I have a 75 gallon aquarium with a 20 gallon sump. The sump is divided into 3 chambers, protein skimmer to baffles to refuge to the return section. I added cheato about 6 weeks ago, when I got the cheato it was in a tight ball shape, dark green with a firm course texture. The cheato has now lost the ball shape, fell apart all pver the sump and the texture has changed to a soft mussy texture. I have a 65 watt power saver full spectrum bulb which is on a timer to cut on for 16 hours a day when the display lights go off. I have a 3 inch sand bed in the refuge and about 5 turbo snails. Any ideas why the cheato has lost its dark green color and course tecture? What do I need to do to correct this? Thanks in advance!
Cheato Not looking so well-
- Thread starter buford
- Start date
smalls383
New member
I found that my chaeto is very touchy to changes in light spectrum and cycle....I changed from a 5500K bulb to a 6500k bulb and a lot of chaeto started to die off and fall apart....then I canged back and it was ok again after it grew back...
Then I increased my lighting from 12 hours/day to 18 hours/day and I was buring the chaeto near the surface from too much light.....I found that a 26W 5500K bulb for 10-12 hours is the best combo for me.....However, different fuges have different requirements....
Then I increased my lighting from 12 hours/day to 18 hours/day and I was buring the chaeto near the surface from too much light.....I found that a 26W 5500K bulb for 10-12 hours is the best combo for me.....However, different fuges have different requirements....
The light I'm using is the n:vision 14 Watt Spiral Daylight found at hd- it produces 60 w. I have the light in a metal fixture sitting on top of egggrate on top of the refuge tank. Maybe this is too close? The nitrates have came up to 5-10 ppm phosphates. I have no nussiance algae in the display tank. I can take the snails out, I thought most had snails in the refuge- suggestions?
I can't tell if there is other growth, it looks like it because some is attached to the sand bed, but with the cheato falling apart so bad, I can't tell what is what. I was thinking of trying to pull out the more course cheto and siphing the rest out to try to get it back on track- opinions of this approch?
SteveNMegz
New member
have u trimmed it back lately? we keep ours chaeto light on 24/7, whenever some starts looking brownish or gettin to packed we rip it out, we usually take out a handful every other week, the whole ball we have is probably about 3 handfuls, we notice it also starts browning when it isn't able to roll around
I just got done cleaning the sump- I had ordered cheato from 2 seperate people and it appears to be 2 diffeent types. One is the dark green thicker more course type the other is thinner. I removed all of the thinner type that seems to have fallen apart all over the sand bed. ( I had bought from 2 different people in the hopes of getting more pods) I did a 20 gallon water change and now my nitartes have come up to 40 ppm. I have moved the light from sitting right on the top of the refuge up about 7 inchs and have set it to stay on 24 hours. What do I need to do to lower the nitrate level other than water changes?
Possible over feeding may be the problem. I have plenty of circulation in the tank (2) # 3's, the sand bed it 2 months old, no canister filter, sponge filter nor bio balls. On 7/01/08 I had no nitrates, this may have spoked do to the slight movement of the top of the sand bed in the sump?
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