Major Algae problems help !!

mrpet

Member
So I have a 170 gallon reef tank recently broke it down completely because of alage problems. The algae looks like dinos . Removed all the real reef rock and replaced the sand and rock with actual live rock . Within a month same problem. My nitrates and zero and so are the phos . The corals looks great with the exception of the alage everywhere. My tap water is terrible over 1000 on a tds meter using a ro/di unit so do not think its silicates ? Not running gfo also not carbon dosing right now . Have a pretty heavy bio load so not sure what to do ? Any suggestions its a never ending battle that I lose all the time. Also have a fuge with tons of chaetomprpha in it ? Skimmer is on . Thanks Scott
 

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pics look like cyno but its not its a dark rusty color and stringy
 

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You’re definitely describing the characteristics of Dino’s. Sounds like the cause (or a part of anyway) is your nutrients bottoming out. Generally we don’t want undetected nitrates and phosphates. Here’s what’s generally reccomended nowadays:

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I’d definitely look into getting those raised up. Beyond that, people have had luck (though it seems hit or miss) running a UV sterilizer and some also dose live phytoplankton as well.
 
In addition to what @Reefing102 said, what is your TDS after the RODI?

What are your other water parameters? Specifically:
Alkalinity
pH
Calcium
Magnesium
 
For starters your PO4 is too low and it's impacting your corals ability to compete with any nuisance algae in your system. The old reccomendation to keep PO4 below .03 mg/l is wrong and the given surface reading of .005 is misleading as most of the ocean surface is much higher. (Distribution charts of oceanic PO4 levels clearly indicate a diffusion gradient that is lowest around reefs.) Southampton University identified .03 mg/l as the minimum to keep coral photobiology from being impacted by phosphorus defincies. As PO4 varies depending on what's using it a buffer level is advisable. As .3 mg/l is what corals may see in the wild I'm happy with .1 to .3 mg/l.

Patience is needed when dealing with nuisance algae issues and FWIW, I've seen nuisance alge issues resolve themselves after a catastrophic event with just small frequent water changes much like the initial "uglies" stage in setting up systems resolves itself.. However i would be slightly more hands on and I would start with weekly water changes of 5% - 10% and use steel straws to manually siphon out algae. I would add urchins, the short spine species are my prefference but the long spine species work well and for your size system 4-8 depending on size. I would not get pencil urchins. I would also consider other herbivores like Sally lightfoot crabs, thin stripe hermits and the large algae eating blennies (snails and small hermits are fine but not very effective for problem issues in my exprience). This process I stumbled on back in the '90s and is used to remediate reefs in the wild.

I would get rid of your cheato and algae scrubber as it's releasing alleopathic compounds detrimental to corals. Do not carbon dose, this can have the same effect as algae as it's a form of labile DOC that promotes excessive and potentially pathogenic microbial growth. Turn off your skimmer, it's only skewing the microbial populations and isn't removing removing the neutral sugars that can cause problems for corals.

As far as the any algae growing on the sand. Sometimes I'll siphon it off rinse it then soak it in H2O2 for awhile then rinse it well and return it to the tank. Sometimes I'll just rinse it in clean slatwater and return it to the tank. I've had mixed results both ways so I'll try one and if it doesn't seem to work that well I'll try the other (presumably there's differences in wether algae is just growing on the surface of the sand and is easily rinsed off or is actually grwoing in the micropores and surface irregularties and has to be killed with H2O2).
 
Water parameters are as follows
Alk 6.2


Nitrates 1.6


Phosphates 38


Mag 1450


Cal 400


Ph 8.4


Salinity 1.026


That’s with no GFO or protein skimmer

The phos was tested with the hanna ultra low phosphorus kit hanna for the KH as well
 
Just a reminder patience is needed. "Ugly" phases when fixing algae problems can take as long as when a system is first established. What herbivores do you have? What steps are you taking to remove the algae? At 0.04 mg/l (38 PPB) your PO4 is just borderline acceptable so let it get higher before using GFO again. FWIW, corals get as much as .3 mg/l PO4 with upwelling.
 
Also a problem with algae; so much it is floating in the water. See photos; also of what foam pads are taking out. I cannot even test right now; the algae is coloring the water so bad. Oddly, the sump water looks good; so, I could test that.

I tested on April 25th:
PO4 - 0.03
NO3 - 0; so I dosed to bring it up to 4-5ppm
Ca 420
Mg 1280
All 9.3
pH 8.3
RODI water TDS is 0.
I was away 2 weeks ago during which no food was added. When I returned, the water looked good. I restarted feeding but only what could be eaten within 1-2 minutes. Then things went bad.

I have done 3 g water changes for each of the past 3 days.

I am thinking about dosing with something that I can run through the system. Peroxide is one idea. I saw 0.5ml of 3% per 10g to start. Or, I could drain the tank down to about 15g and add fresh water.

Any suggestions are welcome.
 

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I neglected to add it is a 55g tank. 6 fish, frogspawn, Zioa, mushroom, brain, green star and acropora; and a collection of inverts. They all seem fine; although the GSP has closed which could be due to algae on it.
 
No, I am not. I could add ChemPure’s Original formula to the sump. Here are the photos. The end-on shows the algae in the HOB.
 

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Almost looks like a bacterial bloom to me.

Another thought, did you have Caulerpa in the tank? Sometimes it goes "sexual" are releases gametes that will cloud up the water like that.
 
Sorry, I should have posted a photo with the lights fully up. This after a 3g water change, adding it to the sump. Here the water looks pretty good. However, the sides of the aquarium are coated with algae again; a couple of hours after cleaning. Although, I do not see nearly as much floating algae.

Prior to the water change, I took a sample from the sump. The nitrate is at zero again 2 days after the dose to increase it to 4-5ppm, which I have seen a lot. So, the nitrate is being consumed by something. I had been adding Microbacter on a regular basis thinking I needed it to out-compete the algae for nutrients. Microbacter was last added two days ago and five days prior to that addition.
 

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You're PO4 is borderline and might be dropping down below .03 and causing PO4 deficiencies in your corals. Here's a video by Charles Delbeek on what he's found researching nitrate and PO4 at the Steinhart Aquarium.

 
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