cheato not growing

mario4254

New member
i been fighting red slime algee for bout month and a half it wasnt bad mostly on my sand ( i had 2 phosphote reacrots running with Phos Guard abd PhosBan ) i did few extra water changes and looks like im winning the war! red slime goes away slowly and now its almost all gone....a week ago or so i added a dual reactor from BRS to run carbon as well as suggested by many (put some more PhosGiuard in the second chamber) .....what i noticed that my cheato has stoped growing ( i even changed the bulb again i use the home depot CF 6500K ) so to my question is light enough to grow cheato? i dont test my phosphates but with 3 reactors in use i assume its very low ( my front glass gets covered with coraline algee faster than with the green algee ) .....some people claim they toss out handfulls every month or so even before i had the reactors going mine wasnt growing fast at all ...... any imput is great thanks mario
 
ok so here is the scoop cheato needs nitrate phosand light to grow. so with your reactor you prob dont have any phos now so your cheato cant grow. so pretty much you choose between reactor or cheato. imo i think the reactor works better. but then you have no export for nitrate so you have to get a reactor for that also.
Matt
 
I'm gonna tag along because I have the same issue! My chaeto isn't dying it just will not grow. ph-8.0 sg-1.025 ammon-0 nitrite-0 nitrate-0 I do not have a quality tester of phosphate other than the API which always comes up-0
 
you dont have alot of nitrate for it to feed off of that is why. see the cheato is put into the tank because it is a GREAT export for phos and nitrate because that is what it grows on. also it is a good place for your pods to live.
Matt
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14188611#post14188611 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by matt880305
ok so here is the scoop cheato needs nitrate phosand light to grow. so with your reactor you prob dont have any phos now so your cheato cant grow. so pretty much you choose between reactor or cheato. imo i think the reactor works better. but then you have no export for nitrate so you have to get a reactor for that also.
Matt

Not quite because even with your reactor there is still phosphate there (i remember in an organic form/type) that is can still be absorb along with nitrate (as many don't run a sulfur denitratefier). i run both and my cheato grows nicely. i recommend trying different lights as i was recommended a 70 watt MH would be least for cheato if the CFL bulb doesn't work (which does for me).
 
I had the same issue, I had it for almost a year with no growth. I was using a energy saver bulb and it worked great before I upgraded to my current tank. I added a stronger light (96w quad pc bulb) and my growth incread by 3 times with in a month.
 
I have the same cfl bulb and my Cheato is growing very well.
How bad was the red slime? Red slime will compete for the nutrients.
Have you heard of Chemiclean (red slime remover) Just make sure you do real good water changes after using it. 5 months back I notice some red slime starting. Chemiclean worked out well.
 
Try trimming your cheato mass in half and throwing half out. A lot of times this will get it to start growing. My phos is .01 and my No3 is ~1.5 and my cheato grows just fine. Sometimes it will stall like you have said, I cut it in half and it starts growing again.
 
Over skimming can cause this too.. After I bought my new octopus skimmer and once it started running, after a week, my cheato started dyeing. Before the new skimmer, the refugium was full of cheato. Now, there is nothing left.. I threw out all the decaying ones.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14191189#post14191189 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by akaimal
Over skimming can cause this too.. After I bought my new octopus skimmer and once it started running, after a week, my cheato started dyeing. Before the new skimmer, the refugium was full of cheato. Now, there is nothing left.. I threw out all the decaying ones.

This is interesting as I just started running a new octopus skimmer.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14191370#post14191370 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by JPSKI25
This is interesting as I just started running a new octopus skimmer.

Funny and interesting as it started to slow when i modded my octo to perform at its finest :cool:
 
I just finally got my Octo running good after over a year. When I did the mesh mod, I didn't notice that the venturi was starting to clog with salt creep. This past week when I noticed that it wasn't getting any air at all, I figured out that the venturi was completely clogged. Now that it is cleared, I am finally happy with its performance. I guess that is something to keep an eye on.
 
i do have have oversized skimmer rated up to 220 gl
http://www.finsreef.com/product.php?productid=16548&cat=254&page=1
skimmes good dark nesty stuff about 1/3 cup a week.........
duke i did throw out like 40% of it already but since its not really growing back i dont wanna throw out anymore .....
as far as the algee problem was not that bad only on tha sand bad and thick only in few places it dies almost all by morning that next day it grows back but less than day before and so on i still got few spots here and there
 
Maybe try some caulerpa instead, I started out with cheato and caulerpa with the same bulbs and the caulerpa overtook the cheato and cheato doesnt really grow anymore. Also, I think cheato likes either A. better light, or B. more flow, or both. I say this because I put some in my main tank once just to see how it did and it exploded in growth, this was under 250 halides and lots of flow.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14194626#post14194626 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by matt880305
OT: hey blakduc do you know of any venturi mods for the octo

which skimmer you running matt? I have the regular NW and modded the venturi for a more air:water ratio. now it foams like an MSX or octo extreme
 
I am running the DNW-110 recirculating skimmer. Since all of the mods, it is actually working as it should. I only did 1 layer of enkamat since I don't have a kill-a-watt. Much better than stock and way more consistant.
 
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