from DT as possible. Do a three day blackout. Do a large water change. This killed all the algae in my DT and have my chaeto the leg up to our compete the nuisance algae.

 

[Gobi-Wan]

Yes I have gentle flow on the chaeto right now. My return pump is 700ish gph and maybe 150-200 is going through the 10g fuge. Hard to guess exactly as the ratio is controlled by ball valves.

10-15% WC every week but occasionally I miss a week. I was thinking I need to get my RODI tested. I use an RO buddie filter system and I'm not sure what quality the water is coming out at now after 6 months and 1 replacement of the DI material. I know the water in my town is pretty hard before filtration.

CUC is a few hermits (3 or 4) and maybe 20-30 assorted snails. Some are in fuge now which I didnt do originally so hopefully that will help with gunk growing in there instead of chaeto. I banished one enormous hermit to the fuge.

 

[Gobi-Wan]

Had the exact same issue. Hand remove as much algae from DT as possible. Do a three day blackout. Do a large water change. This killed all the algae in my DT and have my chaeto the leg up to our compete the nuisance algae.

Forgot to say, 2 weeks ago I did a 20% water change, and during the water change I took out every rock and scrubbed the hair algae off in the old water collection tub. Then after the water change I did a 3 day blackout which eliminated most of the patch of cyanobacteria I had growing in one corner of the substrate, and the hair algae didnt grow at all during the blackout but now it's back pretty thick again already. I did however only replace my chaeto after this, in other words I didnt have chaeto in the fuge during blackout. It had all pretty much died out previous to that.

 

[mamedina]

Forgot to say, 2 weeks ago I did a 20% water change, and during the water change I took out every rock and scrubbed the hair algae off in the old water collection tub. Then after the water change I did a 3 day blackout which eliminated most of the patch of cyanobacteria I had growing in one corner of the substrate, and the hair algae didnt grow at all during the blackout but now it's back pretty thick again already. I did however only replace my chaeto after this, in other words I didnt have chaeto in the fuge during blackout. It had all pretty much died out previous to that.

Did you make sure you tank was completely blacked out. Put a blanket over it or something like that?

 

[Gobi-Wan]

Ok, now that you mention it, how do you feed your fish during a blackout? I turned the light o for a few minutes to get them to come out. I did have a towel over the tank to block light from the nearby window.

 

[mamedina]

It’s gotta be completely blacked out IMO. I would just crack the blanket over a little and quiet a little food in. Your fish are going to be fine as they are “hibernating” during the blackout time.

 

[mamedina]

*squirt

 

[Sir Chris]

For the 1st 6 months my fuge was stale with growth. Now with a somewhat matured tank has now become a issue with growth and outcompeting Pom Pom. It’s a marineland LED 3 blues all white that’s 30$.
The hair algae is eating the sugars and outcompeting the chato so a large fuge for more dwell time or cover the tank and pick the masses you can.
PO4 .01 (Hanna)

Have you tried a normal test but pulling from the fuge to see if anything. Idk my fuge is slow moving and exports crazy amounts now.. I feel there the best natural filters and don’t use socks for that.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

FWIW, with that amount of phosphate (2 ppm) and nitrate (5 ppm), the chaeto, even if growing as fast as possible, can never bring down the phosphate value noticeably because it will run out of N to make tissue (unless you dose ammonia or nitrate).