Pics of my 24g AquaPod!

SugarFox03

SugarFox03

Animal Behaviorist
Hey everyone, I havent been here in about 6 months. I just wanted to post some pics of my tank, and also ask some questions. I'm fighting what seems to be a losing battle with algae...hair, green bubble, red bubble and caleurpa (this is going away!) I bought a sea hare yesterday, but he doesnt seem to be doing much except laps around the glass. I had a problem with a LFS I was using to buy water, turned out there's was causing my problems. I havent used them in 3+ months, but still seem to be having these problems. I'm doing 10 gal water changes a week, I dont overfeed, I have a Remora protein skimmer and mini fuge in the right chamber with chaeto & 4-5 lbs of live rock rubble. I have 3 fish, all of which are doing fine, and numerous corals and inverts. Anyway, here are the pics taken this weekend and last weekend.

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Ugly red bubbles
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Guess it would help to post the question...does anyone know what those red bubbles are and how to get rid of them other than plucking them all one by one from the tank?
 
first off i would test my water out test for amo,nit, and i would test for ,phos ...that should help you a little bit i hope
 
one otherr thing ,,you are almost changing out half the water a week ,,i would think you are not letteing the bacteria biuld up to add in braking anythign down
 
I have to do such large water changes because my nitrates get extremely high. I didnt have a chance to test today as I was out all day. I will test everything tomorrow and report back to you guys. I test every weekend, and the nitrate is the only thing that I get scary results on. I visited a new LFS today that I'm going to start using. They seem pretty darn good, so I'm hoping to start seeing some better results from this place. A few people I know use them for everything and never have an algae problem with their tanks.
 
We need to see your water parameters to help you ! Also test Your source water. The problem algaes are getting nutrients from something you just have to figure it out. What is your total circulation?

BTW, Your tank looks great!
 
Are you using frozen food and if so are you rinsing in a net under tap water? If you don't, those frozen juices can cause a huge nitrate problem.
 
Actually before today I was only using flake. I used brine for awhile (frozen) to spot feed corals and as a treat for my clown. I just bought from frozen mysis today that I plan on spot feeding the corals tomorrow and will rinse it out first. Thanks for that tip! Since I dont have too much I would just normally cut a cube in half, stick that in a small cup with a little bit of tank water, and let that sit for an hour or so with a few drops of vitamins and use the squirter to spot feed. I have a decent clean up crew and I'm also pretty good with pulling out any uneaten bits so they dont sit & cause any problems. Thanks again for the tip though, I never knew to rinse them off...guess it makes sense though! I will also get the params tomorrow. I'm too lazy to do it tonight...takes too long. :D

Thanks everyone!!
 
Have you tried:

Coral Sea Aquariums Inc
1373 N Military Trl
West Palm Beach, FL 33409

I'm in Boca, a friend told me about these people. Don't know anything about them, but he was happy. Also, heard good things about:

Crystal Reef Aquariums
932 Northlake Blvd
Lake Park, FL 33408

an acquaintance with a Phd in Marine Biology recommended:

Oceans Below Inc
110 U S Highway 1
North Palm Beach, FL 33408
 
Thanks Med for the recommendations. I actually got most of my things from Coral Sea, then had a bit of a disagreement with the owner. I won't be going back there. I will check out the other two places though! I did check out a new place called Tanks A Lot in Lake Worth, they are pretty small, but really nice people in there. I'm going to start getting my water from there and corals and everything also, they have beautiful pieces!
 
have u tried barrier reef in boca? also there is another place in boca off of congress... the guy knows his stuff real well. Even let me borrow his 125 gallon water tank, took me to his house to fill it with well water that ran through his purification system (free of charge) and gave me a great deal on live rock. he does mostly custom installs in houses but i have never seen so many corals flourish in a store and i have yet to keep my fish as healthy adn happy looking as he does. I'll post the location of the place later and the name... for some reason its not coming to me right now. Anyways, the people at barrier reef definetly know their stuff. my only bit of advice is go there during the week sometime during mid day... before 5 so they can actually devote time to you.

as for your nitrates... as we all know it comes from fish waste... is there just not enough circulation in your tank and u have dead spots where detritus is building up? maybe a decaying sponge? cause given your fuge and skimmer u shouldnt be having problems unless its from the salt u use, water, or food. as for buying saltwater from stores... dont bother doing so. better to use RO with a quality salt (tropic marin, well worth the $). All the places that sell premade saltwater and i mean ALL of them use the same 2 or 3 guys who put a hose into an inlet where the intracoastal drains into the ocean reguardless of na incoming tide or outgoing. Sure u can run a fishtank like that... and have it look nice... but u will notice a huge difference if u mix it yourself.
 
Barrier Reef is the place I was using and thats when I started to have all of the problems. I was going to Coral Sea, but me & the owner dont get along, but while using his water I never had a problem. My problem with mixing is that I don't have much time for that. I'd much rather go to a fish place & buy the water I need. I guess if it comes down to never getting rid of this hair algae or mixing myself I'll go out and buy a thing of Tropic Marin (which I have decided I will use if I ever need to mix myself, thats good stuff!) but I want to purchase an RO/DI system first.

As far as the tank, there's no dead spots that I can tell, there's lots of movement in the tank. I'm thinking about putting another MJ 400 in there just in case though.
 
Thanks everyone. Yeah, I'm working on the hair algae. I'm thinking the water I have been using for top offs could have been the culprit. I will now be using much better water, with a 0 TDS reading, so that should really help. I didnt realize the stuff I was using before had a TDS reading of 2, and although not that high, can still cause problems I guess, and the reason why it wont go away.

The water I was using from Barrier Reef had a TDS of 180, I wanted to strangle someone. :furious: That was months ago at the peak of my algae problem, mostly hair & caulerpa. The caulerpa is almost all gone, but I am still fighting the hair algae, and these ugly dark red bubbles, which I have no clue what they are. I have a few green bubbles, but those aren't anywhere near as bad or fast spreading.

I'm going to continue with the large weekly water changes and pray that this new water does the trick. I will definately keep you all posted!

Thanks again for the comments, its my little Pride-N-Joy, and its a great feeling to get such wonderful feedback from ya'll! :D
 
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