Is there such thing as a pest free mature tank?

[darren24]

I have had several tanks over the years but most recently set up a 34G Solana after fighting off some internal demons. Anyway I have inspected and dipped every frag that went in to the tank. I started with "dead" rock that had been bleached etc. Now 6 months later (give or take) I have bubble algae and aiptasia. Now granted there is very little of both and I remove them as I see them but does anyone have a mature tank that does not have any type of nuisance algae or pests? Just wondering if it is possible.

Edit: Just a disclaimer. I am not saying my tank is mature at 6 months but you know what I mean...

 

[jef4y]

Not really. It's a constant battle against algae or nuisance hitchhikers. It's just varying levels of control.

Right now I'd consider msyelf to be pretty "clean" with one small piece of aiptasia that grew back after nuking it, and some very mild spots of GHA.

 

[rdnelson]

The only pest free tanks I know of are the ones sitting on the shelf with no water.

 

[johniii]

rdnelson99;793089 wrote: The only pest free tanks I know of are the ones sitting on the shelf with no water.

Even those have spiders

 

[acroholic]

I used a mix of Marco and my own rock in setting up the 465. I have some green striped shrooms that I thought I had gotten rid of. Other than that, I don't think I have any aiptasia or mojanos, and I definitely don't have blue cloves any more. But I would not be surprised if there is some bubble algae lurking somewhere in the tank, although I haven't seen any.

By some definitions I don't have any pests in this tank, but by my definition the shrooms are a pest.

Best we can do is monitor and QT new corals. Sometimes they (pests) can slip by despite our best efforts.

 

[jamescook]

no

 

[jef4y]

As mentioned by Acroholic above, it really depends on your definition of "pest". To me bubble algae isn't a pest because I have virtually none of it. To a tank that's over-run with it, yeah that person might consider it a pest.

 

[chefrepo]

Nope.

 

[jennm]

Tanks we've worked on for many years are pest-free. If we find pests, we persist til they're gone. Part of the equation is once you stop adding new stuff, new pests don't come in. If some came in during the stocking process, then it takes some work to rid them.

Some older fish are pests... they don't like any new additions... but they don't count. :lol:

Jenn

 

[rdnelson]

No matter how hard you work at it some pest still come in. After all, I was just at your store not long ago. Try as you might you couldn't keep me out! hehehehehe

JennM;793283 wrote: Tanks we've worked on for many years are pest-free. If we find pests, we persist til they're gone. Part of the equation is once you stop adding new stuff, new pests don't come in. If some came in during the stocking process, then it takes some work to rid them.

Some older fish are pests... they don't like any new additions... but they don't count. :lol:

Jenn

 

[jennm]

LOL! Just stay out of the tanks, OK?

 

[mvm]

I used marco rocks on my current tank. I do have a little bit of bubble algae and as Charlie mentioned, I'm 99% sure that it came from a frag plug. Moving forward, I have unmounted all frag and mounted on a new frag plug. No aptasia or manajo.

 

[darren24]

Thanks for the responses and ideas. Much appreciated.