(I cant believe I actually remembered my account, it's been a long time)
Anyway, Problem 1.)
my tank got hit hard by a massive heat wave that came through our area a little over a month ago and hasn't recovered fully since. Lost some fish and coral, and that infamous green algae is covering everything. I tried sea hares but they kicked the bucket a week later without eating much algae at all.
Let me back up and tell you about the tank. 55 gallon, fairly standard dimensions, and perfect water quality (it's driving me nuts that everything is going down hill all of the sudden.) This tank has been alive and kicking for over 2 years and this is the first time I’ve not only run into serious problems, but ever had any real problems at all.
Problem 2.)
Our house is to be fumigated this Friday, and I am wondering the best way of going about this. I asked our neighbor and he has no problem at all with letting me reset up the tank in his garage for the 5 days or whatever it takes. My plan is to kill 2 birds with one stone.
Since I already have to move everything anyway, I am much more keen on the idea of taking each rock out and individually removing the green algae, as well as trawling the sand to get all the undesirables out. On top of doing massive water changes, what other precautions should I take to ensure that this algae will never come back? Should I run some carbon when I set it up again, or will that add nitrates and make the algae worse? I've been out of the research phase for this marine tank stuff for 2 years. I set my tank up right once already, I just want to make sure I do that again. I'll just be sure to bring in some big fans next time we have a heat wave.
My plan:
- Take half the water out
- Clean off the rocks in the water I just took out
- Discard the water
- Clean off the sand
- Keep coral / fish in a 5 gallon bucket briefly
- Half full of water and sand only, move the tank to neighbors house
-Set tank up on sturdy table, reassemble everything
- Top off tank with new water I mixed the night before
- play the waiting game
- repeat everything above (minus cleaning the rocks unless they still need it) as the tank is moved back into my house after the fumigation is complete (I might as well wait a few extra days to be safe.)
- Hurray, tank is clean and fumigation dodged!
Any suggestions would be nice. My main concern is to make sure this algea never comes back, as it did a number on my corals already. Thank you very much.
Anyway, Problem 1.)
my tank got hit hard by a massive heat wave that came through our area a little over a month ago and hasn't recovered fully since. Lost some fish and coral, and that infamous green algae is covering everything. I tried sea hares but they kicked the bucket a week later without eating much algae at all.
Let me back up and tell you about the tank. 55 gallon, fairly standard dimensions, and perfect water quality (it's driving me nuts that everything is going down hill all of the sudden.) This tank has been alive and kicking for over 2 years and this is the first time I’ve not only run into serious problems, but ever had any real problems at all.
Problem 2.)
Our house is to be fumigated this Friday, and I am wondering the best way of going about this. I asked our neighbor and he has no problem at all with letting me reset up the tank in his garage for the 5 days or whatever it takes. My plan is to kill 2 birds with one stone.
Since I already have to move everything anyway, I am much more keen on the idea of taking each rock out and individually removing the green algae, as well as trawling the sand to get all the undesirables out. On top of doing massive water changes, what other precautions should I take to ensure that this algae will never come back? Should I run some carbon when I set it up again, or will that add nitrates and make the algae worse? I've been out of the research phase for this marine tank stuff for 2 years. I set my tank up right once already, I just want to make sure I do that again. I'll just be sure to bring in some big fans next time we have a heat wave.
My plan:
- Take half the water out
- Clean off the rocks in the water I just took out
- Discard the water
- Clean off the sand
- Keep coral / fish in a 5 gallon bucket briefly
- Half full of water and sand only, move the tank to neighbors house
-Set tank up on sturdy table, reassemble everything
- Top off tank with new water I mixed the night before
- play the waiting game
- repeat everything above (minus cleaning the rocks unless they still need it) as the tank is moved back into my house after the fumigation is complete (I might as well wait a few extra days to be safe.)
- Hurray, tank is clean and fumigation dodged!
Any suggestions would be nice. My main concern is to make sure this algea never comes back, as it did a number on my corals already. Thank you very much.
