Ben’s back at it 20G long

[ExitTrauma]

Update.

Got rid of the Jebao gyre and got a pair of Jebao DLW-10. These are the Nero knock offs.

So far I like them a lot. In my opinion it’s better than the gyre was. The gyre was loud and unreliable. These are dead quiet and move a lot of water. So far I have them on alternating pulses at 30% strength which is the lowest they will go.

Opinion?

Well I was gonna post a video but I’m not sure how to do it.

 

[Reefing102]

Update.

Got rid of the Jebao gyre and got a pair of Jebao DLW-10. These are the Nero knock offs.

So far I like them a lot. In my opinion it’s better than the gyre was. The gyre was loud and unreliable. These are dead quiet and move a lot of water. So far I have them on alternating pulses at 30% strength which is the lowest they will go.

Opinion?

Well I was gonna post a video but I’m not sure how to do it.

Best and easiest is upload to YouTube and link it back here. Should “in theory” embed automatically

 

[ExitTrauma]

Sigh.

Upon further watching and assessment, this stuff is now growing everywhere even on top of the small Xenia colony. I’m nearly convinced at this point that it is 100% Dinos which really blows.

I’m not sure what to do about it. The last time I had to fight these I blacked out the entire tank and beat it.

 

[griss]

Oh crap. *knock on wood, I’ve never dealt with Dinos. I *think* @kharmaguru has some knowledge.

I will say, I recently got some Brightwell Razor and that stuff really cleared my tank of all algae…good and bad, might want to try it.

 

[ExitTrauma]

Update: I’m currently in the middle of a blackout. Sitting at 2 days. I also am doing some micro dosing of chemiclean in the event that it’s just some brown cyano.

When I start it back up, given the amount of ambient sunlight present in the room, I may scale back the light cycle by an hour or two.

I ordered the bright well razor. Thatll be another thing to try. There is also a product called Dinox that I’ve never tried that I might give a shot.

Here’s a question…I’ve never had a sumpless build before and have always run some form of filter sock. I’m not doing that here just some sponges.

I thought about building a recirculating gravel filter to help occasionally suck up some extra detritus once a week or so. If I use a Turkey baster on the rocks a ton of crap floats out of them. Maybe excess nutrients are contributing?

Opinion?

 

[griss]

What are you thinking for the recirculating gravel filter? I’m having a hard time visualizing.

Blowing out your rock should help as well.

 

[ExitTrauma]

What are you thinking for the recirculating gravel filter? I’m having a hard time visualizing.

Blowing out your rock should help as well.

I’m thinking of getting one of those freshwater gravel vacuums, the siphon kind, and hooking it up to a pump.

Take the outlet of the pump and Plumb it into….something. Something like a canister filter filled with filter floss, reactor filled with filter media, etc. then route the outlet back into the aquarium.

Idk if that makes any sense

 

[griss]

I’m thinking of getting one of those freshwater gravel vacuums, the siphon kind, and hooking it up to a pump.

Take the outlet of the pump and Plumb it into….something. Something like a canister filter filled with filter floss, reactor filled with filter media, etc. then route the outlet back into the aquarium.

Idk if that makes any sense

Hmmm, should be interesting. If you do that, document the build please.

 

[ExitTrauma]

A little update.

After a couple days blackout, then turning the lights back on slowly ramped, this stuff seems to be coming back. It’s not terrible, but it’s curious more than anything.

In other news. I got a ph probe finally for the apex. After calibrating it like 3 times I’m getting. PH of like 7.8? My dkh is 10.5 magnesium is 1440. I need some reagents to check my Ca, but I can’t imagine it’s low. I have a AWC with the apex and using reef crystals and I have nothing using any calcium anyway.

I’m tempted to hook up my old kalk stirrer even though it’s grossly oversized and would probably be an eyesore…

I have noticed that even after all this time I still have no coraline growing so maybe the Ca is low?

 

[griss]

The ph of 7.8 is a bit low. I was having all kinds of cyano issues and (I think) what finally cleared it is was ph above 8 consistently. Despite dosing Alk daily, I still had problems.

My tank is in the basement and I had the crappy builder grade windows sealed with plastic and struggled with ph. After removing the plastic, my ph is 8 at the lowest and 8.3 mid-day. This was likely due to CO2 build up in the house.

So, it could be you need to introduce outside air or add a CO2 scrubber????

 

[ExitTrauma]

The ph of 7.8 is a bit low. I was having all kinds of cyano issues and (I think) what finally cleared it is was ph above 8 consistently. Despite dosing Alk daily, I still had problems.

My tank is in the basement and I had the crappy builder grade windows sealed with plastic and struggled with ph. After removing the plastic, my ph is 8 at the lowest and 8.3 mid-day. This was likely due to CO2 build up in the house.

So, it could be you need to introduce outside air or add a CO2 scrubber????

Well, I leave the windows open a lot here because I do smoke a pipe from time to time. (Tobacco pipe people.). The tank is also right next to the exterior door and it’s open a lot.

Now it could be a surface agitation issue holding in too much Co2, that’s a thought along those lines. Maybe I’ll point the powerheads more at the surface and see what that does?

If it doesn’t work, what’s your suggestion sir?

 

[ExitTrauma]

So, I’m wondering if it’s because the system doesn’t have a skimmer. I kicked around either buying air stones and a pump or buying a hob skimmer. I went with a bubble magus qq1 skimmer. I will report back if that fixes the issue or not.

 

[griss]

Yep, let's see what the skimmer does. Adding Kalk would certainly not hurt.

Another thought, maybe try testing pH using a different method like a titration test kit (Salifert or other brand) to make sure your probe/Apex are reading correctly.

 

[ExitTrauma]

Yep, let's see what the skimmer does. Adding Kalk would certainly not hurt.

Another thought, maybe try testing pH using a different method like a titration test kit (Salifert or other brand) to make sure your probe/Apex are reading correctly.

Ordered the salifert.

Recalibrated my probe now I’m running about 7.65-7.86 typical cyclic.

I know everyone always says pH “is what it is”, but I don’t like how low the valley is. I don’t mind the cyclic shift that’s pretty normal but I’d rather see a 7.86-8.07 than what I’m getting. Will that make a huge difference?…….i guess who knows.

Yesterday I had every door and window open with the front door right next to the tank, I moved one of the power heads up to the surface so it started sucking air and left it like that for most of the day and had zero difference in the PH raising it by like .04 at the most.

So is it a gas exchange issue? Maybe, skimmer is on its way and won’t hurt anything, but plan B I guess is to start kalk dosing which scares the living crap out of me to do since the only stirrer I have is the avast one that’s way oversized for this tiny system.

I’m starting to regret going with this tiny system. I know I know, queue the “I told you so’s”. This experience will keep me from ever having a sumpless system again.

Anyways, enough whining.

Got a couple pics. One is my ph graph and the other is the kalk stirrer. On a scale of 1-10 how much of an eyesore is it?

 

[griss]

I won't do the I told you so because many, many people have successfully kept smaller systems. Heck, after we moved into our first house I downgraded from a 58 to a 15 to try to save money.

If using an oversized kalk stirrer makes you nervous (and I don't blame you there) you can mix small batches of kalk and drip it into the tank. I did this with my 15 back in the day. I used a 20 ounce soda bottle (yes, soda, not pop ), drilled a hole in the lid for airline tubing, and used an airline tube valve to allow a slow drip. Yes, it was a manual process but, with a smaller system it wasn't that big of a deal to me.

 

[griss]

BTW, I think your tank is still looking great. So, maybe chasing the pH number isn't a concern.

Upthread you mentioned a lack of coralline algae. With my pH varying between 8-8.3 and my Ca around 425-450, I have very little coralline in my tank as well. I dose Alk, Ca, Mg and NO3 daily and still not much coralline. Granted, I have a LOT of Acro frags in the tank for such a small system.

 

[ExitTrauma]

BTW, I think your tank is still looking great. So, maybe chasing the pH number isn't a concern.

Upthread you mentioned a lack of coralline algae. With my pH varying between 8-8.3 and my Ca around 425-450, I have very little coralline in my tank as well. I dose Alk, Ca, Mg and NO3 daily and still not much coralline. Granted, I have a LOT of Acro frags in the tank for such a small system.

Thanks for all the help In this my friend.

I agree about chasing numbers. I think you’ve convinced me not to intervene just yet. I’m going to let it go. The corals looks good all except for that minor algae or whatever it is, issue. The Xenia is taking off though that’s not any major accomplishment lol. The only thing I have for a “canary” if you will, is that small Duncan frag and it seems happy? Nothing seems like “bent out of shape” if you will. So I think we give it a few more weeks of slow monitoring and in the next month or so if something shows up that objectively needs addressed then we can do it at that time.

So I’m putting the kalk rocket tube away lol

 

[ExitTrauma]

Heres a couple of shots. Got a filter and a macro. Got some macro shots of whatever snot this stuff is.

 

[griss]

Thanks for all the help In this my friend.

I agree about chasing numbers. I think you’ve convinced me not to intervene just yet. I’m going to let it go. The corals looks good all except for that minor algae or whatever it is, issue. The Xenia is taking off though that’s not any major accomplishment lol. The only thing I have for a “canary” if you will, is that small Duncan frag and it seems happy? Nothing seems like “bent out of shape” if you will. So I think we give it a few more weeks of slow monitoring and in the next month or so if something shows up that objectively needs addressed then we can do it at that time.

So I’m putting the kalk rocket tube away lol

To be perfectly honest, aside from my Apex monitoring Temp & pH, the only time I test is when my corals/nems don't look happy. Probably not the smartest approach but, it's how I've done things since the 1980s lol.

 

[griss]

Heres a couple of shots. Got a filter and a macro. Got some macro shots of whatever snot this stuff is.

Aside from Bryopsis, Cyano and GHA, I've never been very adept at ID-ing other nuisance algae. So, I'm not sure what that is.