Any ideas to help my customer - slime, hair, and dinos

[FishWife1]

Hi - I have a job maintaining tanks for individuals and businesses. On Thursday I did an initial consult at a home with a 40 gal. reef tank. The tank is about 5 months old and was set up by a company that is now out of business (with good reason). The tank was originally home to a yellow tang, a blue (I'm guessing Hippo) tang, a Perc, and another large fish - the owner wasn't certain what it was. Needless to say, the only fish still alive is the perc.

The tank has a CPR Backpack on it - fine, pc lighting -fine, a MJ 600 - eh, and that's it. No heater and no other filtration or circulation. It contains nice live rock and about a 2" sand bed. there have been 0 water changes. The owner kept referring to the "Turbo" snails which weren't touching the algae and when she pointed them out to me they were Nassarius snails.

The tank is full of slime, hair algae and possibly dinos. Slime had even accumulated on the surface of the water - yuck. When I began explaining to the owners what would have to be done they opted to use our maintenance service.

My initial suggestions for purchases are going to be:

heater
thermometer
salt
ro water
power filter
carbon
phosban
a MJ 1200 or 2 for in tank (use the 600 for water changes)
some real Turbos
some blue leg hermits
a couple of Emerald crabs
a sandsifting star
a sandsifting cuke


I am going to suggest that I come in for weekly water changes and that they rinse their carbon and phosban daily until the slime and dinos clear up. Surprisingly their nitrates are not that high, around 10.

They were hoping I could just dump a chemical in there and fix the problem. Another company had done just that and it didn't work. I assured them it wouldn't work this time, either, and that they had to fix the source of the problem.

Does anyone have any suggestions other than what I have listed above?

Thanks - Laurie

 

[RichConley]

1) The bakpak is pretty much useless. I wouldnt put one on anything bigger than about a 10g.
2) You need WAY more flow.


So: Upgrade skimmer. More flow. More water changes.

 

[alan214]

RichConley is right target. You customer would be best served spending their money on a decent skimmer and an RO/DI unit.

 

[sunfish11]

I don't find it that surprising that nitrates are low. There is only one fish and the dyno, cyano, and algea are eating up the rest that was left in the water. I would temporarily house the fish and take a toothbrush to the rocks, vaccuum the sandbed well, siphon off and/or scrape the glass, change all the water, let it cycle (should go reasonable fast), and then add a new cleaning crew.

Don't get the sandsifting star, it will die because the tank is to small and she only has a two inch sandbed. Cuke may also have a problem with the shallow sand bed. The nassarius snails that she has will be fine.

Make sure you get the warm water turbo snails.

Think about another skimmer.

Think about puting in a small sump and running some filter media there and ditch the canister.

More powerheads for circulation. Multiple smaller ones in different areas are better that one big one.

Find out what the owner wants to do with the tank. I am assuming that you already explained that her previous fish were too big for a 40 gal tank.

Lisa

 

[FishWife1]

My company will supply the ro water and the backpack at this time is pulling out tons of junk - probably because there is so much junk in there. I, too, would prefer a better skimmer on there and will talk to them about it in the near future.

Any other critter recommendations?

Laurie

 

[lhoy]

If they truly have dino's water changes only make it worse!!!! Trust me, read Sprung's book on algae. The best solution is to turn off the lights until the dino disappears.

Lee

 

[RichConley]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9281199#post9281199 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by lhoy
If they truly have dino's water changes only make it worse!!!! Trust me, read Sprung's book on algae. The best solution is to turn off the lights until the dino disappears.

Lee

Dinos are a part of any natural cycle. Water changes only hurt if your source water is high in silicates.


If they're using Tap, water changes probably hurt. If theyre using RODI, it'll help.

 

[petoonia]

I would use an assortment of snails Turbos, mexican turbos banded trochus, astreas, cerith, nassarius, maybe a lettuce nudibranch. I would add some extra snails at first then remove some once the algae is under control.

 

[FishWife1]

Thanks all.

What the owner wants is a quick fix. I explained over and over that there is no quick fix when the tank is in such bad shape.

I just found out that they were concerned because they expected the tank to look "much" better after my first visit (which was supposed to be just a consultation - I gave them a courtesy water change after blasting their rocks, cleaned their skimmer pump, pulled out gobs of hair algae, all the while explaining what would have to be done). Some people just don't get it but I guess that just goes with the job.

Anyway, thank you for all the advice. I'm sure all of it will come in handy.

Laurie

 

[Sk8r]

Borrow a cannister filter and run a 1 micron filter on the tank, stirring that sandbed up deliberately but judiciously, blow off rock with a turkey baster---I'm assuming the rock is set directly on the bottom and not ON the sandbed, so it will not be good to lift it, just stir the sand, and maybe remove the fish during this operation in some tank water, so he won't get gill irritation from what you're about to do. You may use up several filters on this job. We used to do this back in the 80's before there were skimmers in common use, and it's still a good answer when facing detritus, junk, and massive pollution and mayhem in a tank. It restores the water to pristine and clear, yanks all swimming stuff, all floating debris.
THen I'd lay down two more inches of washed sand. And run yet one more filter. Make sure the rock is 1 lb per gallon.
The 1 microns turn out water that looks like ro/di straight from the tap. THe only thing they don't yank is solute chemicals [salt, etc.] and the water turns out crystal clear.

That should be a pretty radical transformation. Then get them to get a lawnmower blenny for that algae, and set them up with some spirulina flake for when he's gone through it and getting hungry. I've never seen one turn down spirulina.

 

[willtel76]

It might also be a decent idea to add a UV filter on a temporary basis. I know mine helped with my algae issue and it will give some instant gratification for water clarity.

 

[lakee911]

If you don't mind me asking, what does a company charge to come in periodically (say weekly or twice weekly) to clean tank, change water and tweak equipment or in this case pull algae etc?

Thx

 

[ralphie16]

yellow pages, lakee911, have all the answers you seek