Heeeeelllllpppppp with No3 and Phos
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I actually had this running pretty good at one timenot anymore LOL! So I don’t think phosphates are potentially a problem, seems more like nitrates? Doing a water change actually tonight of about 45/50 gallons
Phosphate checker is low range, not ultra low
Barely feed at all. I think the fish have actually been surviving off of algae, including the clown fish LOL
I have been blowing off the rocks before water changes, but will definitely try a toothbrush and stuff method. Been concentrating more on the sand than the rocks so maybe that’s where I’ve been doing wrong?
Lol! Well it sounds like you got a good head on your shoulders! Keep at it!
The nassarius will have detritus to eat, but it’s all about managing available nutrients and thousands of snails is unfortunately not sustainable.
As for nutrients; if you have an algae growth issue (especially that much), then both N and P are your problem. Not just one. Nonetheless, siphoning out the algae (not just blowing it off the rocks) will help the most. Rather than concentrating on the sand vs the rocks, concentrate on ‘removing organics’ from your system. This can be utilizing the skimmer, removing snails, siphoning the sandbed, or even pulling algae out by hand.
All that said; you haven’t been doing wrong. You just need to do more... and most of all, it will take time. You’ll get it though!
Honestly id recommend a stronger light for faster growth. 25w just isnt going to be anywhere near sufficient to reduce nutrient levels, it might maintain a low level system but i don't think it will grow cheap fast enough to reduce nutrients.
I just purchased this light are i killed my other one due to dropping water in it.
Waterproof LED Grow Light Relassy Full Spectrum Plants Lights, 150W COB Plant Light for Outdoor/Indoor Plants with Natural Heat Dissipation, No Fans No Noise, Outdoor/Indoor Plants Growing Lights https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07HGRM827/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_SQbqDb0T7N5SQ
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Poor Man's Nutrients Control - Donovan's Nitrate Destroyer
Hello fellow reefers!. I have been in the hobby for more than 3 years, the first 2 years was tough. Cyno, diatom, nuisance algae, high NO3 (120ppm at one time) and ich/velvet. I have tried several nutrient control method (poor man, so most of it were DIY project). GFO, water fall scrubber...
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Is that a typo on the phosphate reading? .41 is really high. I dont think tap water is even that high.
Since your not using the Ultra low Hanna you are not seeing the true PO4 number.
I agree there are way too many snails in that tank. Nassarius are not going to eat the waste in the sand bed, they want fresh food. That's why they come out of the sand as soon as you feed the tank and even if you were feeding a heavily stocked 180 there still wouldn't be enough food for 1000 of them. Feed the tank some mysis. You'll see them all come out of the sand to make it a lot easier to pick them out and sell before they start dying off.
I agree with Bobby on the light. While the LEDs used in it are a good spectrum 25w isn't near enough. I also know those Amazon Chinese fixtures run at about slightly more than half their listed power. Those little cobs they use just don't have any power. Especially to punch through water. You really need a better light.
Think of your sand bed as a septic tank. 50% or more of the fish and all the other animal waste is down there. Plus whatever has died while the tank was neglected. Going the route you are on will be a never ending battle, 6 months down the road you'll still be dealing with gha & cyano and want to quit for good. Spend all the time and effort now with a full reboot. Rinse all the sand and rocks out then hit it with some big water changes in quick succession. Once that's done you can deal with whatever is left in the rock with the methods others have posted.
I agree there are way too many snails in that tank. Nassarius are not going to eat the waste in the sand bed, they want fresh food. That's why they come out of the sand as soon as you feed the tank and even if you were feeding a heavily stocked 180 there still wouldn't be enough food for 1000 of them. Feed the tank some mysis. You'll see them all come out of the sand to make it a lot easier to pick them out and sell before they start dying off.
I agree with Bobby on the light. While the LEDs used in it are a good spectrum 25w isn't near enough. I also know those Amazon Chinese fixtures run at about slightly more than half their listed power. Those little cobs they use just don't have any power. Especially to punch through water. You really need a better light.
Think of your sand bed as a septic tank. 50% or more of the fish and all the other animal waste is down there. Plus whatever has died while the tank was neglected. Going the route you are on will be a never ending battle, 6 months down the road you'll still be dealing with gha & cyano and want to quit for good. Spend all the time and effort now with a full reboot. Rinse all the sand and rocks out then hit it with some big water changes in quick succession. Once that's done you can deal with whatever is left in the rock with the methods others have posted.
Oh, and yeah. Something's wrong with your ro system if your seeing those levels of nutrients. Have the test kits possibly expired? When was the last time you changed the ro membrane?
I've been having a little cyano outbreak that started a few weeks ago and been confused as my nutrient levels are low. I've been dosing sodium nitrate to keep it around 5ppm but dont dose any phosphates which stay around 0.01-0.03. This might be my problem. Thanks for this info!
True. Bad tests kits most likely as OP is been in the hobby for awhile. I know I made mistakes with my Hanna PO4 checkers in the beginning. I wasnt thoroughly mixing the powder which caused a high reading.
I’ve heard this before from others as well. But disagree with cyano being caused by an imbalance in nutrients.
Cyano is an organism; and as such, it isn’t caused by its environment. Rather, cyano is in a system because it is added (intentionally or unintentionally); and thrives because it’s not limited by a lack of nutrients. (I.e. it has food to survive)
If you eliminated all of the nitrates, the cyano would die. If you eliminated the phosphates, cyano would die. So I’m not confident with the hypothesis that the balance of food has anything to do with it. Cyanobacteria has been around for a long time, and is an extremely productive organism. If you put it in any system and there is the right environmental conditions plus any amount/balance of nutrients, it will grow to accommodate.
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Smh....
imo you’re not doing anything wrong. Yea that’s a lot of snails but they are probably tiny. You’ve been doing this long enough that I doubt it is anything obvious.
To be honest that pic kinda looks like dinoflagellates AND cyano, which can be birthed by silicates (which no one tests for ever).
Yes the NO3 is high, but it’s a new tank.
If it were my tank I would stop tinkering (as hard as that is to do). Concentrate on keeping your equipment free of gunk and let it settle in for another month or 2. See if it will pan itself out.
Also completely rule out DINOS if you can... because that’s a whole other ball of wax
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imo you’re not doing anything wrong. Yea that’s a lot of snails but they are probably tiny. You’ve been doing this long enough that I doubt it is anything obvious.
To be honest that pic kinda looks like dinoflagellates AND cyano, which can be birthed by silicates (which no one tests for ever).
Yes the NO3 is high, but it’s a new tank.
If it were my tank I would stop tinkering (as hard as that is to do). Concentrate on keeping your equipment free of gunk and let it settle in for another month or 2. See if it will pan itself out.
Also completely rule out DINOS if you can... because that’s a whole other ball of wax
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Would you prefer me saying that it thrives in an unbalanced nutrient environment? I'm speaking from my experience only. Yes I know it's present all the time, but it only gets out of control and grows when my nutrients are not balanced.
If you take away all of either nitrate or phosphate, everything will die.
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Sorry, it seems like maybe you took my statement as an attack. I didn’t intend so and I wasn’t trying to argue semantics. My belief, experience, understanding simply isn’t in line with that hypothesis.
I don’t prefer saying that it thrives in an unbalanced environment. My statement is that it will thrive in any environment because of its genetics... of course, assuming control of variables such as predators, temperature, external toxins, etc.
If I were to elaborate, I would say that it will thrive most in an environment with plenty of both N and P. As such, vastly different from the ‘Imbalance’ hypothesis. My belief could be wrong; but I wanted to propose another option for readers’ consideration.
How long have you been using it? Pretty happy with it?
Poor Man's Nutrients Control - Donovan's Nitrate Destroyer
Hello fellow reefers!. I have been in the hobby for more than 3 years, the first 2 years was tough. Cyno, diatom, nuisance algae, high NO3 (120ppm at one time) and ich/velvet. I have tried several nutrient control method (poor man, so most of it were DIY project). GFO, water fall scrubber...
Really interesting! I'm in 31029 though, so no telling when I'll get back up to atl
I'll check again today, but that is what it came up as lol
So I just need the ULR reagents, not a new tester, right?
That's why I blew off the rocks and stirred the sand originally, to try to reboot.. the rock is all together though, so would be extremely tough to get out? I did take most of the other rock in fuge, sump, etc out and rinse though..
Test kits are brand new. Not sure on membrane, but prob been a while on that.. filters changed days ago, rodi maybe 6 months (but whole thing/RODI not really used that much at all)
The reason this makes sense to me (not a scientist or professionally educated, btw) is because Im actually causing it. Im adding nitrates but not phosphates. There are tanks with very high nutrients with no cyano and tanks running ULNS without cyano and vice versa as in my case. I dont consider my tank ULNS, at least im not trying, but nutrient levels have been pretty low. As mentioned previously, I was keeping my nitrates at 5ppm through dosing. Since the cyano outbreak, I've upped my photo time on my ATS to 20 hours and lowered my NO3 dosing to keep it at 0.5-1. The cyano has died down but still lingering. I'm gonna stop the dosing all together and see where that goes. Hopefully not a road to dinos.
In response to the question about the light, i literally just added it, i was using a 1000w but water killed it. The 1000w grew algae like a beast, i wanted to try it because kessil has a 1200w fuge light that is $1100, i got mine for $45 on ebay.
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Im using these lights for my ATS and they're great but the ones @bhodges82 linked are even better since the light distribution is wider and higher wattage. I used to have 30W warm white ones that came with the ATS and they didnt grow algae as fast as these lights.
You'll need the ULR tester like this one but I would try another test with what you have and make sure the powder is fully dissolved.
I haven't seen where that would work, it may be possible but I haven't seen it. I did a quick search but didn't find anything. I believe the led's in the two units many use different spectrum's. If that the case it won't work like that.
You can still suck all the sand out and rinse it thoroughly. While the sand is out use a maxjet 1200 zip tied to a piece of 1/2" pvc to really get in there and blow the rocks off. With filter socks and big water changes you can get most of the crap out of there. Leave the lights off for a couple weeks, except the new one you put over the fudge
This will drop the nutrients and kill off the gha & remaining cyano that you couldn't suck out. I think this will be the best bet to restart the system and get you back on track.If you're dead set against doing it this way there is another costlier option you can take. Let me know if you want to hear it.
I haven't seen where that would work, it may be possible but I haven't seen it. I did a quick search but didn't find anything. I believe the led's in the two units many use different spectrum's. If that the case it won't work like that.
You can still suck all the sand out and rinse it thoroughly. While the sand is out use a maxjet 1200 zip tied to a piece of 1/2" pvc to really get in there and blow the rocks off. With filter socks and big water changes you can get most of the crap out of there. Leave the lights off for a couple weeks, except the new one you put over the fudge
If you're dead set against doing it this way there is another costlier option you can take. Let me know if you want to hear it.
I just saw that there is another hanna that specifically says ULR on the tester due to Lshin037's post above.. darn, was hoping I could just switch reagents
(I actually thought about taking all the sand out and doing bare bottom, but have a pretty deep sand bed in the display (had some gobies and blennies before) so could pose issues etting it all out/smart?
I just saw that there is another hanna that specifically says ULR on the tester due to Lshin037's post above.. darn, was hoping I could just switch reagents
I actually thought about taking all the sand out and doing bare bottom, but have a pretty deep sand bed in the display (had some gobies and blennies before) so could pose issues etting it all out/smart?
Official Sand Rinse and Tank Transfer thread
If you are reading this thread to cure a tank invasion from a link I sent you, we do not need to identify your type of invasion here we do not need you to test anything at anytime regarding nitrate, phosphate etc Above all, we do not need to see a microscope slide picture of your invasion at...
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I generally don't agree with a lot of the points in this thread. But it is a viable way to fix issues when a neglected tank needs a reboot, such as yours. There are some bacterial products you can use but with a deeper bed I don't know if they'll really get down in there and do their job. Things like Vibrant, Dr Tims Waste-Away & Re-fresh. Vibrant will do a great job on the rocks, not sure on the sand bed. But it will kill the chaeto too. With the Dr Tims route you'd need to follow THIS plan and really stir the sand up after the doses with thorough vacuuming during the water changes to be effective.
Either of those will still require a lot of work over time vacuuming the sand bed repetitively (there will still be places you can't reach) water changes, skimmer cleanings... or you can blow it all out at once by rinsing the sand, blowing the rock off with a pump and cleaning the sump. Remember the tank didn't get like this over night and it'll take some elbow grease to get it back the way you want it.
