Nutrient level in SPS tank
- Thread starter dzhuo
- Start date
BuckeyeTodd
New member
I just searched and saw Jeremy recommend 6 1/2 with lg PPW, so perhaps my memory is faulty or there are other reputable people who recommend 6. Is your wedge pipe wide open? If it is wide open then the water level is too high. If you have had to adjust wedge pipe to get the water level that high and it still won't skim, somethings wrong and my only advice would be to let someone else try it or shoot a PM to Mojo~ and maybe he can provide insight that us skimmer simpletons are lacking
dzhuo
Active member
It's not wide open. If it's wide open, the water level inside the skimmer will drop way below the skimmer cup. I adjusted the wedge pipe and it's roughly 45% close and it's only that I can get at least a tiny bit of skimmate. Mojo~ is on my other skimmer thread, he made one comment but never came back. Jeremy also made one comment and never came back either. 
Charles, it can't be the food. How popular are frozen? Virtually everyone feed frozen and ATB would be out of business by now if frozen affect their skimmer this bad. Beside, you know I feed a lot less than most people. Again, we are not talking about a few hours, this is +5 months now.
That's how I always clean the cup. I never use any chemical. I also never rinse the cup because I heard this could destroy the biofilm and helps to make the skimmer recovery faster after a cleaning. I only use paper towel.
Charles, it can't be the food. How popular are frozen? Virtually everyone feed frozen and ATB would be out of business by now if frozen affect their skimmer this bad. Beside, you know I feed a lot less than most people. Again, we are not talking about a few hours, this is +5 months now.
That's how I always clean the cup. I never use any chemical. I also never rinse the cup because I heard this could destroy the biofilm and helps to make the skimmer recovery faster after a cleaning. I only use paper towel.
dzhuo
Active member
OK. I will talk to Victor and see what else he can do. I think he's being quiet reasonable so far and sent me a new motor for the pump. He probably doesn't want to send me a new skimmer thinking I am just trying to take advantage and asking for a newer skimmer. But I am NOT. I just want this damn freaking crap to skim like it supposed to.
MedicBMC
Premium nonpaying member
I think you mentioned you run ROX carbon changed every 2 weeks. right?
I just started running ROX carbon and my skimmer shut down for a good 2 days and still doesn't produce nog like it did before. During those two days all I got was build up in the neck. I think ROX pulls out so much stuff that there isn't anything left to skim. Just a piece of info I though I might share.
I just started running ROX carbon and my skimmer shut down for a good 2 days and still doesn't produce nog like it did before. During those two days all I got was build up in the neck. I think ROX pulls out so much stuff that there isn't anything left to skim. Just a piece of info I though I might share.
Just try it. Frozen foods are the WORST against skimmers due to the oils. 2-3 days of ONLY pellets going into the tank, nothing else. Kalk, 2part, top off, and pellets for 2-3 days and see what happens. Lets atleast eliminate frozen foods, a known foam head killer, from the list of maybes from your particular tank.
dzhuo
Active member
Thx Medic! Yes I did run ROX .8 pretty much 100% of the time because Victor suggests that something in my tank water might be causing the skimmer to not skim so I went out to spend more money on reactor and carbon trying to fix this issue. Nevertheless, it didn't help.
I think there is definitely a possibility that ROX .8 shuts down the skimmer but assuming the carbon is really that efficient (more so than an ATB 840), wouldn't my tank be very nutrient poor? Why am I growing dino? Why is my glass cover in bio-film (quiet heavily, check the picture I post earlier) every 2 days?
Do you guys think it would be a good idea to shut my reactor down all together? I am just worry that if my skimmer isn't working and if I shut my reactor down, I basically have no filtration other than my LR and sand. I am concern this could accelerate the decline of my acros.
I think there is definitely a possibility that ROX .8 shuts down the skimmer but assuming the carbon is really that efficient (more so than an ATB 840), wouldn't my tank be very nutrient poor? Why am I growing dino? Why is my glass cover in bio-film (quiet heavily, check the picture I post earlier) every 2 days?
Do you guys think it would be a good idea to shut my reactor down all together? I am just worry that if my skimmer isn't working and if I shut my reactor down, I basically have no filtration other than my LR and sand. I am concern this could accelerate the decline of my acros.
SPSEMPIRE
New member
What are you doing / dosing to keep your phosphates at zero? Whatever you have been doing has been reducing your natural biological filtration.
I would defiantly turn off the reactor for a week and see how everything does. If you don't want to it completely off, you can restrict the flow down a lot.
Your Acropora Loripes is looking good and coloring up. How long have you had that guy? A lot of the maricultured acros will naturally brown out and then color back up after a few months. They are not impossible to keep but a little bit tougher to color up.
I would defiantly turn off the reactor for a week and see how everything does. If you don't want to it completely off, you can restrict the flow down a lot.
Your Acropora Loripes is looking good and coloring up. How long have you had that guy? A lot of the maricultured acros will naturally brown out and then color back up after a few months. They are not impossible to keep but a little bit tougher to color up.
SPSEMPIRE
New member
The best tanks I have seen in person always have a little big of algae growth on the sand bed or the back wall on the aquarium.
dzhuo
Active member
I am not sure. Maybe the GFO and regular water change? I have no idea. The Hana Check does have an error margin of 0.04 so my 0.00 could potentially be 0.04. I am not even sure my phosphate is at 0 now that algae is showing up.
I would say just a few weeks. I think the color does look better but I consider the improvement and color contrast to be bleaching. A slightly bleached coral almost always looks better than a healthy brown-ish coral.
Btw, that's exactly how I lost my green acro frag. It came in looking healthy showing polyp extension and good grow for the first 2 or 3 weeks. And then slowly it retracts it's polyp and turning pale in color. It will remain in this state without grow for at least a couple of months before it eventually dies. My blue milli frag is following exactly this pattern and I am afraid eventually all of them will go down like that.
Anyone know why it's doing that?
MedicBMC
Premium nonpaying member
Yeah I've read this whole thread and it is truly a mystery. I mean on one hand you have p04 and tests that indicate a low nutrient system, but then you have signs of a high nutrient system (ie dinos, biofilm etc.)
Looking at the whole picture the one thing that sticks out is the fact that your skimmer isn't working properly. In no tank with a bioload of 17 fish would a skimmer not produce anything significant in 5+ months. Also IMO don't take your reactor off-line because this could be the only thing keeping everything together.
Like a previous poster said, try and troubleshoot the problems with the skimmer.
Looking at the whole picture the one thing that sticks out is the fact that your skimmer isn't working properly. In no tank with a bioload of 17 fish would a skimmer not produce anything significant in 5+ months. Also IMO don't take your reactor off-line because this could be the only thing keeping everything together.
Like a previous poster said, try and troubleshoot the problems with the skimmer.
SPSEMPIRE
New member
It is your food source and I am about 100% sure on this one. SLOWLY, Turn your GFO offline.
Personally, I constantly adjust the flow going through the reactor on a weekly basis and I almost always turn the GFO reactor off for about 1 week a month. You are going to see your system go through some algae phases but that is okay. Just keep up with the manual removal at that point. I usually siphon out the algae and replace the water that is removed with a fresh salt mix.
From a guy who has played around with a lot of maricultured acros, if they have been in your systems for less than 2-3 months than I would think it is pretty natural to loose some color before it colors up.
Personally, I constantly adjust the flow going through the reactor on a weekly basis and I almost always turn the GFO reactor off for about 1 week a month. You are going to see your system go through some algae phases but that is okay. Just keep up with the manual removal at that point. I usually siphon out the algae and replace the water that is removed with a fresh salt mix.
From a guy who has played around with a lot of maricultured acros, if they have been in your systems for less than 2-3 months than I would think it is pretty natural to loose some color before it colors up.
BuckeyeTodd
New member
I think the acros are getting better, the skimmer is what worries me.
Is the skimmer consistently producing anything, even if its thin? Perhaps the skimmer is pulling all that is there. I kept thinking my skimmer should be producing like all the pics I see on here. Well, I just started vodka dosing and I now know how their skimmate is so dark and thick. My skimmer went from pulling a wet grean to a solid black sludge, same skimmer just one week of vodka dosing. So if its just the color or thickness of the skimate, don't worry about that-you do still have a fairly small bioload for a 150 gal tank. I had thought of the food angle, but just the length of time leads me to think something else is the prob(my atb does take like five hours to rebuild foam head after frozen food).
I still think the best idea is to loan the skimmer to someone with a larger bioaload and figure out if its working or not. If you knew the skimmer was working, then you'd be positive that given your water testing you could continue to slowly increase bioload. Not knowing if its working is the scary part.
Is the skimmer consistently producing anything, even if its thin? Perhaps the skimmer is pulling all that is there. I kept thinking my skimmer should be producing like all the pics I see on here. Well, I just started vodka dosing and I now know how their skimmate is so dark and thick. My skimmer went from pulling a wet grean to a solid black sludge, same skimmer just one week of vodka dosing. So if its just the color or thickness of the skimate, don't worry about that-you do still have a fairly small bioload for a 150 gal tank. I had thought of the food angle, but just the length of time leads me to think something else is the prob(my atb does take like five hours to rebuild foam head after frozen food).
I still think the best idea is to loan the skimmer to someone with a larger bioaload and figure out if its working or not. If you knew the skimmer was working, then you'd be positive that given your water testing you could continue to slowly increase bioload. Not knowing if its working is the scary part.
allsps40
New member
I saw that you feed a lot of frozen foods, which is a good thing. Do you rinse your food before feeding it?? There are a lot of oils in the liquid that is left after thawing out frozen foods. I always thaw my food in ro water then pour it into a fine fish net to remove all the water and oils. Before I did this I had nutrient issues. The oils will also keep your skimmer from making a good foam head.
dzhuo
Active member
Thx for the help guys! Really appreciate it.
Update... I finally confirmed with Brett what I have is not dino but a relative of cyano. Brett explained this better than I can here. I recognize the brown algae (bottom portion of the picture) immediately. Brett notice this particular cyano thrives in nutrient poor environments and loves high flow. Well, a number of you already said my tank is nutrient poor right? The high flow also match what I see. I have only seen it in the outlet of my Tunze and return pipe so far. I am going to follow Brett's suggestion of using Coral Snow to see if I can kill this cyano.
As for the skimmer and frozen food. Can you guys show me a couple examples of others having this problem? Frozen food is very popular and so is NW skimmer. It shouldn't be hard to find combination of these 2 and we should have lots of report people struggling with their skimmer all the time. Most people (including TOTM) feeds frozen exclusively and much more than I do, do we know they are having similar problems? The reason why I am hesitated to stop feeding frozen is because my anthias won't touch pellet as I made my note here.
I also want to make sure these aren't being ignored:
Update... I finally confirmed with Brett what I have is not dino but a relative of cyano. Brett explained this better than I can here. I recognize the brown algae (bottom portion of the picture) immediately. Brett notice this particular cyano thrives in nutrient poor environments and loves high flow. Well, a number of you already said my tank is nutrient poor right? The high flow also match what I see. I have only seen it in the outlet of my Tunze and return pipe so far. I am going to follow Brett's suggestion of using Coral Snow to see if I can kill this cyano.
As for the skimmer and frozen food. Can you guys show me a couple examples of others having this problem? Frozen food is very popular and so is NW skimmer. It shouldn't be hard to find combination of these 2 and we should have lots of report people struggling with their skimmer all the time. Most people (including TOTM) feeds frozen exclusively and much more than I do, do we know they are having similar problems? The reason why I am hesitated to stop feeding frozen is because my anthias won't touch pellet as I made my note here.
I also want to make sure these aren't being ignored:
If you ask me, I feel the problem with his skimmer cannot be food related. Losing the foam head for a couple hours after feeding food related? YES, Losing the foam head for 5+ months food related? I doubt it.
His skimmer is top of the line guys. Hell even my skimmer will start foaming an hour or so after I feed mysis, maybe even sooner. And my skimmer is only a swc 160, rated for 100 gallons heavy bioload and I have probably a 60 gallon system. With only a medium bioload and I'm still skimming.
His skimmer is rated perfectly for his system, either his system is really low in nutrient. I still think it should be skimming something if this is the case. Or the skimmer is defective.
If you think rust or other heavy metals are getting into your tank, run a poly filter which will change colors when it absorbs certain metals.
His skimmer is top of the line guys. Hell even my skimmer will start foaming an hour or so after I feed mysis, maybe even sooner. And my skimmer is only a swc 160, rated for 100 gallons heavy bioload and I have probably a 60 gallon system. With only a medium bioload and I'm still skimming.
His skimmer is rated perfectly for his system, either his system is really low in nutrient. I still think it should be skimming something if this is the case. Or the skimmer is defective.
If you think rust or other heavy metals are getting into your tank, run a poly filter which will change colors when it absorbs certain metals.
SPSEMPIRE
New member
Yes, that is correct but I think you still need to figure out why your system is nutrient deficient. I should have clarified what I was meaning by a food source. It sounds like you have stripped your food source for your acros out of your system. The cyano originally starts a result of this die off of the zooplankton and micro bacterial life in your system. Do you think you could have added too much GFO at once?
dzhuo
Active member
There is a possibility. According to Boomer, the general guide line of using GFO is 1/5 cup per 50g of water. My tank is 150g + 40g sump and I estimate there is maybe 170g total. I should be using 1.5 cup of GFO given this. My guess is I am using a little more. I made a note earlier that although I have no precise measurement, I am using roughly 1/3 of my BRS single reactor for ROX .8 and another 1/3 of the space for GFO. I have been starting this pretty much from the beginning since Victor suggested that I run carbon. I have been changing the media every 2 weeks (something just a bit longer) per each water change.
Maybe I should really just take the reactor off line to see what happen. The only reason why I haven't done this is because I am afraid this is the only filtration I have since the skimmer isn't working.
A note from Victor (I emailed him last night), he wants me to bring the skimmer to his place so he can test it for me. I am not comfortable doing that without my skimmer and CO2 scrubber since pH can really drop to 7.6 without them. I ask Victor if he could lend me another working skimmer while I drop off mine in person (he's somewhat close to me and I am willing to just drive to his place) but he said he doesn't have one for me. I kind of find it difficult to believe he doesn't have a few skimmer laying around. Oh well, I haven't make up my mind yet.
you're changing out your gfo and rox fairly quickly. I think the norm is to change it out every month. I remember when I added tooo much gfo. My acros started to show signs of stn. When I replaced my gfo reactor with biopellets. over the course of 2-3 weeks, the affected acros seem to heal over the stn areas.
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