mhucasey
Acros & wieners, oh my!
I'm glad it worked well for you! I kept getting bubbles in a perpetual loop until I made the outlet the high point and had the inlet as the low point.
Learning/rebuilding from my epic fail
- Thread starter reefmutt
- Start date
I'm glad it worked well for you! I kept getting bubbles in a perpetual loop until I made the outlet the high point and had the inlet as the low point.
mhucasey
Acros & wieners, oh my!
Good luck on getting everything back on track. It will take a little while to get the pellets fully seeded and working, adding a bacterial supplement can help speed that up. Other than that I would just focus on keeping ALK and salinity stable for the time being.
8ppm Nitrates won't hurt anything and neither will the phosphate numbers. I can tell you this advice right now because I'm not going through the issues, if I was in your place I would be tweaking everything trying to fix it. Usually when I'm in that position I screw something up worse by accident.
renevilleneuve
New member
control the input instead,most likely you will suction on the intake, I think.
renevilleneuve
New member
lose suction on the intake
jroovers
New member
For some reason I thought you had GFO going lol, I must be confusing threads, my memory is garbage these days 
I disagree with this, without getting into a Thales worthy debate on nutrients, if you have gone from 0 phosphate to greater than 10 in a short period of time, that type of swing is going to be detrimental to your SPS. I wouldn't worry about 8 ppm nitrate so much, but the phosphate I would, and especially when considering it was a drastic swing (based on what you've said). I wouldn't be reaching for pellets or other nitrate reducing methods, I've been reaching for a SMALL amount of GFO and bringing it online, and monitoring phosphates moreso than nitrates. I would also do some regular water changes to help get those numbers down a bit (nitrate under 10 and phosphate down in the 0.05 region, but slowly now, not all at once, too much swinging otherwise). I'm surprised you are saying your corals are going pale, I would expect some RTN or some royally peeved looking corals, but not paling. Paling is usually too little nutrient, you've swung the other way now (maybe you had too little and now have way too much which is exacerbating the issues with corals that were starving to begin with). I would stop dosing AA as that is only going to exacerbate your nutrient issues. I would feed moderately to minimally until you get your nutrient levels stable, and same with the lighting, keep it moderate and back off going to strong (sounds like you've already done that).
I disagree with this, without getting into a Thales worthy debate on nutrients, if you have gone from 0 phosphate to greater than 10 in a short period of time, that type of swing is going to be detrimental to your SPS. I wouldn't worry about 8 ppm nitrate so much, but the phosphate I would, and especially when considering it was a drastic swing (based on what you've said). I wouldn't be reaching for pellets or other nitrate reducing methods, I've been reaching for a SMALL amount of GFO and bringing it online, and monitoring phosphates moreso than nitrates. I would also do some regular water changes to help get those numbers down a bit (nitrate under 10 and phosphate down in the 0.05 region, but slowly now, not all at once, too much swinging otherwise). I'm surprised you are saying your corals are going pale, I would expect some RTN or some royally peeved looking corals, but not paling. Paling is usually too little nutrient, you've swung the other way now (maybe you had too little and now have way too much which is exacerbating the issues with corals that were starving to begin with). I would stop dosing AA as that is only going to exacerbate your nutrient issues. I would feed moderately to minimally until you get your nutrient levels stable, and same with the lighting, keep it moderate and back off going to strong (sounds like you've already done that).
ChrisKirkland
Reef and Coral Fanatic
For some reason I thought you had GFO going lol, I must be confusing threads, my memory is garbage these days
I disagree with this, without getting into a Thales worthy debate on nutrients, if you have gone from 0 phosphate to greater than 10 in a short period of time, that type of swing is going to be detrimental to your SPS. I wouldn't worry about 8 ppm nitrate so much, but the phosphate I would, and especially when considering it was a drastic swing (based on what you've said). I wouldn't be reaching for pellets or other nitrate reducing methods, I've been reaching for a SMALL amount of GFO and bringing it online, and monitoring phosphates moreso than nitrates. I would also do some regular water changes to help get those numbers down a bit (nitrate under 10 and phosphate down in the 0.05 region, but slowly now, not all at once, too much swinging otherwise). I'm surprised you are saying your corals are going pale, I would expect some RTN or some royally peeved looking corals, but not paling. Paling is usually too little nutrient, you've swung the other way now (maybe you had too little and now have way too much which is exacerbating the issues with corals that were starving to begin with). I would stop dosing AA as that is only going to exacerbate your nutrient issues. I would feed moderately to minimally until you get your nutrient levels stable, and same with the lighting, keep it moderate and back off going to strong (sounds like you've already done that).
I agree with that. However over time if his PO4 and NO3 came to those levels (over 3 months) then the SPS would likely be ok, probably not as colorful but they likely wouldn't RTN/STN.
tripdad
Frustrated Stick Gardener
I just want to pick up your spirits a little bit. I have also been battling a fierce algae outbreak of my own. I had to discipline myself to think long and act slowly in order to get it under control. I had a phosphate dump from some eggcrate I put into a new frag tank plumbed into the system. Have been fighting a nasty brown algae and green bubble and green hair. I read up,removed as much manually as possible and installed a reactor with 1/2 the recommended GFO and waited. The PO4 would drop and then creep back up, so I would add 10% more GFO and wait. Slowly the PO4 has gotten down to .08 and stable there. I have actually had to increase nitrates as they were less than 2ppm. It has taken 6 weeks but sand now stays clean and the snails can keep other surfaces clean. I have no tang in tank to eat algae as it's only a 40 breeder so I have to rely on the CUC of snails and hermits. Please make small changes . My acro colors are best they have ever been, cleaner and brighter, less muddy looking.I know it's hard to sit and wait but it will work, you will win and have the tank you want.Remember that the test numbers are going to be false for a while as the algae keeps consuming nutrients, you have to think long term in a stable number, stripping to zero will hurt corals. Anyway this approach is working for me, acting slowly, and I wish you the best.P.S. My PO4 had jumped to 30ppm in a week.
mhucasey
Acros & wieners, oh my!
For some reason I thought you had GFO going lol, I must be confusing threads, my memory is garbage these days
I disagree with this, without getting into a Thales worthy debate on nutrients, if you have gone from 0 phosphate to greater than 10 in a short period of time, that type of swing is going to be detrimental to your SPS. I wouldn't worry about 8 ppm nitrate so much, but the phosphate I would, and especially when considering it was a drastic swing (based on what you've said). I wouldn't be reaching for pellets or other nitrate reducing methods, I've been reaching for a SMALL amount of GFO and bringing it online, and monitoring phosphates moreso than nitrates. I would also do some regular water changes to help get those numbers down a bit (nitrate under 10 and phosphate down in the 0.05 region, but slowly now, not all at once, too much swinging otherwise). I'm surprised you are saying your corals are going pale, I would expect some RTN or some royally peeved looking corals, but not paling. Paling is usually too little nutrient, you've swung the other way now (maybe you had too little and now have way too much which is exacerbating the issues with corals that were starving to begin with). I would stop dosing AA as that is only going to exacerbate your nutrient issues. I would feed moderately to minimally until you get your nutrient levels stable, and same with the lighting, keep it moderate and back off going to strong (sounds like you've already done that).
This is a subject I'm passionate about, please don't tank my disagreement as a lack of respect
The all-in-one pellets utilize a chemical phosphate remover(may be a form of GFO actually) and will lower the phosphates slowly on their own, they just need time to work. I have heard the "Phosphate swing" theory quite a lot, it is one of the big mantras from the Zeovit folks. In one time period I had a bunch of STN and the experts kept saying it was from "drastic changes" in parameters - lowered too fast, raised too fast, etc. In my tank at the time the phosphate value was largely unchanged.
If parameter swings are so dangerous then why do Acros not immediately die when placed in customer's tanks? Going from the dealer's water to the customer's water represents drastic swings in Alkalinity, Calcium, Phosphate, and Nitrate. Yet in many cases the acros do better switching. I am currently saving a portion of a table coral that was dissolving in my dealers tank but stopped immediately upon going into mine. Food for thought.
I do, however think that the real cause for a lot of these issues is excess Iron. People overdo the GFO or add GFO to Zeovit for example and both give off Iron. Iron is limiting nutrient for bacteria and algae and adding a bunch of it at once can trigger blooms of bacteria that already live on the corals surface. These blooms turn against the host coral. I have inadvertently done this myself by overdosing Iron, and have seen the same thing happen with additions of too much GFO or overuse of Zeovit stones. In some cases I was able to stop the STN using antibiotics.
Just give one method time to work, the system needs a chance to balance out.
jroovers
New member
Probably not the best spot to debate this, but I'll reply with my thoughts and how it may apply to reefmutt's current situation. No offense taken on my end, this is based on my personal experience.
My understanding is quite different regarding pellets, as I understand it they are much more proficient at removing nitrates over phosphates, and their is no chemical removing going on... that is why I suggested some GFO over pellets, as his nitrates aren't that elevated really, but probably could come down a bit.
They die all the time. How many people come home from the LFS with wild and aquacultured SPS and have 100% success? Zero. You're much likely to have success with frags from another established SPS tank where the parameters are dialed in and similar to what we already have in our captive systems. Obviously many acros are more tolerant than others, so the specific species is going to have an impact.
In terms of your dealers tank lol, maybe his nutrients are way too high, and yours are lower, hence the recovery. May be the flow, lighting, etc. etc. etc. Could be any number of factors.
I think excess iron should be about the farthest thing from reefmutts mind at the moment. He is having a significant algae bloom and isn't even running GFO, so not sure how you explain what is going on in his system. I agree alot of people overdue GFO and cause a drastic change in nutrient levels which SPS don't like (speaking from experience). That is why I suggested he start with a small amount of GFO and not go crazy.
You say this at the end, but in the same sense say not to worry about drastic nutrient/parameter levels, as corals can tolerate this all the time? If your theories are correct, then why do you need to wait for things to "balance out". This contradicts most of what you say. That said, I agree it is the right approach.
My understanding is quite different regarding pellets, as I understand it they are much more proficient at removing nitrates over phosphates, and their is no chemical removing going on... that is why I suggested some GFO over pellets, as his nitrates aren't that elevated really, but probably could come down a bit.
They die all the time. How many people come home from the LFS with wild and aquacultured SPS and have 100% success? Zero. You're much likely to have success with frags from another established SPS tank where the parameters are dialed in and similar to what we already have in our captive systems. Obviously many acros are more tolerant than others, so the specific species is going to have an impact.
In terms of your dealers tank lol, maybe his nutrients are way too high, and yours are lower, hence the recovery. May be the flow, lighting, etc. etc. etc. Could be any number of factors.
I think excess iron should be about the farthest thing from reefmutts mind at the moment. He is having a significant algae bloom and isn't even running GFO, so not sure how you explain what is going on in his system. I agree alot of people overdue GFO and cause a drastic change in nutrient levels which SPS don't like (speaking from experience). That is why I suggested he start with a small amount of GFO and not go crazy.
You say this at the end, but in the same sense say not to worry about drastic nutrient/parameter levels, as corals can tolerate this all the time? If your theories are correct, then why do you need to wait for things to "balance out". This contradicts most of what you say. That said, I agree it is the right approach.
jroovers
New member
Maybe. Who knows. Isn't the case in this situation, sounds like things have happened quickly, and anyone who grows SPS knows that isn't typically a good thing.
renevilleneuve
New member
From my humble 1 year experience and 1165 gallons of saltwater. It seems nobody has infused science and many factors which are not always accounted for have some kind of influence. I'm pretty sure we are all trying our best and continuously improving from these varied experiences. Lots of love.
mhucasey
Acros & wieners, oh my!
I would agree if these were regular pellets, but the All-In-One pellets are a unique case - they contain GFO already. The mfg has not stated this but they are dark brown and they state that they remove phosphate so putting two and two together it seems likely. The pellets slowly release the gfo and remove the phosphate more gradually so adding GFO is not necessary. They do need time to work however.
This has not been my experience, but my fancy acclimation procedure is to take the coral out of the bag, remove the plug, examine the coral for pests, and put it straight in to the tank. The only frags Ive ever had die right away were two that were shipped to me and were in the bag for a long time and a deepwater acro that I dipped. I don't dip corals as a rule, i think a good portion of corals that don't survive the transition are due to dipping, but that is just my experience.
You may be right, there are too many variables to be sure of anything. That being said, one of the "cures" for STN is to put the coral in a new system. The change in parameters, bacterial balance, etc have saved corals in many cases that I have read.
My read of Matt's parameters did not suggest that they were all that drastic. That is why I suggest that his best bet was to leave things as they are. Matt has stated that he has "chased parameters" in the past and it has led to bad things happening. His corals are pale, but they are not STNing. I think that they will be ok, with a little time. The tank swings due to the bloom and die off of the bloom are likely the cause of the increased PO4, but it will work itself out. My biggest problems in the past were when I had Phosphate testing at over .2 and I started doing things like adding GFO and adding more carbon dosing to bring it down. The corals were fine before that but I was obsessing about the numbers and my interventions caused more harm than good. It turned out that the phosphate tests were just giving bad readings anyway, I don't think that the Hannah checkers are worth a darn. I went to the Milwaukee Phosphate colorimeter and the actual numbers were lower and more consistent. I just don't care about the Phosphate number anymore, I use the "how long does it take for the glass to get covered in algae" method now to monitor nutrients
ChrisKirkland
Reef and Coral Fanatic
It's a toss up. It could be nothing related to nutrients.
renevilleneuve
New member
Does anyone know of someone who might have a white worm culture in Montreal?
renevilleneuve
New member
It seems the Hannah phosphorus test does the job. At least for me.
reefmutt
Active member
wow! i like the debate going on here.
I'm going to try to clarify my situation and then explain my actions
first, tripdad, thanks for the encouragement and attempt to get me to go slow- it is very good advice but advice that is very difficult to take!
chris, jordan, matt, i think that ultimately, you guys are pretty much in agreement... believe it or not..
Rene, i put my valve on the intake- makes sense. also, i believe that the Elos high resolution po4 test kit is as accurate and maybe more reliable than the hanna ulr tester. i have and use both to confirm my readings..
Mike, i actually DID start carbon dosing a small amount of my vsv/cano3 mix when i saw nutrients jump after removing the pellets..
ok.. here goes..
i had been running aio pellets for several months along with a small dsb. i was originally using vsv and cano3 to control n and p keeping them at around 1-3 ppm n and .04 ish p. when i introduced the aio pellets, nutrients started to drop, so i stopped the vsv/cano3 and nutrients remained around the same.. then i did 3 things at pretty much the same time:
i added cheato on reverse daylight, added some ecobac+pellets to my aio pellets and began adding fish and corals.
As soon as i began adding more food for the fish, nutrients began to drop dramatically- like non detectible. it was though the food was an extra carbon source for the bacteria in the system and it put the pellets into overdrive... there was also a corresponding uptick in all sorts of algae as feedings went up and nutrients went down. slime algae in my sumps, bubble algae, bryopsis etc. my corals began to pale out significantly. why did this happen? not sure...
to try to help the corals, I increased feedings and began adding AAs. this did not help anything but the algeas. Nutrients stayed at 0. along with the corals getting pale, i did have some stn and rtn.
So i removed the pellets, 3 days later, the anemone got shredded and the tank went cloudy.
for another week nutrients stayed undetectable. i assumed the algea bloom in the water, as well as the dsb and cheato had begun to consume to nutrients.
Then i turned off the lights for a couple of days to try to reduce the algae bloom and when i turned them back on and tested, nutrients had jumped way up..
so what caused the jump? not sure.. but probably, imo, since the water is still a bit cloudy (meaning the algea bloom is still around), that the removal of the pellets is what caused the jump.
its been only about 5 days that nutrients have been up..
in those 5 days i have begun a small amount of vsv/cano3 dosing to compensate for the lack of pellets and just yesterday, i have reintroduced the pellets in a recirculation reactor which i can control better.
tomorrow, i will test again and see where the numbers are.
so the way i see it, the only significant swing in nutrients has been very recent and due to the removal of that big carbon source- the aio/ecobac+ pellets.
Jordan, i hate gfo..... I've used it to death in the past and as tripdad mentioned, it only made levels go up and down.. using a carbon source to pull n down and then using a little n along side a carbon source has been very good for me at bringing down p.
the aio pellets seem to have shown themselves effective at bringing down p along with n and that is why i began using them in the first place... so that i could stop dosing the cano3 to reduce p..
my recent addition of the vsv/cano3 mix was an attempt to turn the upswing in nutrients back into a downswing without resorting to gfo.. tomorrow i will see where i stand on that front when i test.
my testing is more (so i tell myself) to see where the numbers are than to try to chase them, but i guess i do have targets in mind for n and p. close to where jordan mentioned n of 3-5 ish, p somewhere below .05.
i believe that once the pellets are properly dialed in, i will be able to keep n and p stable..
OH!!
AND.. remember i also had a funky high mag reading which i began to bring down by keeping the ca reactor under performing while i dosed small amounts of buffer. doing this allowed me to keep alk steady at around 7 while mag and ca dropped a bit. tomorrow i will stop that extra alk dosing and turn up the reactor just enough so that it will begin to maintain alk on its own again.
just to be clear, i was dosing enough alk booster to raise my system volume by only a half dkh... so i wasn't dosing a lot..
to sum it up, there has been plenty of chemical changes going on (sorry trip dad, i have tried to make the changes small...) but i am really trying to maintain parameters at where they have been for most of last summer..
i'll post some numbers tomorrow..
and please keep on giving your opinions.. opinions and knowledge is what drives this forum and makes it so great..
now i need a drink!!!
I'm going to try to clarify my situation and then explain my actions
first, tripdad, thanks for the encouragement and attempt to get me to go slow- it is very good advice but advice that is very difficult to take!
chris, jordan, matt, i think that ultimately, you guys are pretty much in agreement... believe it or not..
Rene, i put my valve on the intake- makes sense. also, i believe that the Elos high resolution po4 test kit is as accurate and maybe more reliable than the hanna ulr tester. i have and use both to confirm my readings..
Mike, i actually DID start carbon dosing a small amount of my vsv/cano3 mix when i saw nutrients jump after removing the pellets..
ok.. here goes..
i had been running aio pellets for several months along with a small dsb. i was originally using vsv and cano3 to control n and p keeping them at around 1-3 ppm n and .04 ish p. when i introduced the aio pellets, nutrients started to drop, so i stopped the vsv/cano3 and nutrients remained around the same.. then i did 3 things at pretty much the same time:
i added cheato on reverse daylight, added some ecobac+pellets to my aio pellets and began adding fish and corals.
As soon as i began adding more food for the fish, nutrients began to drop dramatically- like non detectible. it was though the food was an extra carbon source for the bacteria in the system and it put the pellets into overdrive... there was also a corresponding uptick in all sorts of algae as feedings went up and nutrients went down. slime algae in my sumps, bubble algae, bryopsis etc. my corals began to pale out significantly. why did this happen? not sure...
to try to help the corals, I increased feedings and began adding AAs. this did not help anything but the algeas. Nutrients stayed at 0. along with the corals getting pale, i did have some stn and rtn.
So i removed the pellets, 3 days later, the anemone got shredded and the tank went cloudy.
for another week nutrients stayed undetectable. i assumed the algea bloom in the water, as well as the dsb and cheato had begun to consume to nutrients.
Then i turned off the lights for a couple of days to try to reduce the algae bloom and when i turned them back on and tested, nutrients had jumped way up..
so what caused the jump? not sure.. but probably, imo, since the water is still a bit cloudy (meaning the algea bloom is still around), that the removal of the pellets is what caused the jump.
its been only about 5 days that nutrients have been up..
in those 5 days i have begun a small amount of vsv/cano3 dosing to compensate for the lack of pellets and just yesterday, i have reintroduced the pellets in a recirculation reactor which i can control better.
tomorrow, i will test again and see where the numbers are.
so the way i see it, the only significant swing in nutrients has been very recent and due to the removal of that big carbon source- the aio/ecobac+ pellets.
Jordan, i hate gfo..... I've used it to death in the past and as tripdad mentioned, it only made levels go up and down.. using a carbon source to pull n down and then using a little n along side a carbon source has been very good for me at bringing down p.
the aio pellets seem to have shown themselves effective at bringing down p along with n and that is why i began using them in the first place... so that i could stop dosing the cano3 to reduce p..
my recent addition of the vsv/cano3 mix was an attempt to turn the upswing in nutrients back into a downswing without resorting to gfo.. tomorrow i will see where i stand on that front when i test.
my testing is more (so i tell myself) to see where the numbers are than to try to chase them, but i guess i do have targets in mind for n and p. close to where jordan mentioned n of 3-5 ish, p somewhere below .05.
i believe that once the pellets are properly dialed in, i will be able to keep n and p stable..
OH!!
AND.. remember i also had a funky high mag reading which i began to bring down by keeping the ca reactor under performing while i dosed small amounts of buffer. doing this allowed me to keep alk steady at around 7 while mag and ca dropped a bit. tomorrow i will stop that extra alk dosing and turn up the reactor just enough so that it will begin to maintain alk on its own again.
just to be clear, i was dosing enough alk booster to raise my system volume by only a half dkh... so i wasn't dosing a lot..
to sum it up, there has been plenty of chemical changes going on (sorry trip dad, i have tried to make the changes small...) but i am really trying to maintain parameters at where they have been for most of last summer..
i'll post some numbers tomorrow..
and please keep on giving your opinions.. opinions and knowledge is what drives this forum and makes it so great..
now i need a drink!!!
reefmutt
Active member
Eric, I really apreciate that offer. It is very kind of you. I know how it feels to house somebody's corals in your tank... With the possibility of bringing in some nasty to your system.
Thank you but I think things look a bit better in the tank.
Still cloudy but not as bad.
Early this morning I did a 10% wc and as I said, I have been dosing some vsv/cano3 since my last tests from the 29th when I got 8ppm n and .13 p.
Today I noticed some polyp extension on a few corals.. They don't seem to be too bad right now. I'm not sure about a couple of very faded out corals but many of them look ok- not super fantastic but ok.
My readings tonight showed 3ppm n and .09 p. So the carbon dosing has had a small effect. This is what I as hoping for.. Just a small effect.
I will probably do another WC in a couple of days and maybe consider increasing the amount of cano3 in my dosing mix to try to keep n up and pull p down just a touch.. I will begin testing twice a week just to keep an eye on things...
I have stopped adding AAs now that I have n and p in the system.
So I am hopeful at the moment.
Funny how different corals can be when reacting to changing conditions. I have a a few deep waters that have been perfectly fine through all of this and my red dragon has actually grown a tiny bit..
I now have my aio pellets running with a very slow flow- I'm sure they aren't doing anything yet but when they do start to work, I don't want them to hit the system hard.. That's why I have them running very slow and why I will test bi weekly for a while..
I really apreciate all of your comments and suggestions!
I'll do an update on Wednesday.
renevilleneuve
New member
Which Wednesday,just in case..
