Need help with Chaeto lighting

K

Kaera

New member
Hello!

I have a refugium with a bunch of chaeto (2-3 times the size of a tennis ball) in it. Prior to setting up the refugium (almost two months ago) I had a biopellet reactor which resulted in almost zero nitrate and phosphate on my tank, but I decided to try if I could reach the same results with chaeto without having to put money into replenishing the pellets.

I have a Tunze white eco led illuminating the refugium (700 lumen, 6500 kelvin) but the chaeto hasn't really grown, maybe 50% at best.

My tanks nitrate is 25ppm and phosphate 0.5ppm


Any ideas what the problem is? Is the light insufficient, are my nitrate & phosphate levels too low for the chaeto to grow or is it maybe a backlash from removing the biopellets?

Thanks in advance!
 
What size tank? It may take a while for the chaeto to take off. You could try a grow light. Something like the mars hydro 300 or smaller version. Pretty inexpensive and people grow some serious chaeto with it.

I don't think a fuge will keep up with biopellets depending on the size of the fuge vs the size of the tank. An ATS would probably be better suited if your bio load is high.
 
I do not know if it will fix your issue (they are often multifaceted) but 6500K LED's are not good for growing macro's. I would start with replacing that with something that has more red in it, either a "grow" led or fluorescent in a warmer tempature


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pisanoal said:
What size tank? It may take a while for the chaeto to take off. You could try a grow light. Something like the mars hydro 300 or smaller version. Pretty inexpensive and people grow some serious chaeto with it.

I don't think a fuge will keep up with biopellets depending on the size of the fuge vs the size of the tank. An ATS would probably be better suited if your bio load is high.
Click to expand...

It's a 500 gallon tank with around 20-30 fish & some LPS corals in it. The sump is around 50 gallons and I could propably convert half of it to grow chaeto.
 
From what I have seen, most people that have success with chaeto as primary nutrient export have some sort of reactor or fuge that allows the chaeto to tumble and maximize growth from all angles.

I don't have any experience with tanks that large, but my gut feeling tells me that you don't have enough space for a fuge large enough to be used primarily for nutrient export. I would try a grow light as they are pretty cheap, and if that doesn't work for you, look into building an ATS. Some can be done very affordably and seem to be awesome for primary nutrient export.
 
pisanoal said:
From what I have seen, most people that have success with chaeto as primary nutrient export have some sort of reactor or fuge that allows the chaeto to tumble and maximize growth from all angles.

I don't have any experience with tanks that large, but my gut feeling tells me that you don't have enough space for a fuge large enough to be used primarily for nutrient export. I would try a grow light as they are pretty cheap, and if that doesn't work for you, look into building an ATS. Some can be done very affordably and seem to be awesome for primary nutrient export.
Click to expand...

I wonder if a 14w CFL horticulture bulb would be suitable, or should the wattage be higher then that?
 
With a good reflector that might be good enough. I know there plenty of people claim to get by with regular incandescent, but I'm not sure how good their growth is. I went with a roleadro ufo 138w led grow light. Was only $40 on Amazon and has some decent reviews. Just started with it so I can't really comment

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For years I couldn't grow cheato until I change to Mars Hydro 300. Now I have to throw out all the cheato except for a small portion to go back in the sump every two weeks
 
I bought a 3500k 100 watt equivalent led from home depot and the chaeto has tripled in size since I bought it. The huge has only and inch of drop from one panel to the other. Th chaeto can roll in the chamber by itself. A nice touch is there is some red algae along for a ride that is growing nicely as well.
 
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