Salty Dog24
New member
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pico reef pest algae problem challenge
- Thread starter brandon429
- Start date
brandon429
Active member
The bottle does go flat in time of oxygen, like a soda does for carbon
rcharlie Thank you for rather outstanding pics
I can tell you did the spot treatment exactly right and your results should be well in line with the others Thank you!
Also we are inviting a new friend over here with a Dino problem and those are among the toughest challenges but I bet we have a great chance. Watch for pics and updates of these recent tanks I'm expecting good outcomes and after shots
rcharlie Thank you for rather outstanding pics
I can tell you did the spot treatment exactly right and your results should be well in line with the others Thank you!
Also we are inviting a new friend over here with a Dino problem and those are among the toughest challenges but I bet we have a great chance. Watch for pics and updates of these recent tanks I'm expecting good outcomes and after shots
Salty Dog24
New member
Thanks Brandon! Best Thread I've seen in a LONG TIME!
DaytonaJoe
New member
Brandon and I PMed a bit about my algae problem and agreed to transfer over to the thread.
My tank has been infected with dinoflagellates (I believe) for months and valonia + green cyano for years and I'm about to give up. I've tried hydrogen peroxide dosing, 3 day blackouts, large water changes, and tons of scrubbing.
It's a 60g display w/ about 75g total water volume. Salinity 1.025, calcium 410, alkalinity 9.0, phosphates reading 0.
I added a number of snails maybe 3 weeks ago, not knowing that dinoflagellates may kill them. Strangely enough they all seem okay except for 1 fuzzy chiton that died.
I'm going to attempt to include pictures...
The first pic of the rock shows what I believe to be dinos: the brown snot looking stuff that comes out in tendrils.
My tank has been infected with dinoflagellates (I believe) for months and valonia + green cyano for years and I'm about to give up. I've tried hydrogen peroxide dosing, 3 day blackouts, large water changes, and tons of scrubbing.
It's a 60g display w/ about 75g total water volume. Salinity 1.025, calcium 410, alkalinity 9.0, phosphates reading 0.
I added a number of snails maybe 3 weeks ago, not knowing that dinoflagellates may kill them. Strangely enough they all seem okay except for 1 fuzzy chiton that died.
I'm going to attempt to include pictures...
The first pic of the rock shows what I believe to be dinos: the brown snot looking stuff that comes out in tendrils.
rcharliesam
Member
Uhh... Yeah, this method really works. Hopefully no long term harm, but I will likely proceed with the spot treating on the other rocks.
Has anyone tried H2O2 on lyngbya? I am 95% certain I am up against it right now and didn't find any references to in the thread using the search. Also, this is considered a cyanobacteria. Not sure if it would help knock it out by pulling the rocks in my pico and spot treating it to help get it stomped out.
brandon429
Active member
I dont recall any input on it but it cant hurt to try using the external method. peroxide zaps most cyano and algae life when applied, the key detail is how often it comes back and thats interesting to see as it ranges between tanks. Ive found this useful for the initial kill in most cases. In my tank, occasional treatment kills 100% of algae and makes me not have to test for anything with a perfectly clean tank for 3 years so I like it as the preventative too. this is harder to attain in large tanks/
brandon429
Active member
rcharlie and daytonaj:
Thanks for your follow up!! been busy a bit on the rc drone forums and was neglecting my tank bros. you can see from earlier posts the external method is the go-to, simply because it preserves all the non targets that would otherwise be hit using an in-tank method.
Daytona your live rock appears to have cyano in my opinion and not dinos which is great, that brs rock is known to have a bit of phosphate bound and imo that will take care of itsself in time if you are using the common p04 interceptor media
i still recommend the external dose method for any of it you want to zap
valonia should respond well to an initial kill. I owe my friend snakebyt frompages ago acknowledgement that peroxide may or may not beat valonia, his tank had it tough. your tank has rock that can be removed however, thats a more thorough treatment option keep us posted
Thanks for your follow up!! been busy a bit on the rc drone forums and was neglecting my tank bros. you can see from earlier posts the external method is the go-to, simply because it preserves all the non targets that would otherwise be hit using an in-tank method.
Daytona your live rock appears to have cyano in my opinion and not dinos which is great, that brs rock is known to have a bit of phosphate bound and imo that will take care of itsself in time if you are using the common p04 interceptor media
i still recommend the external dose method for any of it you want to zap
valonia should respond well to an initial kill. I owe my friend snakebyt frompages ago acknowledgement that peroxide may or may not beat valonia, his tank had it tough. your tank has rock that can be removed however, thats a more thorough treatment option keep us posted
Thanks. I have seen a decline already based on changing out my GFO and Carbon. I also replaced an RO membrane that was getting a little long in the tooth along with every other stage of my Spectrapure MaxCap. I can easily remove one of my two rocks to spot treat some spots and will see how it goes.
I dipped all the wet side components of my MP10 in a 50/50 solution of H2O2 and RO water. There wasn't much of this stuff on the pump because I cleaned it recently but what was on it basically fell off the pump components in a couple minutes and was just floating around in the bath. I could soak in 100% vinegar overnight and still needed to scrub w a toothbrush to remove this stuff.
DaytonaJoe
New member
Sounds good, I'm glad to hear it's most likely not dinos! I've been dosing 10ml of peroxide to the tank daily and I'm going to do a big rock scrubbing (outside of the tank) tomorrow. I will post new pics then!
rcharliesam
Member
Updates. Spot treated second rock on Sunday. Also have been doing low daily dosing to keep the rest in check.
Second spot treated rock
first spot treated rock
Tank shot
Original state (11/13/13)
Second spot treated rock
first spot treated rock
Tank shot
Original state (11/13/13)
brandon429
Active member
Those pics side by side tell the exact tale as I envision the process, thanks so so much!
these side by side pics are the perfect summary to the peroxide method, its pros and cons:
-undeniably, you did not recycle your tank. you did not affect your in house bacteria so we have utterly destroyed the #1 old assumption about peroxide use many times over in this thread, the old adage that using it will sterilize your tank and kill all the pods etc. we know how to apply it carefully to avoid that, even if other posters elsewhere managed to nuke their tank or sps with 3%. thats not happening here. its simply not occuring here page after page.
Playing devils advocate for the staunchest anti-peroxide posters out there, if peroxide does have an initial impact on bacteria, we can't quantify that in any way, neither could Randy Holmes Farley when I asked him about it in a thread in the chem forum which can still be dug up, and magically these corals above dont seem to care much. Obviously the bacteria rebound quickly enough such that no ammonia escapes oxidation or we would be having mass ammonia problems in this thread.
Zero proof exists that peroxide use in a reef tank negatively impacts nitrifying bacteria. The challenge exists to find the link or abstract and post it here, a link to aquarium studies and peroxide. we are actually developing quite a testament to the null hypothesis, perhaps it actually boosts filtration bacteria by boosting the overall oxygen content aerobes relish (just a guess)
We also are not getting ANY reports of nitrate spikes, which would indicate an action on the anaerobes from our tanks. Some loss of pods has been noted in full rock dips> who cares, they'll repopulate from other areas in the tank. there is a price in curing algae problems long after that first rock was overtaken.
-our method simply kills a target it is not better or worse than another method. If you have access to your rock or tank targets and would like that algae gone, use it. If you prefer a long drawn out battle over phosphates to beat algae, select that method or use a combo.
Nobody is saying this is the best way to fight algae, what we like to do here is -safe- applications that preserve your non targets and try and make predictions about what will happen to your targets. if your target doesnt die, no prob, try something else.
ID of target species is typically not needed here, we just zap. The target above could be one of ~twenty species we refer to as GHA collectively. ID'ing algae correctly is very hard to do, I respect guys like plantbrain who can. Plantbrain from the macros forum is a very powerful resource of plant info, i was actually talking to him online when the web was quite new in 1995 regarding the action of actinic light on aquatic plants and Ive never forgotten how smart he is. amazing to see him still here today. dang near 20 yrs later he still typing plant info wow and you can speak to him any way you need in the macros forum here. he hangs out on plantedtank.net too for obvious reasons.
3% has a very high percentage of cures/kills on green hair algae which I rate as the #1 best algae to treat with it depending on your setup, which is why your pics look so great post treatment. I rate neomeris annulata as the algae least likely to respond to peroxide and if you get that in your tank simply burn the whole tank to the ground and never reef again.
What the pics show above is a simple reset. This is what RCharlieSam's tank looked like before it got algae invaded through whatever the primary cause was./ Now that its reset, continue as you please. In my tank I simply repeat as needed. You can choose better lighting or po4 binding going forward, algae scrubbers etc, but in the end if they let you down, you know for a fact how to always reset.
even though its a little self serving to say, I still feel Charlie's best bet was the peroxide. You can hook up GFO and wait weeks for dieoff and it very well could be sustained, but oh how much quicker was this, and, you can still use the GFO in its correct place as a preventative and not a remover of algae.
I stand by the statement that Charlie's tanks chemistry was least overall impacted by the brief peroxide work compared to any other method that truly does shock a system into compliance. This is just pure results pictured above, Id be curious to know in two mos how well things are holding up no matter what you do to your nutrient controls.
Thanks for great great pics
B
these side by side pics are the perfect summary to the peroxide method, its pros and cons:
-undeniably, you did not recycle your tank. you did not affect your in house bacteria so we have utterly destroyed the #1 old assumption about peroxide use many times over in this thread, the old adage that using it will sterilize your tank and kill all the pods etc. we know how to apply it carefully to avoid that, even if other posters elsewhere managed to nuke their tank or sps with 3%. thats not happening here. its simply not occuring here page after page.
Playing devils advocate for the staunchest anti-peroxide posters out there, if peroxide does have an initial impact on bacteria, we can't quantify that in any way, neither could Randy Holmes Farley when I asked him about it in a thread in the chem forum which can still be dug up, and magically these corals above dont seem to care much. Obviously the bacteria rebound quickly enough such that no ammonia escapes oxidation or we would be having mass ammonia problems in this thread.
Zero proof exists that peroxide use in a reef tank negatively impacts nitrifying bacteria. The challenge exists to find the link or abstract and post it here, a link to aquarium studies and peroxide. we are actually developing quite a testament to the null hypothesis, perhaps it actually boosts filtration bacteria by boosting the overall oxygen content aerobes relish (just a guess)
We also are not getting ANY reports of nitrate spikes, which would indicate an action on the anaerobes from our tanks. Some loss of pods has been noted in full rock dips> who cares, they'll repopulate from other areas in the tank. there is a price in curing algae problems long after that first rock was overtaken.
-our method simply kills a target it is not better or worse than another method. If you have access to your rock or tank targets and would like that algae gone, use it. If you prefer a long drawn out battle over phosphates to beat algae, select that method or use a combo.
Nobody is saying this is the best way to fight algae, what we like to do here is -safe- applications that preserve your non targets and try and make predictions about what will happen to your targets. if your target doesnt die, no prob, try something else.
ID of target species is typically not needed here, we just zap. The target above could be one of ~twenty species we refer to as GHA collectively. ID'ing algae correctly is very hard to do, I respect guys like plantbrain who can. Plantbrain from the macros forum is a very powerful resource of plant info, i was actually talking to him online when the web was quite new in 1995 regarding the action of actinic light on aquatic plants and Ive never forgotten how smart he is. amazing to see him still here today. dang near 20 yrs later he still typing plant info wow and you can speak to him any way you need in the macros forum here. he hangs out on plantedtank.net too for obvious reasons.
3% has a very high percentage of cures/kills on green hair algae which I rate as the #1 best algae to treat with it depending on your setup, which is why your pics look so great post treatment. I rate neomeris annulata as the algae least likely to respond to peroxide and if you get that in your tank simply burn the whole tank to the ground and never reef again.
What the pics show above is a simple reset. This is what RCharlieSam's tank looked like before it got algae invaded through whatever the primary cause was./ Now that its reset, continue as you please. In my tank I simply repeat as needed. You can choose better lighting or po4 binding going forward, algae scrubbers etc, but in the end if they let you down, you know for a fact how to always reset.
even though its a little self serving to say, I still feel Charlie's best bet was the peroxide. You can hook up GFO and wait weeks for dieoff and it very well could be sustained, but oh how much quicker was this, and, you can still use the GFO in its correct place as a preventative and not a remover of algae.
I stand by the statement that Charlie's tanks chemistry was least overall impacted by the brief peroxide work compared to any other method that truly does shock a system into compliance. This is just pure results pictured above, Id be curious to know in two mos how well things are holding up no matter what you do to your nutrient controls.
Thanks for great great pics
B
brandon429
Active member
the duncan rock before and after is my fav area from above
rcharliesam
Member
The duncan rock was not even spot treated. Just a result of the dosing and water change siphoning. There is still some algae on there, but with the VAST majority pretty much under control or eliminated all together, the dosing should eliminate the rest pretty easily.
Thanks for the kind words and for saving my tank.
brandon429
Active member
that was one Id rate just above neo~
we do have some hardfast dino cures Ive linked to w peroxide. about 50% or more simply dont respond...things typically cant get worse in those tanks even if peroxide doesnt help...post the big full tank shot lets see if we cant get you better than 50% chance
the #1 trick I like to do on dinos with peroxide is to first hand siphon/clean/remove the dinos thoroughly over a few hours work, no peroxide.
then when your tank is free physically of them, for that 24 hour period anyway, thats when we max zap based on your non targets the pics will show
instead of clearing the biomass w peroxide, I like to hard attack the regrowth instead when they are in a consumptive phase to produce new biomass. this often turns out to be a lot of elbow work only to have half the tanks still have a dino prob. you are close to tearing it down anyway I figure, whats a last ditch scrubbing going to hurt other than waste a lil time./
but you combine that with a pond UV sterilizer meant for a koi pond, then we are really partying. That combo alone comprises most of the cure threads there are using peroxide to beat dinos. some recent ones in the chem forum, literal cures written right there.
we do have some hardfast dino cures Ive linked to w peroxide. about 50% or more simply dont respond...things typically cant get worse in those tanks even if peroxide doesnt help...post the big full tank shot lets see if we cant get you better than 50% chance
the #1 trick I like to do on dinos with peroxide is to first hand siphon/clean/remove the dinos thoroughly over a few hours work, no peroxide.
then when your tank is free physically of them, for that 24 hour period anyway, thats when we max zap based on your non targets the pics will show
instead of clearing the biomass w peroxide, I like to hard attack the regrowth instead when they are in a consumptive phase to produce new biomass. this often turns out to be a lot of elbow work only to have half the tanks still have a dino prob. you are close to tearing it down anyway I figure, whats a last ditch scrubbing going to hurt other than waste a lil time./
but you combine that with a pond UV sterilizer meant for a koi pond, then we are really partying. That combo alone comprises most of the cure threads there are using peroxide to beat dinos. some recent ones in the chem forum, literal cures written right there.
Last edited:
rcharliesam
Member
Also, regarding any negative effect that the dosing may have had on the corals... There appears to be none so far. In fact, everything seems healthier now that it is not being strangled out by the hair algae. Gsp, acans, zoas especially. My inverts are also now eating like crazy. When I was mag dosing, a lot of the corals were looking like crap. I did not have many inverts at the time of mag dosing to compare. But before the peroxide, they were pretty much only staying on the sand.
I will definitely post some longer term updates as the months go on, but for now the results will likely not be anything drastic enough to translate well in pictures.
I will definitely post some longer term updates as the months go on, but for now the results will likely not be anything drastic enough to translate well in pictures.
boosted_347
Member
Brandon recommended that I come here and join in the fun so here goes:
29 gallon biocube. Running no skimmer but doing 10% water changes once a week. 30# of dry marco rocks which I've been told after the fact tends to leech phosphates for a while. This tank finished its cycle 10/15/2012, so I've had it just over a year. GHA has always been somewhat present in here, but reared its ugly head within the last couple of weeks. I'm just about to do a water change now, but want to know how best to treat the entire tank.
There's 1 clown, a pistol shrimp/ywg pair, a few brittle stars (I never even knew I had them, one hitch-hiked and somehow I have about 5 now). There's a zoa, a couple of mushrooms and daisy polyps. Obviously I don't wanna kill anything off, but as you can see.... it's covered. Help!?!?!! Oh.. and nevermind my coralline issue on the glass. I'm getting to that next. :c)
29 gallon biocube. Running no skimmer but doing 10% water changes once a week. 30# of dry marco rocks which I've been told after the fact tends to leech phosphates for a while. This tank finished its cycle 10/15/2012, so I've had it just over a year. GHA has always been somewhat present in here, but reared its ugly head within the last couple of weeks. I'm just about to do a water change now, but want to know how best to treat the entire tank.
There's 1 clown, a pistol shrimp/ywg pair, a few brittle stars (I never even knew I had them, one hitch-hiked and somehow I have about 5 now). There's a zoa, a couple of mushrooms and daisy polyps. Obviously I don't wanna kill anything off, but as you can see.... it's covered. Help!?!?!! Oh.. and nevermind my coralline issue on the glass. I'm getting to that next. :c)
Also going to give it a try
Also going to give it a try
All,
I also have some gha that I have been battling with toothbrush, water changes, etc. I am tired of fighting it so thinking about pulling my rocks out and trying this method. I have read almost every page and think I am good on the techniques.
The lazy part of me is trying to convince the non-lazy part to not pull out all the rocks but just do 1ml dose per 10 gallons. I won't because I don't want to risk my small blue maxima clam and a pistol shrimp. I don't care about my xenia. Some of those need to go anyway.
Tank info:
14G Biocube with good parameters (which is why this is frustrating) and upgraded to LED lights. Two clowns, a blue maxima, a goby/pistol shrimp combo, and mostly zoas/mushrooms besides a Duncan and a frogspawn.
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Also going to give it a try
All,
I also have some gha that I have been battling with toothbrush, water changes, etc. I am tired of fighting it so thinking about pulling my rocks out and trying this method. I have read almost every page and think I am good on the techniques.
The lazy part of me is trying to convince the non-lazy part to not pull out all the rocks but just do 1ml dose per 10 gallons. I won't because I don't want to risk my small blue maxima clam and a pistol shrimp. I don't care about my xenia. Some of those need to go anyway.
Tank info:
14G Biocube with good parameters (which is why this is frustrating) and upgraded to LED lights. Two clowns, a blue maxima, a goby/pistol shrimp combo, and mostly zoas/mushrooms besides a Duncan and a frogspawn.
