newbie question

[hdyoung]

Hi all,

Newbie here. I am struggling to get my system set up optimally, and I am trying to get some algea growing well under some fairly bright compact floursecent spotlights (the ones that Melev recommended). Mainly cheato at this point, but I may diversify if I can have success with the cheato first. This is all happening in a somewhat low flow area of my sump.

The issues I am seeing is that the cheato colonies tend to get covered with cyano, and every few days I have to go down there and shake them to break it up. In addidion, it seems that I am seeing pretty slow growth.

I've been reading this forum, and I am guessing that I might want to try dosing of iron. I want to get some suggestions from more experienced people before I start screwing around with my system and dosing things that I cant test for.

Thanks.

 

[slowECUdiver]

just a quick guess here, but if you're getting cyano on your chaeto, you might have luck combatting the cyano by trimming the chaeto back. typically i don't see any cyano on my chaeto until it gets very large, at which point the cyano starts winning the battle for nutrients. to combat it, i remove most of my chaeto so i'm left with a baseball sized clump. i trim mine a little with every water change (1 time a week) and do a major pruning every month or so.

i'd hold off on dosing iron until the cyano abates and/or you get the upper hand. if you start dosing iron and the cyano is present, it will also absorb the iron from the water column and still compete with the chaeto for nutrients.

one other thought popped into my head...you might toss a few snails in the area with the chaeto to help combat the cyano.

HTH.

 

[jimmyray]

Chaeto prefers some flow, plus cyano likes low flow. Try putting a powerhead in that area to create some water movement. That will probably solve your problem.

slowECUdiver, your logic seems backwards. A larger ball of chaeto would remove more nutrients, competing more with the cyano. A smaller ball of chaeto takes up less nutrients than a large one, which would leave more for other algaes... does that make sense?

 

[slowECUdiver]

jimmyray...on the contrary, my logic seems good to me, and here's why... as the chaeto gets larger, at least in my refugium, it has less room to tumble and less of the chaeto's surface is exposed to the refugium light, which has lead to the development of cyano on the chaeto.
when i trim it down to a baseball size, it has more room to "tumble" in the refugium and as a result, more of it is exposed to the refugium light. i also have a dedicated powerhead in the refugium of my sump to help keep the chaeto "tumbling."
the same thing is evident in my nano tank...i have a HOB filter with rubble rock and chaeto...when the chaeto completely fills the chamber, i start to see cyano develop in the tank, as less of the chaeto is exposed to light. when i trim it down to a small ball, it allows the light to cover more of the chaeto's surface area, increasing the uptake of unwanted nutrients and increasing the gas exchange (CO2 to O2).

 

[kmk2307]

hdyoung,

Do you test your phosphates? You may want to try to use something like Phosban. Cyanobacteria love phosphates.

HTH,
Kevin

 

[hdyoung]

I believe that my phosphates are detectable.... around 0.25-0.5 ppm by a test kit which I ...... sort of trust.

The cheato is definitely in a low flow area. No tumbling going on at all. From what I have read tumbling is not necessary, and I dont have any baffles set up currently that would cause that to happen.

I will definitely put a powerhead into that area and jazz things up a bit, and hold off on putting any chemicals.