Another question about hair algae

C

Critter9905

Can someone please give me the magic answer here!
I've been battling this for a while now. I had a sea hare, and wiped it all out. Got rid of him, now it's all back.
I've tried algaefix, lanthanum chloride, water changes, etc. I can't seem to get this under control. It's very disheartening.
My P04 is 0.15. I know that's high, and certainly my problem, but I can't figure out how to get it down. I'm running a BRS dual reactor with GFO and Carbon. I've run the GFO for a couple weeks now, and there's been no change whatsoever. I make my own water through a BRS RO/DI and still nothing better.
I feed once or twice a week using frozen cubes.

Any help???

110 Tall oceanig tank.
All parameters are where they should be except the P04.
 
Algaefix will work I dose it everyday instead of what is recommended I have a bad out break of lobophora covering 70% off my rock and slowly it's is dying off. I have used it to kill gha and bryopsis before. I dose mon tues wed and do a water change on either sat or sun


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I have plenty of cleaner crew crabs and snails.
I can get things to eat the algae, but why does it keep coming back???
I feed maybe once a week, one cube of mysis and one cube of Cyclops.

Pampee, how much water change did you do? How long did you dose like that?
 
Livestock:
Purple tang, six line wrasse, 2 clowns, mandarin and a foxface.
Several inverts (snails, hermits, emerald, mithtrax and a cucumber)
Several sps, lps and zoas.
 
What kind of salt do you use? Have you tested your RO water? How old is the membrane? Have you tried dosing a carbon source with bacteria?

I'd try wiping out your nutrients to starve out the algae. I don't do water changes, but keep my po4 at .02 by dosing bacteria w/ pellets and running a refugium. Certain salts can be high in phosphates or nitrates from what I've read, but I use Tropic Marin Pro when replacing displaced saltwater from skimming wet.
 
I use Reef Crystals.
I haven't tested my RO, but all my filters are new, as well as the membrane. Maybe 50 gallons have run through them.

I've never heard of carbon with bacteria.... Is there a specific product like that? Do you run it in a reactor?
I have a refugium, but could use more macro...
 
You can use Brightwell's or Continuum's bacteria and carbon source or use Warner's bio pellets which is run in a reactor. The bacteria is only dosed once or twice weekly, but the carbon is dosed based on the nutrient level in your system. In conjunction with your skimmer, you will pull out much more skimmate doing this.
I'd recommend reading up on it a little so you have a good idea of how it works. Bio pellets or carbon dosing, I'd start out with 1/2 to 1/3 the recommended amount to prevent dropping your alk too fast or getting a bloom that can crash your tank. That's the reason some people don't recommend it since they didn't do their research.
 
So carbon is run through a reactor like I do now.
The bacteria would be dosed as needed.

You think there would be a benefit to bio pellets in a reactor vs bacteria dosed? One better than the other?
I've thought of the possibility of my sandbed being dead. Is that possible? Would this correct that or should I look at new substrate?
I don't mind spending the money if it will cure this problem...
 
I use a pellet reactor, but add carbon when dosing bacteria and heavy feeding. It helps in preventing algae growth on the glass in my system. I think a reactor will help prevent the outbreak of cyno which some people have reported from straight carbon dosing. That's why I like dose bacteria too though to prevent cyno from growing.

I'd probably leave the sand bed alone unless you wanted to add a little on top. I'd be careful not to crash your system messing with the bed too much.
 
Clean up crews don't work for your problem they remove the algae then release the nutrients back into the water. identify where the phosphates are coming from, what is the story with your tank? did you buy used live rock? what are your feeding details, too small of skimmer?
Refug/lighting/Algae Scrubber? IMO GFO is great for maintaining low phosphates, but is too expensive for most people to use to reduce large quantities especially when the LR/LS is saturated. With feeding habits the cheap Petsmart type food is high in phosphates the brand I first bought is 3 x higher than formula 1. emarald entree and marine cuisine seem to be just fine, but human food is usually treated for preservation and needs a wash before adding to the aquarium. Look into added lights for your refugium or an ATS, getting the algae out of your water column is the key not just having them dissapear through chemical or biological methods only to reappear a few weeks later. Perhaps increasing flow to lift the detrius up into the skimmer??? There are infinite possiblities and certainly no magic answer but patience and time will assist.
Also how are your nitrates?
 
I have a large reef octopus skimmer, about a year old, rated for a 300 gallon tank on my 110.
I feed once, maybe twice a week. 1 cube of mysis, 1 cube of cyclops
ALL parameters are in check except the P04.
Salinity is 1.024
I have 2 AI Vegas for lights.
Refugium with chaeto.
Plenty of crabs and snails.

The only thing I can think is the rock. If that's the case, how can I fix that? How long can rocks leach phosphates?
I REALLY don't want to tear my rocks down and replace them... Some of them have encrusting SPS on them, some have zoas. I can pull off what I can but taking all my rocks out...... I just don't know. I have no way of knowing which rock(s) would be the problem.
 
Sounds like you have a great setup.

Any rocks that sit in a high nutrient tank will absorb them. I had this problem in my first tank bought used rock from FOWLR tank and the nutrients never did go down below .1 even after two years, but I didn't have the knowledge or money to get them reduced, I kept a softies tank so it wasn't an major concern for me then. Keep up with the GFO it exactly what you need just a lot of it. If you have the space an Algae scrubber worked wonders for my current tank, I only used it during my long initial cycle until my phosphates went near zero.

If you have LR you can remove and scrub that's a good start but will take some time, acid baths also help clean the rock, but won't work on your coral rocks.

Buy some non-surgical hemostats and spend a few minutes a week pulling off the big stuff and trashing it. Slowly things will improve.
 
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