What else is new - algae invasion - young tank - lost control :(

[vdupuy]

Hi everyone and tyia for your help. This forum is surely a life saver.

Right now though, it is really rough. For many weeks my tanks has been fighting a battle with these brown algae. See pictures. My phosphates have read 0 for the longest time so I've been feeding Neophos, I'm not normally around 0.02-0.04. Still no luck. Other metrics are pretty standard I suppose: 390 calcium, 13.7 nitrate, 10 dKH, 1400 Mg, 1.026 salinity. I keep reading different approaches, but I'm not even sure what they are so I'm a bit hit and miss. I have about 10 snails, some turbo so torchus, don't seem to make a dent. I temporarily made the lighting much whiter for the pictures, typically I run very low white and mostly blues, 8h per day. Skimmer and Roller mat. 90 gallons.

Any help appreciated, happy new year!

 

[JTP424]

Curious about your lighting schedule and whether the tank is near a window etc.
Also understocked CUC in my opinion...
Check out what Reefcleaners suggest for a 90 gallon clean up crew... (to clean up a tank such as yours etc)

 

[Cthulukelele]

Hi everyone and tyia for your help. This forum is surely a life saver.

Right now though, it is really rough. For many weeks my tanks has been fighting a battle with these brown algae. See pictures. My phosphates have read 0 for the longest time so I've been feeding Neophos, I'm not normally around 0.02-0.04. Still no luck. Other metrics are pretty standard I suppose: 390 calcium, 13.7 nitrate, 10 dKH, 1400 Mg, 1.026 salinity. I keep reading different approaches, but I'm not even sure what they are so I'm a bit hit and miss. I have about 10 snails, some turbo so torchus, don't seem to make a dent. I temporarily made the lighting much whiter for the pictures, typically I run very low white and mostly blues, 8h per day. Skimmer and Roller mat. 90 gallons.

Any help appreciated, happy new year!

Do you use RODI water? Also have you changed your filters recently? I can get these sorts of blooms when my filters start to fail as my local water is very silicate rich, and if I'm high in silicates brown algae and dinos start to explode

 

[Baby Damsel 219]

corals look happy but the tank owner it not I say do a water change and siphoned the sand

Cthulukelele is right about the silicates use some chemi pure which it says it obsorbs silicates

 

[vdupuy]

Quick updates.. not by a window. Lighting schedule attached. Cleaning crew makes sense but I had so many snails die, and 3 urchins, I thought perhaps they don’t eat this. I use RODI water with recent resin. Roller works as designed I believe. Skimmer fills about once a week. Chemiclean never tried, will definitely. Anyone know the actual algae species?

 

[Cthulukelele]

Also to keep you from despairing, if it IS the silicates problem, fixing your RODI source will fix the problem in a few days to a week vs larger issues like OVERWHELMING dinos, hair algae, cyano, etc.

That's not to say it's unreasonable to be concerned about ballooning algae and not liking the look of your tank. It's mostly me wanting to reassure you that honestly? For a very young tank those corals look quite happy, and realistically your algae problems are very solvable. You're doing a good job, and it's easy to overwhelm yourself on the details in the hobby.

 

[vdupuy]

 

[Cthulukelele]

Quick updates.. not by a window. Lighting schedule attached. Cleaning crew makes sense but I had so many snails die, and 3 urchins, I thought perhaps they don’t eat this. I use RODI water with recent resin. Roller works as designed I believe. Skimmer fills about once a week. Chemiclean never tried, will definitely. Anyone know the actual algae species?

This is either diatoms or some species of benthic dinoflaggelates that would need to be identified under a microscope. Also if your tank is very very young a diatom explosion and die back is normal in which case hair algae would come next.

 

[THE REEF WHISPER]

Do a black out shut off any light to the tank cover it with cardboard every inch. If you leave a little bit open it will come back. You need to cover the whole entire tank for 5 days and The algae will be gone I did it for like and it went away you can feed very lightly for the fish

 

[Cthulukelele]

Do a black out shut off any light to the tank cover it with cardboard every inch. If you leave a little bit open it will come back. You need to cover the whole entire tank for 5 days and The algae will be gone I did it for like and it went away you can feed very lightly for the fish

Respectfully, please don't do this. Brown algae like you're experiencing can be one of dozens of different things, and this would only work for a few of them while angering your current happy looking coral. It also doesn't assure they won't come back if conditions remain optimal for whatever species this is.

 

[THE REEF WHISPER]

True it can be phosphates with your levels

 

[Baby Damsel 219]

i had this happen to a friend the clean up crew will die before fish and coral since the po4 and the nitraes are to harsh so I think there is an imbalance of nutrients

 

[Delightful Reefer]

When I went through that, I noticed my nutrients were getting eaten up by the algae, and once it cycled through, NO₃ and PO₄ quickly ballooned. I then started weekly water changes and daily bacterial supplements to address it.

I didn’t see hermit crabs on your list and would definitely add around 15 or so to help out. They’re super helpful with algae on the rocks.

I’ve also had good luck doing a water change while using a double-sided nylon brush to scrub and siphon out as much as possible.

 

[stE26wy14]

Quick updates.. not by a window. Lighting schedule attached. Cleaning crew makes sense but I had so many snails die, and 3 urchins, I thought perhaps they don’t eat this. I use RODI water with recent resin. Roller works as designed I believe. Skimmer fills about once a week. Chemiclean never tried, will definitely. Anyone know the actual algae species?

DONT USE CHEMICLEAN
USE CHEMIPURE
CHEMICLEAN KILLS MOST IF NOT ALL BACTERIA IN THE TANK
DOONNTT

 

[vdupuy]

so if I summarize… chemipure not Chemiclean, sizeable CUC including urchins and hermit crabs, use a brush to scrub white doing a water change. Based on recent history phosphates will tend towards zero, rest has been stable but will continue to monitor. Did I forget anything? What is the next stage I should look for to perceive progress?

 

[stE26wy14]

so if I summarize… chemipure not Chemiclean, sizeable CUC including urchins and hermit crabs, use a brush to scrub white doing a water change. Based on recent history phosphates will tend towards zero, rest has been stable but will continue to monitor. Did I forget anything? What is the next stage I should look for to perceive progress?

how long has this tank been up and running?
also, whats ur fish stocking, and what are u feeding and how heavy? r u dosing anything rn?

 

[Baby Damsel 219]

DONT USE CHEMICLEAN
USE CHEMIPURE
CHEMICLEAN KILLS MOST IF NOT ALL BACTERIA IN THE TANK
DOONNTT

that's what I was saying too bro and killing the bacteria will only just add to the nutrients

 

[Cthulukelele]

so if I summarize… chemipure not Chemiclean, sizeable CUC including urchins and hermit crabs, use a brush to scrub white doing a water change. Based on recent history phosphates will tend towards zero, rest has been stable but will continue to monitor. Did I forget anything? What is the next stage I should look for to perceive progress?

I really wouldn't use chemipure OR chemiclean in your tank right now. How long has it been running? Have you already been dosing anything? How quickly did all your snails die? What are your current inhabitants/feeding schedule? How quickly did this crop up? A lot more information is needed to give good advice on this.

 

[Sam7]

Dont pour any more chemi anything in your tank. Start with water changes and scrubbing that algae gunk off and sucking it out of your tank. There is no magic CURE....if there was nobody would be on here. If you tank is not mature you are going to get what is happening,,,especially if you used DRY rock when you started. Only run your lights 8 hours max a day. Stop buying any more coral and fish until you get the tank going in the right direction. Clean your skimmer and filters often....vaccum that sand. Read up on dino's Stock up on elbow grease

 

[vdupuy]

Thank you all for your advice. The tank is approximately 6 months old. There are still some active snails, maybe 5-6. Urchin died after 2-3 months. There are 6 fish, all have been there since the beginning and in good health:
- 1 Azure Damsel
- 1 Banggai Cardinal
- 1 Bicolor Blenny
- 1 Blue Velvet Damsel
- 2 clowfish
- 1 large emerald Crab
- 5-6 mix of Turbo and Trochus
- There were 3-4 hermit crabs, I think they are all dead.

I feed the fish lightly with pellets, some occasionnal flakes and frozen. Algae has been ramping up slowly almost since the beginning, I think it is pretty much capped out now. I tried adding a few new corals recently that died pretty fast. They ones still alive and doing very well are all from the beginning.