Ugly brown phase for 2 years, please help

[BanjoBandito]

I never knew such a thing existed. I'll have to check it out. Do you tumble it at all or just float it back there?

 

[DannoOMG]

I never knew such a thing existed. I'll have to check it out. Do you tumble it at all or just float it back there?

Since it is the top part of the media basket it gets moved around a little bit cause the floss and denitrate are underneath it. So if I tumble it around it isn't intentional.

 

[TigNJaxx]

here’s where we stand.

right when you are fed up and ready to trustfall fix the reef send me a message.

we do a secret undisclosed action on the tank, and then the next picture you post here will look so good we‘ll be accused of photoshopping it. You yourself won’t believe it’s this clear even as the tank sits right in front of you. I realize this is an unbelievable claim, but when you’re ready, a ~40 gallon will take right at 3-4 hours to prep.

there’s a certain preparatory test we’d do first, then it’s hammer time and your reef will be completely 100% restored and not one spec of algae and the params will be perfect and the corals and fish much happier.

I'll bite. What test? and where do we start?

 

[brandon429]

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

check out Eric’s prep above and our exchange

something tells me he’s going to do an exceptionally good job, his prep summary showed real intent to study actions above norm

post a pic of your tank here if you want to customize anything it’s fun doing these rip cleans remotely. We make the comparison between landscaping and rip cleaning this way: what % of lawns do you know that only require weeding/ dandelion pulling one time for the life of the lawn vs ongoing weekly care not just for mowing, but culling out bad growths? Just about all. 99% of lawns require ongoing willingness from the owner to look sharp when you drive by and notice


Imagine pulling dandelions or weeds one time in a three hour run on a garden completely choked by weeds and never expecting to work on it again

rip cleans are gardening of a reef tank

especially when dealing with dinos

when we make a tank look perfect with a rip clean, percentages reverse and actually a large portion do remain under control for a long time when they’re easy cyano challenges. But some invasions and some setups need ongoing care to win over the invasion and the benefit of having totally cloudless sand and rocks is that you can reach in and lift out a rock to garden it externally, set it back in, and no huge cloud of waste erupts like all tanks do before the massive export cleaning run/ rip clean

systems that are allowed to completely fill up with waste via months of delayed action have backed up pores in the live rocks filled with invasion, waste, and then daily new waste backed up from residents in the rock. When we get around to rip cleaning as a last resort vs the first resort, we unplug rocks and they begin to express waste + invader cells in weeks after the rip clean which is why we must agree to continue taking charge on removal as guidance, gardening, for the system as a whole and eventually we will win against the offending mass.

setting up UV sterilizers after the rip clean might help, or changing light intensity or spectrum, ensuring quality topoff water is in place all help in growback prevention but we should expect to work a while in guidance for having waited till the last minute in most jobs.

if you’d like a custom planned run post pics here and we will build one thanks for posting!

 

[Idech]

I don't have an outbreak that bad (yet) in my 13 gallon nano. I have some thick spots with green hair algae. I got some nylon brushes to try and grab it. It just makes a mess. I have a refugium going in the back of the tank. Who knows if that is going to help. My nitrates were a little over 0 (maybe 2ppm) yesterday. My phosphates are 0 (according to the API kit, maybe they are indeed higher but API can't detect?)

I just do small water changes and I hope it goes away eventually. It has been in the tank for over 2 months. I figure it is going to take that long to get rid of it. My refugium has only been running for over a week. I added a big bag of carbon. Change my filter floss out and rinse my bag of denitrate in tank water every week.

I have tried using API's AlgaeFix... pfffft. Doesn't do anything.

I like the idea of pumping up the powerhead when the lights go off. I have an MP10 on a 13 gallon tank and was running it at 25%. Now day time is at 30% and night time will be 40%.

The hobby can be a real ball buster sometimes. ( and I am only a year into my own personal tank. 2 years if you count the time spent on the work tank)

(Pic taken with white lights on so you can see the mess.)

Is it me or this fish looks really thin (sunken belly) ?

 

[DannoOMG]

Is it me or this fish looks really thin (sunken belly) ?

They died shortly after.

I am having my tank analyzed for fish disease. (It takes two weeks for them to look my samples) I want to see what did them in.

 

[brandon429]

If you are using dna sampling for that it’s not going to work, that’s a marketing ploy they use to get sales. The system needs fallow and quarantine above all. To see why I’d make such harsh claims about reef tank dna testing for disease check out Randy’s posts on the issue in the fish disease forum. the sample we send in is so impossibly small % of the whole picture it’s just about useless to employ the approach for fish disease control identification etc.

matter of fact it can be harmful by indicating no issues when there are indeed disease components in an unprepped tank, or identifies only one potential player among many. Regardless, fallow and qt are the ways to go. When dna testing becomes legit in marine fish disease ID and response, it’ll be a sticky in the disease forum with a direct link to the company providing it.

 

[DannoOMG]

If you are using dna sampling for that it’s not going to work, that’s a marketing ploy they use to get sales. The system needs fallow and quarantine above all. To see why I’d make such harsh claims about reef tank dna testing for disease check out Randy’s posts on the issue in the fish disease forum. the sample we send in is so impossibly small % of the whole picture it’s just about useless to employ the approach for fish disease control identification etc.

... Great. $99 down the tube.

 

[brandon429]

they still provide some data plots that don’t exist without the sample. Maybe they’ll include an overall bacterial picture about the tank too, small data plots that when aggregated show new trending in reefing.

For example, dna testing showed us for the first time on paper than systems who start off with cycling bacteria alternate populations within two years to have completely replaced original dosed strains with functional and suited strains that come from the items we add and the locality directly surrounding the tank. Ammonia control stayed consistent the whole time start to finish, but all along the entire bacterial community was undergoing a total shift, that’s neat stuff.

Additionally we see that rip cleaned systems arent bacterially harmed after having their sand washed, this gives people more trust in rip cleans and that in turn saves tanks from total invasion losses. Before dna sampling it was common thought that sandbed washing was all bad


these are my opinion, after reading patterned follow up posts after having swabs analyzed in the various posts

 

[fltt]

Anyone want t to guess what dinos these are?
I don't have a micro scope and I have not seen alot of different types.

 

[landlubber]

Anyone want t to guess what dinos these are?
I don't have a micro scope and I have not seen alot of different types.

unfortunately our guess is no better than your guess which is why a microscope is recommended. they don't look different from each other and noticeable improvement takes a while to see.

 

[fltt]

Ok i will have to get a micro scope then.
Thank you for the information.

 

[landlubber]

Ok i will have to get a micro scope then.
Thank you for the information.

i was in your shoes a couple of years ago myself. there are "toy grade" scopes that can do a decent enough job to get an id and don't bust the wallet. good luck!