Finally an easy solution to bryopsis!

you are the man!

you are the man!

I have a 180 gallon aquarium that I have set up with live rock and was planning a fish only aquarium. For this reason I have not paid much attention to magnesium and calcium levels. As a result I have operated with depleted levels and have struggled off and on with bryopsis. At one point it became so bad I got rid of everything and set up a freshwater tank.

Since transferring back to a marine tank a year ago and setting up my live rock I started getting hair algae again. I have again tried several solutions with no success. Your article convinced me to give it a try and WOW!!!!! Since boosting the magnesium level to about 1350 the bryopsis is struggling and starting to die off.

I know now this does work and wanted to thank you for your post. People need to understand that setting up a fish only tank does not mean they can ignore the chemical balance, if you do you will not be happy with the results.

Thanks again
 
sdallas said:
Since transferring back to a marine tank a year ago and setting up my live rock I started getting hair algae again. I have again tried several solutions with no success. Your article convinced me to give it a try and WOW!!!!! Since boosting the magnesium level to about 1350 the bryopsis is struggling and starting to die off.
Click to expand...



Man that's good to hear. :bounce1:


Just know that your low calcium and mag levels didn't really contribute to the bryopsis (or hair algae, they are two totally different things). Bryopsis and hair algae don't benefit anything, really, from low calcium or mag levels.

Lots of folks have tried standard magnesium chloride flakes and mag sulfate (epsom salts) that don't work at all (I know, I tried both, and a LOT of them).


The Tech M usually does the trick--- is this the product you used? I've also heard of folks having success with Seachem Reef Advantage, but that seems to be much more hit or miss.

There's just some impurity in the Tech M (and apparently some batches of Reef Advantage mag) that kills the bropsis. Magnesium in and of itself doesn't seem to do anything other than it's usual helping corals and coralline algae.
 
Add one dose, let it cycle for an hour or two for good mixing, and test your magnesium. If it went up by around 50-100, (preferably around 50, in my opinion) then stick with that dose, once daily.


Also dose by "target feeding" the stuff to the bryopsis. Cut off all circulation/return pumps, use a turkey baster to puff it onto the biggest bryopsis patches, and let them stew in it for as long as you feel safe leaving your pumps off (for me, that's about an hour or two). Watch corals carefully and turn on all the pumps if any of them start behaving badly (ie, closing up or wilting).


Obviously you're going to test your magnesium increase on that first dose before you do the above method, just in case your calculation is overkilled. Ie, your first dose just toss it in the sump and leave everything running so you can verify the increase.
 
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I haven't read this whole thread...just skimmed through some ofit and I am intrested in using the Tech M to get rid of my bryopsis. Bare with me if this has already been asked. I have seen a couple people on here say they have lost some inverts after using this product. I have 2 clams that I would really rather not lose, has anyone used this product sucesfully on a tank with clams in it?
 
Hmm. Good question. I had no clams when I did the treatment on my system. The only thing that seemed to suffer was one torch coral head that did a polyp bailout, but the other heads on the torch did just fine.

I'm planning on getting a clam in the near future but I'm also getting close to using the Tech M again, but this time with a different strategy. Maybe I should hold off on the clam.


Hopefully someone will speak up on this---
 
Still keeping mag at about 1500ppm and beginning to let it decrease to probably between 1350 and 1400ppm (through my regular weekly water changes)... however, I still will be putting in maybe a capful of Tech-M after each water change (along with more if/when the Mag levels begin to drop) to keep whatever magical element in Tech M in my aquarium and the bryopsis at bay.

All in all, still no more bryopsis AT ALL in the tank!!!
 
I'm having some success slowly beating the crap into submission with a heavy vodka/Vitamin C dosing schedule, but I have to dose nearly unsafe amounts of the vodka.

So long as I dose several times a day a hefty amount, the bryopsis starts looking more and more ragged at the tips, slowly progressing toward the base.


I'm not using any Tech M right now (and haven't for 6+ months), and the bryo hasn't lost a single square inch of space yet, but it's decidedly ragged.

If I can keep it this way, maybe when I dose the Tech M it will be gone for good rather than have it rebound like I did.
 
Re:inverts

My rose BTA was not happy after my fist dose. I am ashamed to admit i dosed more than 100ppm on that first dose. he was closed with in 30 min. He opened back up but has not quite been as "happy"

I actually have a time lase video of the day..uploaded here
 
I used the Tech M to eliminate the bryopsis too, after Mag Sulfate/Mag Chloride had no effect on it. But then the real problems began...

Has anyone had secondary issues resulting from the excessive nutrients released when the bryopsis dies off? I think it helped to fuel a major dinoflagellettes outbreak in my tank. I didn't diagnose it correctly soon enough, and I'm still battling it. I think it's worse than bryopsis!
 
I had a small algae (brown algae) increase, but that subsided with consistent/weekly water changes and running the skimmer on the wet side. I think the key is doing everything slowly, since if all of the byropsis dies at the same time (or in a short period of time), and you don't have anything that will eat it (I think my urchins helped a lot with that), then your system won't have enough bacteria to overcome the die-off without some type of bacteria or algal outbreak.
 
hayes112 said:
I haven't read this whole thread...just skimmed through some ofit and I am intrested in using the Tech M to get rid of my bryopsis. Bare with me if this has already been asked. I have seen a couple people on here say they have lost some inverts after using this product. I have 2 clams that I would really rather not lose, has anyone used this product sucesfully on a tank with clams in it?
Click to expand...

I've had clams during treatment and they were never adversely affected. I've seen astrea snails struggling when I overdosed my little 12g tank and forgot I had snails in it. I grabbed them and put them in my display and they recovered instantly. I've heard others say dosing too much at once causes problems with snails. I've never seen anyone who dosed 100ppm per day or less have this problem though.

The only troubles I had were some leathers and zoanthids lost a bit of color, which they regained after a few months. I've had a large derasa clam for four years now, who's been through several Tech M dosings in two different tanks. Never showed any signs of trouble.
 
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