Finally an easy solution to bryopsis!

[Reefmack]

Hi & thanks. I put 50ml of Tech M in today, although I was tempted to put in 100ml. I was at 1400ppm Mg after a couple of daily doses of 20 ml and the 50ml I added today, That's brought me up from 1300ppm. I'll add another 50ml tomorrow, or maybe 2 doses of 50ml spaced a few hours apart, and continue that till I get to 1600pm or above. I'm tired of the bryopsis growing too close to, or on, on my zoas - where it's impossible to remove without damaging the corals. Hopefully I'll see the same positive results so many others have.

 

[tonyf]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11083161#post11083161 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Reeferhead
I used 5:3 Magflake to epson salts because that's what I had already mixed up, its one of Randy's Mg maintence formulas. Worked fine but I had to bring my Mg level up to over 2000ppm. I've been bryopsis free for about 3 months now but my Mg is still at about 1700 ppm. The only coral I've noticed effected is my frogspawn which looks a little pale.

My experience with magnesium chloride hexahydrate (magflake) is that it has boosted the bryopsis each time that I have used it. Mg around 1500 ppm using this product has only made the bryopsis worse. Must be something in the magflake that the bryopsis really loves.

My reef tank has otherwise A1 water conditions and I run a monster dual recirculating beckett skimmer, but the bryopsis won't die.

Tone

 

[montrealreef]

Hi guys,

I just wanted to share my experience with you. I struggled with bryopsis for over 4 months, I tried different herbivores (Desjardini Tang, Diadema urchin, pincushion urchin, astrea snails, emerald crabs, trochus snails, mexican turbo snails, foxface, leopard rabbitfish) Non of them did any noticeable damage to the bryopsis population. I did daily 15% water changes for 3 weeks, still no effect. I tried pruning by hand but the algae would grow back within 2 days. I tried cutting down on feeding, and still no effect. Water parameters throughout this period were as follows: Temp 77-79, pH 7.9 - 8.2, nitrate 0, phosphate 0, Ca 440, Mg 1200-1300, Alk 14 (using salifert test kits)

I then stumbled upon this thread, and figured I would give it a try. My MG level was 1300 when I started. I raised it to 1800 over a period of 10 days using Kent Tech M, and I'm happy to report that the results are amazing. The bryopsis "bleached" on the 3rd day of treatment, and now it is almost completely gone. The rabbit fish and the urchins also seem to be more interested in the dying bryopsis.

I've taken a few photos to document the result (sorry about the quality)

[/IMG]

Before Mag treatment

[/IMG]
3 days into mag treatment (notice the "bleaching" bryopsis)

12 days after start of treatment! almost entirely gone (only a few withering strands) The algae left an area of bleached coral where the bryopsis was covering the coral tissue.




Thank you so much for this thread !!!

 

[montrealreef]

oh and I forgot to mention that the only side effect I noticed (and I'm not totally sure it is due to the Magnesium) is that the diadema urchin started to shed a few spines today. He has been "healthy" and active for three months. Time will tell how badly he is affected..

 

[Reefmack]

One effect I saw was that when I was at the start boosting the mag at about 100ppm per day levels with Kent Tech M a large colony of GSP didn't open for a few days (a smaller colony of a different type did however) - back to normal now. I still haven't seen a major effect of the Tech M. It did lighten in color and appeared to be looking sick, but didn't really disappear. In the meantime I picked up a small Foxface and he's thoroughly cleaned off a few zoa colonies of Bryopsis. Confirmed as I've seen him picking it off and eating it. I still have one big clump of Bryopsis that the increased magnesium hasn't had much effect on. I plan on manually pulling out as much of that as I can to see if the mag will take care of the rest better after it's thinned out.

 

[amcarrig]

I have not had any luck using Epsom salts, Mag Flake or Tech M and I'm on the verge of starting the tank completely over as my sps colonies are beginning to rtn from coming into contact with the bryopsis. It's horribly frustrating and heartbreaking.

 

[montrealreef]

amcarrig,

what is the level of Magnesium in your tank? are the other parameters in check (especially Nitrate/Phosphate)?

interestingly, there was one patch of bryopsis in my tank that did not seem to respond to the Magnesium treatment. After a few days I decided to coat it with superconcentrated calcium hydroxide paste after shutting off all the pumps and powerheads in the tank. I left it on for 60 mins then syphoned out what I could before starting the pumps again. The algae took a hit (basically burned from the caustic nature) and 2 days later was gone. I had tried kalk paste in the past, before using Magnesium and it did not work, so at least from this one isolated experience, it seems to me that the combo worked. You might want to give it a try.

 

[TWallace]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11326950#post11326950 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by amcarrig
I have not had any luck using Epsom salts, Mag Flake or Tech M and I'm on the verge of starting the tank completely over as my sps colonies are beginning to rtn from coming into contact with the bryopsis. It's horribly frustrating and heartbreaking.

Are you sure it's bryopsis? I've never had SPS RTN from contact with bryopsis...or any algae actually.

 

[amcarrig]

I'm positive that it's bryopsis as I had it in my old 90 gallon. It made it into my current tank because I was stupid enough to transfer corals from the originally infected tank into the "new" one. We raised our mag to 1600-1700+ using all of the mag. supplements that I mentioned earlier. We've tried for weeks upon weeks (much to the chagrin of our LPS corals which shrivelled up). The treatement(s) stalled the growth of the algae but did not stop it. We also kept our ph very high which supposedly worked for some people as well. I've been pulling the longer stuff out manually on a weekly basis. The RTN is possibly a result of the high magnesium levels and high ph combined with the fact that the algae is constantly rubbing against the corals. We run a phosphate reactor with Rowa-Phos, a calcium reactor AND a kalkwasser reactor. We also have a refugium and run tons of carbon that we change frequently. We have no nitrates and no phosphates and this stuff is still kicking our butts

 

[mcrist]

I know some people on this thread where raising the magnesium to 2000 and over.

 

[amcarrig]

It's quite possible that our mag got that high at some point as it took more than one syringe full of Salifert's test kit reagent to get a reading.

 

[HDFATB]

Has anyone had a perfectly clean tank and had put a frag with some hair algae on It In.

Did It spread?

 

[amcarrig]

Yup

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11327683#post11327683 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by amcarrig
I'm positive that it's bryopsis as I had it in my old 90 gallon. It made it into my current tank because I was stupid enough to transfer corals from the originally infected tank into the "new" one.

 

[Reefmack]

I'm about 99.9% bryopsis free now. The Foxface I got helped a lot, possibly because the Tech M had weakened it and made it more palatable to the fish, as someone above mentioned. In any case the fish had picked it all off off my zoa colonies. I had one big patch left - next to a Euphyllia, and the Foxface made no attemp to eat that patch (maybe fear of being stung by the Euphyllia). A week ago I was able to easily pull that big patch out. It came out very easily, and I have a feeling the Tech M weakened it enough to allow easy manual removal. It's never been easy to pull out in the past. This time all that remained were a few thin white strands which are now gone! I'm keeping the mg up and my fingers crossed!

 

[melev]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11327683#post11327683 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by amcarrig
I'm positive that it's bryopsis as I had it in my old 90 gallon. It made it into my current tank because I was stupid enough to transfer corals from the originally infected tank into the "new" one. We raised our mag to 1600-1700+ using all of the mag. supplements that I mentioned earlier. We've tried for weeks upon weeks (much to the chagrin of our LPS corals which shrivelled up). The treatement(s) stalled the growth of the algae but did not stop it. We also kept our ph very high which supposedly worked for some people as well. I've been pulling the longer stuff out manually on a weekly basis. The RTN is possibly a result of the high magnesium levels and high ph combined with the fact that the algae is constantly rubbing against the corals. We run a phosphate reactor with Rowa-Phos, a calcium reactor AND a kalkwasser reactor. We also have a refugium and run tons of carbon that we change frequently. We have no nitrates and no phosphates and this stuff is still kicking our butts

Then I would suggest getting a Foxface. Those fish love bryopsis. Just remember that that fish has poisonous spines, so you need to be aware of its location when reaching in the tank.

 

[frezel]

ummm thank you jesus for letting me stumble across this page, after 2 hoursof reading 23 pages of threads, i hav hit the end, i will be using epsom salt to get to 1600 and tech m to maintain it, i have a 150 gallon system and this seems to be the best way to get to taht mark. I will post pics of my progress as this is a terible infestation. Only thing is no one ever answered the question of how my epsom to rodi water? Like 4 cup to 1 gallon rodi?etc and how much will the concentration yied per cup? i was planning on doing 4 cups in a 1gallon container and i will test mg before and after to get a basline of how much say 1 cup of this mixture will raisemg...keep up the great work reefers..

 

[amcarrig]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11328655#post11328655 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by melev
Then I would suggest getting a Foxface. Those fish love bryopsis. Just remember that that fish has poisonous spines, so you need to be aware of its location when reaching in the tank.

I just might do that but I'm afraid that my powder blue will beat the living tar out of it. I suppose I can take my chances.

 

[flyyyguy]

well I posted earlier in this thread about ths stuff rearing its ugly head in my tank after a overheating crash this summer.( i have had the crap before)

I run very clean systems and along with that being very anal about blowing my rocks off every water change with a MJ1200, I was fortunate that this time it only really grew on and behind my spraybars that are hard to reach and some crap does settle there....

I had enough of it that i couldnt see most of my spraybars and it was grwoing onto the pvc deep enough that it oucnt be scraped of without taking a bunch of plastic with your scraper... this might have had soemthing to do with the fact that I coatd the spraybars with purple primer when i set the tank up....i dont know

anyway...long story short I did erradicate the stuff and i did it with homemade. I couldnt bring myself to pay for tech M so even against what some people recommended I went at with my RHF recipe. I ended up takintg ti to over 2000 before it really worked although i started noticing it working slightly starting about 1900. I raised it VERY slowly.......it took me nearly a month to get it to that over 2000 level and i kept it there for 3 weeks. I had no problems in doing this except for my calcium became really hard to maintain, and my coral growth slowed down considerably and my coralline growth absolutely stopped which I didnt quite understand to be honest........now that it has dropped some all is well.

Just thought Id report my experience and that it certainly CAN be done without buying overpriced Ro/DI water with some mag thrown in.

I will also say that if you keep yoru reef clean the stuff has a lot harder time taking hold in every nook and cranny. The first time I had the stuff I now know that my poor tank set up was the largest contributor to the stuff taking over. My system simply wasnt set up well enough and it gave it the conditions it needs to take foot everywhere



edit...just one other thing to add to throw some light on my tank and circumstances in case it helps anyone. I am a two part junkie, the tank in qeustion is a high flow DSB sps dominated system, I dont use a refugium nor do i run carbon or GFO.

 

[Mr31415]

Just be careful people. Obviously I am subjective here, but what happened with me when I used Tech-M to raise my Mg from 1400 to 1720, I managed to kill of ALL the bryopsis, and now hair algae is growing slowly in its place.

However, my Colt coral is still bleached, so too another soft coral, my galaxy only recently started getting back colour, some zoanthids are still bleached, one of my Euphyllias died as it was bleached so much that it could not photosynthesize...

And it seems as if the Tech-M fueled the growth of pink hair algae - it has taken over everything. My opinion - think carefully before dosing chemicals.

 

[dendro982]

Pink hair algae:
I bought green porites with this algae on it, but while I was raising Mg levels to 1600 ppm by Seachem Reef Advantage Magnesium (sulphate), this pink algae faded to pale and stopped grow.

Now dosing Tech M. Several days - no effect on either - pink hair algae or bryopsis.

Tried way, posted in thread "Fast solution for bryopsis" - local application of higher concentration - no effect either, at all. Bryosis still nice and green. Mismanaged one squirt - and killed this place on green porites, just like Kalkwasser paste did this on beige porites.

Or there are different kinds of bryopsis, or something else is contributing in bryopsis eradication.
Let brainstorm: what else was done in the tanks with bryopsis during treatment?

P.S. My PO4 is 0, NO3 - 0, new MH 14,000K light + sun, filter feeders tank, heavily fed. Micron sock, changed daily, skimmer, refugium.