Tank Journal : Converting Fresh water to a Saltwater Tank

[fishy408]

Does green algae ever go away?

From what I've read, green algae will always be a part of the system. The concept is to control how much algae growth rather than eradicating it which is impossible and probably not healthy.

I'm currently cleaning green algae off my glass once a week, usually that's how long it takes to build up a film where it effects the look of my display tank. For now, the dry rocks are covered in green algae, which I hope some day with be coraline algae.

So I guess my questions is:

• Do you have green algae film in your tank?
• How often do you clean your glass?
• Once the rocks are covered in coraline algae, will the green algae still be very visible?

Current Water Parameters

• Salinity 1.024/ Temp 79
• DKH 10.9
• Calcium 440
• Mag 1500
• P04 0-.03
• Nitrate 5

thanks in advance!

This is what my tank looks like today before lights turn on at 1pm and trends down at 10pm. XR15 running with Reds/Greens off. Whites running at 40%. Overall Intensity is 35%.

 

[Flagg37]

I clean the film algae off the glass about once a week too. The rocks get a good layer of coraline algae that grows on it which doesn’t allow the green or brown film algae to grow. It doesn’t stop other algae though. Gha, bfyopsis, and bubble algae will still prevail.

A properly tuned uv sterilizer may help reduce film algae. Also there’s a robotic glass cleaner that I was hoping would be out by now.

 

[fishy408]

Oh man, time to aquascape again. Figured I do it now rather wait until later. Hopefully, this will be the last time.

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[fishy408]

So I went and got an Acro a couple of weeks ago. I know that I probably shouldn't, but went ahead and did it anyways. It's an "unknown acro", since I don't know the name to it. It will be used as my test Acro to see if it survives. The question is, when are you ready for SPS? How do you know if you don't try? Looking at the picture, do you think the Acro is doing ok?

thanks!

 

[daddio]

I’m on my phone today so I can’t see that clearly, what are the dark little dots on the bottom side of the branches?

 

[Fish Boss]

So I went and got an Acro a couple of weeks ago. I know that I probably shouldn't, but went ahead and did it anyways. It's an "unknown acro", since I don't know the name to it. It will be used as my test Acro to see if it survives. The question is, when are you ready for SPS? How do you know if you don't try? Looking at the picture, do you think the Acro is doing ok?

thanks!

Stability is the most important aspect for SPS. People say to wait at least 6 months before getting sps, so that the tank is stable nutrient wise. You shouldn’t have nutrient spikes at that point. That’s very important, but I think keeping alk, PH, Cal, and mag stable is the most important. If your chaeto is growing nice and you don’t have very big PH swings, and you’ve got dosing down, i’d Say go ahead and start

 

[fishy408]

I’m on my phone today so I can’t see that clearly, what are the dark little dots on the bottom side of the branches?

I'll take a closer look, but I'm not sure what it is. I don't think they are moving.

 

[fishy408]

Stability is the most important aspect for SPS. People say to wait at least 6 months before getting sps, so that the tank is stable nutrient wise. You shouldn’t have nutrient spikes at that point. That’s very important, but I think keeping alk, PH, Cal, and mag stable is the most important. If your chaeto is growing nice and you don’t have very big PH swings, and you’ve got dosing down, i’d Say go ahead and start

I've been monitoring mostly the (alk,calc,mag).. Currently the amount of corals aren't really using them up faster than my water changes. Have Kalkwasser ready, but haven't had the need for it yet.

Water Params:
5-19 : ALK 7.3/Calc 430/Mag 1410
5-26 : ALK 7.0/ Calc 460/Mag 1500 (WC 30%, changed salt mix)
6-2 : Alk 6.7/Calc 450/Mag 1470

 

[Ibn]

What's your nitrate/phosphate currently sitting at?

 

[fishy408]

If I was running both Algae Reactor and Protein Skimmer at the same time, then nitrates/phosphates would be undetectable by Salifert. I did a test for 7 days with the protein skimmer off, nitrates jumped from 0 to 20ppm.

I'm trying to find a balance between the two. If the protein skimmer runs 24/7, the chateo will eventually die. So I'm currently trying dry skimmming, and decreasing the algae reactor from 12hrs to 8 hrs.

thanks

 

[fishy408]

Updated image of my tank.. Think this is aquascape revision 6.0. When I added the new pieces of Marcos rock, diatoms grew on it for about 2 weeks started dying off and being replaced with green algae.

 

[Coral reefer]

You should be trying to keep alk more stable, and probably a bit higher. Do you see polyp extension on the coral in question ?

 

[fishy408]

1.0-2.0 acceptable swing? For the polyp extension, just started seeing them a few days ago. When the acro was first added, didn't see any

Thanks

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[fishy408]

Quote below is from reef central, about Jason fox.

"Recently watched a video jason gave at a reef show. He was asked about alk swings. His reply was basically he never touches his alk as long as its within acceptable ranges(7 to 10 dkh). if its below 7 he'll bump it up to 7, if above he lets it drift down naturally. He went on to say that his tanks can see a variation of 2 to 3 DKH daily swings, and we all know how his corals(specifically SPS's) look."

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[Ibn]

What's working for him might not work for others, and I would reinterpret what's in writing there. Seems to be that he's trying not to divert from 7 overall. He also keeps a very mixed tank with a lot of LPS, which don't mind it.

For SPS, if you're running low nutrients, I would keep it locked somewhere in the 7.7 - 8.0 range. For the record, this is the alk measurements from my tank.

 

[Coral reefer]

1.0-2.0 acceptable swing? For the polyp extension, just started seeing them a few days ago. When the acro was first added, didn't see any

Thanks

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

Not really best. You'd rather it not really move imo. Time to start dosing

 

[daddio]

Quote below is from reef central, about Jason fox.

"Recently watched a video jason gave at a reef show. He was asked about alk swings. His reply was basically he never touches his alk as long as its within acceptable ranges(7 to 10 dkh). if its below 7 he'll bump it up to 7, if above he lets it drift down naturally. He went on to say that his tanks can see a variation of 2 to 3 DKH daily swings, and we all know how his corals(specifically SPS's) look."

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If you watch the video,

Jason says he changes 1/3 of his water each week. I reckon that covers his alk use

 

[fishy408]

All this Alk talk, made me go test the water again. After 5 days, alk dropped to 5.7 from 6.7. Time to go mix some Kalkwasser . Thanks!

 

[Coral reefer]

Your calcium was in a good range, kalk will raise it needlessly. May want to look into soda ash.

 

[fishy408]

Oh man... that's awesome ..I never heard of soda ash before. Going to read up on it.

thanks!