WILL ROCKS LEECH GHA AGAIN AFTER SCRUBBING!?

[Armani]

Hey everyone so let me explain what’s going on. I have a pic to show the terrible gha. I’ve neglected it for a good month or two and obviously it’s gotten a little crazy now. My options are. 1. Taking everything out scrub the rocks normally, and scrub the bottom floor and do a big water change.
Or 2. Take out the rocks soak them in hydrogen peroxide (3% or 35%) not sure which they say both works good but I feel mine is more severe so 35% might do, but soak them and then rinse them and let them sit in a clean bucket water for a day or two and then add them back into the display. My question is once I’m back in routine of maintenance and keeping things up to par, will the rocks leech the hydrogen peroxide in the main display tank? Is that bad? Will gha come back with a vengeance!?
And final #3 option. Just dosing .5ml of hydrogen peroxide a day and do water changes 10-20% weekly until it all just dissolves away??
And I am aware the good bacteria will die if I h202 them but my plan for that is to start fresh completely with new everything rinse the tank new water new filters and let my canister filter bring back the gold bio load from what’s in filters already. And letting it cycle good n then adding the fish back in and acclimating coral and fish again. What you guys think?

 

[tehmadreefer]

gha can’t “leach”, lol

 

[Armani]

gha can’t leach, lol

Ok maybe not leech lol but will the h202 leech? I heard rocks are like sponges and it’ll “leech things back out” how true is that

 

[tehmadreefer]

Well if there was any appreciable leaching of hydrogen peroxide it would actually be of benefit. Just rinse the rocks good and it will be ok.

leaching mostly refers to organic nutrients bound up in the rock,such as dead/decaying matter, which releases nutrients into the water column.

 

[Anirban]

First, none of them leech. Hydrogen peroxide breaks down almost immediately into water and superoxide ion which actually kills your bacteria or GHA so its not like that it will be staying on your rock like other chemicals. But the root of your problem is imbalanced PO4 and NO3 levels so you have to regularly check them and control them. These algae feed on them so you need to control them once you start fresh. If you really want to start fresh then you can treat those rocks with muriatic acid and then soak them in RODI water for few days(change the water in between). Once you are done with that then soak once in salt water and then seed with some bacteria to start the cycling.

 

[hllb]

Have you tried Reef Flux? Many people have success with that and it's very safe. It didn't work for me (and mine was pretty bad too). The 35% peroxide will work, at least with spot treatments. I've cleared off one large area in my tank that way. But, I think it killed my sea hare (was waiting until the weekend to take him back to the store. RIP) and my corals weren't super happy about it (they're fine, but it seems it's hard on my hammer and trumpet - the others are OK with it)

I've finally made some progress with mine. Not sure if it's the peroxide, or the vibrant I started using.

GHA Progress!

I’ve been battling GHA since late November. While working on nutrients (which were low when this started growing), I’ve tried lots of other things. Reef flux did nothing. No CUC would eat it - even the sea hare. Manual removal was difficult at best and it just came back. I decided to try...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[hllb]

If you choose to take your rocks out and treat with peroxide outside the tank, I don't think you'd need to soak them for that long. The algae will start to bubble instantly. On my tank, the next day, the GHA I treated directly started turning white and on day 2, I scrubbed it off with a toothbrush. If you're able to treat outside the tank, I might soak it for an hour or so, and then scrub the rock, rinse it, and put it back in.

 

[HOOPDEEZ]

peroxide could work, but it will come back. If you nuke the rocks with 35%H2O2 then you may disrupt your bacterial filtration (be careful using 35% it’s powerful). If you have Bryopsis then Flucanozole is one of the only ways to defeat it. Flucanozole will kill GHA as well as other nuisance algae. I have used it with great results

 

[Dan_P]

Hey everyone so let me explain what’s going on. I have a pic to show the terrible gha. I’ve neglected it for a good month or two and obviously it’s gotten a little crazy now. My options are. 1. Taking everything out scrub the rocks normally, and scrub the bottom floor and do a big water change.
Or 2. Take out the rocks soak them in hydrogen peroxide (3% or 35%) not sure which they say both works good but I feel mine is more severe so 35% might do, but soak them and then rinse them and let them sit in a clean bucket water for a day or two and then add them back into the display. My question is once I’m back in routine of maintenance and keeping things up to par, will the rocks leech the hydrogen peroxide in the main display tank? Is that bad? Will gha come back with a vengeance!?
And final #3 option. Just dosing .5ml of hydrogen peroxide a day and do water changes 10-20% weekly until it all just dissolves away??
And I am aware the good bacteria will die if I h202 them but my plan for that is to start fresh completely with new everything rinse the tank new water new filters and let my canister filter bring back the gold bio load from what’s in filters already. And letting it cycle good n then adding the fish back in and acclimating coral and fish again. What you guys think?

Yes, you have a big mess. The 0.5 mL H2O2 dosing is ineffective. You will find scrubbing alone to be ineffective also because you cannot remove all the microscopic bits that will just regrow in a a couple of weeks. Can you scrub the rocks AND add animals to eat the left overs? That’s what I would try. I have heard claims that Vibrant kills GHA but might afterwards result in cyanobacteria growth. Maybe scrubbing and then dunking it in 3% hydrogen peroxide. Never tried it. It will harm anything on the rock as well.

 

[ahiggins]

If you want to put some elbow grease into it...get some vibrant and some disposable eyebrow brushes

 

[ahiggins]

Eyebrow brushes

I consider myself a thrifty gal but sometimes I do things that completely blow myself away Been battling GHA for the better part of 2 months now. See pics below. Unholy hot mess in the nem tank lol So I thought, what could I use instead of a toothbrush to get the algae off the rock to suck up...

www.reef2reef.com

Hasn’t come back since.

 

[MTBake]

Scrubbing it off out of the tank and adding animals to eat what's left is what I would try before adding chemicals to the tank.

These brushes work well for cleaning all sorts of items and rocks

 

[NanoDJS]

grab a sea hare , and get your parameters in check while he eats away , should solve the issue , you need a grazer who will cull the cells , if you "scrub " the rock you will have it everywhere , if you nuke the rock , you will crash your tank, unless you have the equivalent esablished bio filter in place. Just breathe and look for that sea hare , when he is done take him back or sell em to another hobbiest.

 

[brandon429]

thats not helpful but I find it so gutterally funny

 

[User1]

Yes, you have a big mess. The 0.5 mL H2O2 dosing is ineffective. You will find scrubbing alone to be ineffective also because you cannot remove all the microscopic bits that will just regrow in a a couple of weeks. Can you scrub the rocks AND add animals to eat the left overs? That’s what I would try. I have heard claims that Vibrant kills GHA but might afterwards result in cyanobacteria growth. Maybe scrubbing and then dunking it in 3% hydrogen peroxide. Never tried it. It will harm anything on the rock as well.

Vibrant does work. It works very well but there are some things the hobbyist should consider before using it. There is a pretty good, actually a great, thread on the use of vibrant. One thing to know like you hinted at is the cyanobacteria after growth. It isn't so much as cyanobacteria but rather not managing the sudden rush of nutrients from vibrant attacking the GHA.

I saw this first hand. I did my initial does of vibrant and kid you not saw improvements 12 hours later. Side glass was suddenly clear and no signs of GHA. Next 24 hours saw more areas clear. Day after day GHA was slowing being beaten down and cleared. The problem is that I didn't do any water changes to remove the extra nutrients. I did run carbon but I think the water change should have also been done more frequently during this window.

Moral of the story is that while it works, and works well, you must have a properly running skimmer, run carbon, do water changes, and more or less manage the extra nutrients. And above all like you said look to see what is causing the growth to begin with.

OP - I didn't recall what rocks you are using. How long the tank as been up, etc. If this was dry rock some kinds of them, Pukani comes to mind, will leach phosphate over time until it is mature. This can take months if not years depending on how you prepared the rock. Also note that while you are testing the water numbers may look good consider this. The GHA is consuming nutrients....so while you see a good number it could be that way due to what the GHA and other algaes are doing.

You can also search for GHA removal - there is a way to dose inside the tank since I didn't see any corals similar to vibrant if you want to go that route. Again, must have a working skimmer and carbon.

 

[Dan_P]

Vibrant does work. It works very well but there are some things the hobbyist should consider before using it. There is a pretty good, actually a great, thread on the use of vibrant. One thing to know like you hinted at is the cyanobacteria after growth. It isn't so much as cyanobacteria but rather not managing the sudden rush of nutrients from vibrant attacking the GHA.

I saw this first hand. I did my initial does of vibrant and kid you not saw improvements 12 hours later. Side glass was suddenly clear and no signs of GHA. Next 24 hours saw more areas clear. Day after day GHA was slowing being beaten down and cleared. The problem is that I didn't do any water changes to remove the extra nutrients. I did run carbon but I think the water change should have also been done more frequently during this window.

Moral of the story is that while it works, and works well, you must have a properly running skimmer, run carbon, do water changes, and more or less manage the extra nutrients. And above all like you said look to see what is causing the growth to begin with.

OP - I didn't recall what rocks you are using. How long the tank as been up, etc. If this was dry rock some kinds of them, Pukani comes to mind, will leach phosphate over time until it is mature. This can take months if not years depending on how you prepared the rock. Also note that while you are testing the water numbers may look good consider this. The GHA is consuming nutrients....so while you see a good number it could be that way due to what the GHA and other algaes are doing.

You can also search for GHA removal - there is a way to dose inside the tank since I didn't see any corals similar to vibrant if you want to go that route. Again, must have a working skimmer and carbon.

Did you use the recommended dose?

Does it kill other macro algae like Caulerpa?

 

[User1]

Did you use the recommended dose?

Yes, I did. I started with the recommended dose.

Does it kill other macro algae like Caulerpa?

The thread on Vibrant in General sub forum has a lot of discussions on this. I cannot say as I didn't have a refugium online nor a 100% positive ID on what algae I was really fighting. Well, I know it wasn't Caulerpa I know some take a sample and place on a cheap microscope and ID but I sort of just assumed. Mine was green, hairy, could be pulled off, slimy, etc. That was my primary algae on the rocks. On the side walls of the tank I had similar algae but it was light green and brown but not as long or tall if that makes sense.

Below is a before and after in my tank in the discussion thread I mentioned. It is a good thread with a lot of good and bad success stories. Based on my use case it works and I'm happy although I made a few mistakes.

Vibrant Liquid Aquarium Cleaner * Discussion Thread

Generally it becomes easier to eat and more appetizing to grazers as it starts dying off :)

www.reef2reef.com

Not sure if this helps at all but that is at least my experience.

 

[Armani]

thats not helpful but I find it so gutterally funny

Lmaooo dude that’s so on point lol haha

 

[Armani]

Vibrant does work. It works very well but there are some things the hobbyist should consider before using it. There is a pretty good, actually a great, thread on the use of vibrant. One thing to know like you hinted at is the cyanobacteria after growth. It isn't so much as cyanobacteria but rather not managing the sudden rush of nutrients from vibrant attacking the GHA.

I saw this first hand. I did my initial does of vibrant and kid you not saw improvements 12 hours later. Side glass was suddenly clear and no signs of GHA. Next 24 hours saw more areas clear. Day after day GHA was slowing being beaten down and cleared. The problem is that I didn't do any water changes to remove the extra nutrients. I did run carbon but I think the water change should have also been done more frequently during this window.

Moral of the story is that while it works, and works well, you must have a properly running skimmer, run carbon, do water changes, and more or less manage the extra nutrients. And above all like you said look to see what is causing the growth to begin with.

OP - I didn't recall what rocks you are using. How long the tank as been up, etc. If this was dry rock some kinds of them, Pukani comes to mind, will leach phosphate over time until it is mature. This can take months if not years depending on how you prepared the rock. Also note that while you are testing the water numbers may look good consider this. The GHA is consuming nutrients....so while you see a good number it could be that way due to what the GHA and other algaes are doing.

You can also search for GHA removal - there is a way to dose inside the tank since I didn't see any corals similar to vibrant if you want to go that route. Again, must have a working skimmer and carbon.

1 live rocks the rest are dry. Tanks been set up for 2yrs I started getting some good coralline algae on it. When i scrub them they are pure white like new. I’m just worried about the gha coming back I want to keep it crystal clean. I’ll look into vibrant but I definitely don’t want Cyano either! Also I don’t have much of a skimmer. My 90gallon tidal hob filter has a little skimmer but it’s not efficient I don’t think. But I also have a Marineland 360 filter 110g so I might clean it out completely and let the filters bring back the good stuff n let it cycle for a bit I just want it all gone!

 

[Lyzze]

peroxide could work, but it will come back. If you nuke the rocks with 35%H2O2 then you may disrupt your bacterial filtration (be careful using 35% it’s powerful). If you have Bryopsis then Flucanozole is one of the only ways to defeat it. Flucanozole will kill GHA as well as other nuisance algae. I have used it with great results

If you treat with reef flux, do you scrub the rocks while your treating for the 14 days