How long for algae to be gone?

[Mappelbaum37]

I re-did my 75g. that was 6 to 7 months old in late december, early january. It's been approximately 5 months. Ever since I've had algae, more algae, and even more algae. This is what I've done:

*green/brown hair algae, diatoms... the diatoms, and not so much hair algae have gotten better but not to the point where it stops growing. It grows back less each time I remove it, but still does grow back.

-increased flow to tank
-switched from 5g to 10g water changes
-switched from spring to RO water
-Just recently replaced prism protien skimmer w/ octo bh300f
-weekly water changes
-clean fluval every other week
-added chemi-pure to fluval, took out ceramic noodles
-hooked up a phosban reactor
-added chaeto in small in-tank refugium
-increased clean up crew (green emerald crabs, snails)
-switched from oceanic sea salt to red sea salt mix (garuntee's no phoshates and nitrates)

I was thinking of a uv sterilizer, but havent decided yet:

Seeing as there's not much left for me to do, I was curious in how long does it take for algae to go away? It's already been 5 months. I was thinking, that when I re-did the tank, I did use all spring water to fill it up, but by now I've done so many water changes, it would've canceled it out. (thats what I think). How long did it take for your algae to dissapear? I hear all these success stories of how the phosban reactor, and new skimmers and increased maintenance really help take out the algae, but I'm still waiting for that day to come to me.. I seem to get rid of a ton of algae, but it all just comes right back. (not in such big quantities as it used to though).

Thanks

 

[sabbath]

How much GFO are you using? And how often are changing it?

 

[E.J. Coral]

Do you have a dsb?

 

[danceswithfish]

How much do you feed, and what do you feed.

 

[notquitemusashi]

how much lighting and what are your chems?

 

[tbittner]

Do you still have the filter pads in the fluval? Is so, get rid of them. Or start cleaning them every other day.

How long ago did you switch to RO water?

What are your readings for:
Ammonia
NitrItes
NitrAtes
Phosphates

Phosban has a saturation point where it won't remove any more phosphates. But you don't know if you need to change it unless you test for phosphates.

 

[jimwat]

I started my first SW tank with tap water for about the first 6 months. It took almost a year before the HA growth completely went away once I switched to RO/DI (along with various other additions/subtractions to combat the HA). Once the HA nutrient source sets up in your rock and sand (like phosphates) it can take a while to leach back out. Extra water changes and keeping your GFO fresh should help.

A couple of other things (to add to the other 100+ HA suggested solutions). Cut back on your light cycle if your coral can take it, and/or consider turning your lights out for a few days. Also, I found that keeping the Alkalinity between 10 - 12 dKH seems to help keep HA at bay (purely anecdotal).

Be patient. It looks like your doing everything right. Your tank will start to come around before you know.

Good Luck

 

[BeesGoneWild]

Im on the same line as Jimwat i used tapwater for my first 6months or so and it took nearly a year and a half before I started seeing a reduction in algae. I wasnt using a phos reactor though.

 

[sabbath]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12488755#post12488755 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by tbittner

Phosban has a saturation point where it won't remove any more phosphates. But you don't know if you need to change it unless you test for phosphates.

This does not work if you have a lot of HA. It will lower your PO4 so fast that your test kit will always read zero.

I have learned the hard way. The best test kit for PO4 in a display "with HA" is your eyes.

 

[seapug]

It took my 90 gallon about 8 weeks and one media change at 4 weeks for the GFO to work it's magic. Once the Phosphate level went below the algae "threshold" it all died and disappeared in about 5 days. It was one of the most amazing things I've ever witnessed in my tank.

 

[Mappelbaum37]

Appreciate the feedback everyone...

- I am using phosban and replace it once a month. As a matter of fact, the reactor is somewhat new, and I have only been running it for 1 month. I plan on changing the phosban in 2 days. (friday may 9th). Thats when it'll be 1 month. The first time I used it last month, i used approximately 100 grams.

Have no clue what a dsb is....

I feed once a day, marine flakes one day, formula one cubed frozen food, 2 to 3 small pieces of that one day, and mysis shrimp another day...

Lighting: 8 hours of actinics 6 hours of daylights... I cut back from 10 hours of actinics, and 8 hrs of daylight.

I have chemi pure and filter pads in fluval. I do clean them often as in once every other week, but not 1 a day or anything close to that. I think thats a little crazy. I switched to RO water about 2 months ago I'd say. 10 gallons a week.

Looking at the test results now:

ammonia: .25 (once new skimmer kicks in hopefully it will be 0
nitrate: 0
Nitrite: 0.1
pH: 8.4
Phosphates: I use an API test kit and it comes up yellowish. The closest thing to yellow on the color card, is .25 which is light green, so I'll go with that

So the phosban reactor has been running for a month now. Every 2 weeks 2 days before I do a water change i leave the lights off. Then only actinics on the day of the water change, then back to normal the next day. I'm going to use that tactic tomorrow as well. Now, dont get me wrong, I see a difference in the algae. Not only at the rate it grows back, but at the quantity it grows back as well. It is starting to take longer to grow back when I get it out, but when it does come back, it's not as bad as before. Ever since I added the reactor, the back glass used to be covered in algae. Now only half is. It's kinda weird actually. I definately saw a difference on the glass, just not so much on the rocks unfortunately.

This weekend, after the water change, I'm going to get some more snails and hermit crabs. I'm going to have the LFS order in some lettuce nudibranch..Those guys look like they can feast on this algae.

Thanks for feedback

 

[sabbath]

I would start changing the phosban once a week until it is under control.

 

[Mappelbaum37]

That much? sheesh, I cant afford this anymore! Anyways, I'll see how it goes. I'll pick up a larger clean up crew, add the full 150g of phosban to the reactor this time, and see how things progress. I'd be pretty angry if it took a year to get this algae under control.