What's my mushroom doing?

[zreuther]

Am i correct in thinking that my shroom is about to become 2? Hasn't been in my tank even 2 weeks yet.

 

[zreuther]

Here is a pic

 

[Wiz]

Its possible. Doest take long. Looks like you have dinos. That's not good. Could be wrong. But looks like it.

 

[zreuther]

Not sure what you mean by dinos. I am dealing with what looks like brown diatoms to mean but i could be very wrong as im new to this. Anyone else care to chime in?

 

[Wiz]

How new is the tank?? The yellow/brown algae I can see appears to have air bubbles on it. But its in the background. Hard to see. Can you post a pic of it?

 

[zreuther]

Tank is about 2 mths old. And a couple spots have air bubbles but they always go away and they are never bigger than a grain of sand.

 

[Wiz]

Probably diatoms then. Just looked suspicious. :-)

 

[zreuther]

Here is one of the other mushrooms i have. Im currently battling some brown hair and i was thinking brown diatoms. But as i said im still new to this. I have about 20ish blue leg and scarlet hermits and a few differwnt types of snails in an attept to help with the algae issue. Ive already started feeding less each feeding and ive also been skipping a day once a week. Im also saving up to get a small hob fuge till i can get a good sump setup

 

[Wiz]

That's clearer. Doesn't look like dinos. Your probably right. And mushroom looks good. fuges are the best! I love mine.

 

[zreuther]

I cant wait to get one!! I pieced together what i have running over about 6 mths or so then had to wait a year to start it. So from the get go i had to learn patience with this lol. Thanks for your input, Wiz! Any pointers on getting the algae to go away or am i stuck with it for a month or two? I ran through a similar algae bloom with my freshwatwr tank but it didnt look like this at all. It eventually went away and ive had no problems since, fingers crossed, in the year and a half that one has been running.

 

[Wiz]

Without a fuge I would run a gfo reactor and carbon. That will suck up the nitrate and phos. The diatoms will work out themselves but hair algae requires some work. Manually remove what you can and remove excess nutrients from water. I ran a dual reator until the fuge was goin good the pulled it offline. Gotta grow a good amount of macro algae to not need filtration though. This is my 30g fuge on my 40 display.

 

[zreuther]

Unfortunately at the moment i do not have an overflow. Just a hob skimmer, 2x 600gph powerheads, and an aquaclear 50. I however do not have to carbon in the aquaclear. Would this be a good start to help with the algae then since i cant run the gfo reactor till i get an overflow?

 

[zreuther]

This is on a 55g btw

 

[zreuther]

I do have a 10g that i recently used as a qt tank. If i can get an overflow, i can use that as a sump/fuge till i can afford a bigger/better one.

 

[Wiz]

I like to run carbon all of the time. To make sure that no chemicals get in the water at to help with coral Warfare. Any type of refugium is better than no type of refugium. I would do what you can.Phosphate will be a big factor in controlling nuisance algae. Without enough macro to help control it I would definitely look into a gfo reactor Or at the least some sort of phosphate Sponge.A small reactor from bRS is not that expensive.

 

[zreuther]

Can a reacter be used without an overflow? I will add my carbon to the aquaclear today

 

[Wiz]

Defanitly. Has its own pump and return

 

[zreuther]

I have not seen one like this. I will have to look on brs's website. Thanks for the tips!

 

[Wiz]

Np

 

[Tigerman]

I've got a 5 gallon and no fuge. I've got some GFO running in my HOB filter. I've also got some beautiful red macro algae in the display tank. I think it's Red Dragon breath but I'm not positive. It's been growing like a weed so I'm pretty sure it's been sucking up the phosphates pretty good. Until you get a fuge, find a nice piece of macro that will go with your acquascape and go with that.