[dinor2]

Ok, well, I remember you telling me that. I don't know what I've done to get you mad at me but, I'm doing the best I can and if I think there's a possibility that the skimmer not running contributed to the algae growth, would that also not be the possible cause of it? I'm not dissagreeing with you, just saying it's possible there's more than one side to things sometimes. You are obviously more experienced in reefing than me so I'm going to keep listening to you, and if I decide not to take advice and I get a bad result, my bad! But for the most part, I have done a lot of things with my tank that I've been recommended by the people here. Just don't understand why you sound so irritated, well, i do, but, just not sure it's fair to be irrated with someone if they don't agree with you is all. And, like I said, if I don't heed your advice because I don't agree and things go south, that's my own fault, I made a bad decision but I feel for the most part I have done a fairly decent job only being in this for a year and much of the year I've followed LOTS of advice from this wonderful site.

[WhatReef]

Hey dinor2,

I noticed you have alot of those green bubbles all over your rocks, you do know those aren't go for your tank right? I would suggest getting your self some emerald crabs to take care of those for see as it seems you have alot. and if you are having algae problems they are most likely caused by not enough flow and to much light. i had a tank shape just like you once and i have algae problems as well i dunno if its just hard to keep a good flow go or what i dunno. Tank looks good though since i last saw it. As for your skimmer, it wouldnt cause algae blooms if its not working all it does is adds oxygen to the tank and filters out fish urine and toxins, algae is cause by low water movement, to much lighting, if you really wanna kick the algaes butt i would suggest turing your light off for a day or so you can run the blue ones but if you have metal halides just keep them off for a few days as in nature its not always a sunny day and im not just talking out my you know what here, I have experience alot of problems and have found solutions as will you cheers.

[dinor2]

Ya, I know I've got the bubble problem, I did get an emerald crab but, he didn't seem to touch the bubbles, loved hair algae though! He got too stressed with all that happened in the tank and I lost him but, plan on getting two maybe three after the water problem is fixed. Also, I'd really like to add a plant to my overflow to do two things, help compete for the nutrients that the algae bubbles use and, give my pods a nice place to repopulate.

Going to test the water after lunch and see where it's at; Jim was right about raising the mag a little, it's not that low but, as I raise the alk, I believe I should raise the mag a tad as well. So I'll keep posting as there are changes/improvements but definitly going to tackle the bubble algae! Hard to add anymore corals when the rocks are already covered with those dumb bubbles! Oh, going to turn the daylights off tomorrow too, it's rainy and dark here today and tomorrow so, may as well mimick that in the tank when it's like that here! I guess oceans do see dark days from time to time too! Good point on that!
Thanks for the suggestions!

[WhatReef]

Iodine may contribue to algae but i wouldn't worry about that, i add iodine every now and then but only for my xenias and they grow very fast when you use iodine but its safest just to not mess around with it in my opion as most water changes are good enough to provide your corals with what they need as well as other trace elements you might want to add according to what corals you have, i use DT's photoplankton often as i have alot of filter feeders etc. But just looking at your pictures i have noticed your hair algae is growing more at the top of your rock than at the bottom, that right there tells me you have to strong of lighting.

Like i said turn the lights off for a few days, you'll be amazed how that can help, but you need to either reduce your photo period or move your light, meaning its to close to the surface of the tank which it is most likly and get more flow in there, also a sea hair would eat all the algae like crazy as well as emerald crabs. I can assure you if you do these things your tank with look better.

couple questions though!

how long are your lights on for and what do you have for lighting?

how did your fish die?
you said 3 died correct

your skimmer is what size exactly?
you skimmer provides almost all oxygen in your tank and if it isn't big enough for your setup and your bioload is to high it can case your fish to "pass out" and die in the event it fails, mine failed once and i came home and all my fish we on the bottom passed out breathing very fast lucky me i fixed it in time and add some air stones to get the oxygen back up quickly. anyways let me know

[WhatReef]

hey if you dont mind getting dirty, while doing a water change save some water and take one rock out at a time and remove the bubbles in the water you removed from the tank in a bucket of something, cause i here it take a long time to get rid of those nastys and if you pop them in the tank its not good lol

[dinor2]

Well, I have a deltec mce600, here's a link with what it is. Deltec - Aquarium Equipment - protein skimmers, turbo skimmers, calicum reactors, fluidized reactors, kalkwasser stirrers

I almost got the smaller model but, decided I couldn't over skim, right?! So, I believe that the skimmer being off is probably what killed the fish if it adds that much oxygen to the tank and when i did my 'autopsies' all i saw were inflamed gills, with the gills flaps opened all the way which, I assumed they suffocated somehow... didn't think to tie that with the lack of skimming though... interesting.

I lost my lawnmower blenny, orange spot goby and dwarf pygmy angel fish, all were also 'jumping' at the surface for air so, sounds like the cause of their death is spot on.

My lights are on this schedule:

Actinics (mixed 420n and 460n total 3bulbs) on from 8am-7pm
Daylights (mixed 2 10kbulbs and 1 12k bulb) on from 9am-6pm.
These are t5 bulbs also w/individual reflectors.
They're also about four months old and i just replace two bulbs a few days ago so, surely the algae isn't coming from bad or old lights...

I am noticing the corals gaining more color and opening more so, I'll keep testing every day until ph, alk, calcium and magnesium is at good levels and I'll have the lights off the next couple days. As for cirulation, I really think I have that covered, I've got a mj900 in the overflow, 1 koralia 1, 1 koralia 2 and 1 koralia 3, and clean them a couple times a week so they don't get clogged, what do you think? I could be totally off and need to upgrade to stronger koralias...

Thanks for posting the helpful advice, people like you are the reason I love coming to this site!

[WhatReef]

your actinics should only run 10 hours maxium, you might even want to go down to 9 hours for a lil while and your day lights are they metal halides? if so you might want to consider only using the 2 10,000K and leave the 12 k off,and only run them for 8 hours max a day and like i said before you might want to run 1 less hour on those.

My 120 only runs 2 15k metal halides and 4 65watt actinics

your tank is getting more light than my tank and mines twice the size and a 10inches or so deeper so you might want to ease up on the lighting and watch the temperature of the tank should be 75F is a safe temp however you can go up and down a lil(very lil)


and yes your skimmer not running would definitly kill your fish if you have a big bio load i have had a close call and that was scary considering i have over $2000 in fish in my tank and you skimmer should be running 24hrs a day and it does provide all the oxygen in the tank beleave it or not and aquarium filters help to but your skimmer is the lungs of your reef remember that

[WhatReef]

also i sure you already know this but water evaperates daily and you must top up your tank with just fresh pure water have a fill line so you know where it should be at all times, im sure you know this but i just though i would mention it so you know because no doing this can cause you parameters to not be where you want them to be and can cause problems with corals, but im sure you know this just make sure it a daily thing, if you get sloppy and miss things your tank will only get worse but im sure you know all this just thought i would refresh your memory incase you forgot

: P

also how much water do you change and how often do you change it? and how do you do it?
where do you get your water?

[jimw369]

Well you did ask for advice/critcism.

Yeah I get bothered sometimes when people put stuff in their tank and cant post params or even tell what they test for a year down the road. You are going to have problems...just plain fact. If your skimmer is to blame then why werent you watching it? Your algae problem did not show up over night. I guess there are those here that think all this should just be overlooked and just hand out all this wonderful advice that will make everything fine again. Unfortunately you didnt take care of your tank and now its time to learn a little more. I hope you get the algae issues worked out and read some more on water chemistry and Marine Husbandry. There is a lot for you in the RB library if you want to read on these subjects.

Get your params where they should be (Whatever you think they need to be cause you didnt post them in the last day or 2) cut back on your lights and best of all remove the hair manually. Just get it out of your tank. Scrub it or pull it off with velcro it doesnt matter just get it out. Best to take the rock out and get it off. All the crab does is eat a small bit of it and chop down the rest and it lays on your substrate unless you suck it up. If you dont it causes more problems. Never seen an emerald eat bubble algae yet.

Good luck.

[dinor2]

I have the mighty mite ro/di filter for my water and I do top off in the mornings with that water but I understand you bringing that up, it is important! I should be able to get my skimmer running again Wednesday and it is a high end skimmer and works better than by berlin turbo did, rated for up to 200gallons fully stocked so, i figure i'm covered having it on my 55! Anyways, I expect things to be back to normal or close to it by the weekend as the skimmer will be on a few days and it quickly collects gunk, before I broke the pump (the ceramic shaft, I didn't expect that magnetic pull to be so STRONG!!!) I had to empty it every two or three days!

Funny thing though, my nassarius snails are laying eggs! I'm a perfectionist so this has been very hard for me to get over being upset at myself about but, seeing that snail lay those eggs was encouraging, there's hope that it's not totally messed up, right?!

And you know, other than my skimmer being broken, this really was my fault because I did get sloppy for a couple months, I see that and now have a schedule written into my everyday calendar I go to every morning so I won't forget to do what I need to from now on. This was an expensive lesson in why to not stop testing the water and cleaning it regularly.

Speaking of that, I had been doing small 2-4 gallon water changes twice a week, when I was faithfully doing that it seemed to work well, everyone was happy. I also am using the Petco brand salt which i'm sure is lower in mag than other salts so, as soon as I'm done with what I have left, I'm changing to Instant Ocean, it's worth the extra $ if I don't have to dose as much mag.

Thanks for the help! Goign to grab some lunch and test the water, hoping to see more progress!

[jimw369]

[quote=this really was my fault because I did get sloppy for a couple months. I see that and now have a schedule written into my everyday calendar I go to every morning so I won't forget to do what I need to from now on. This was an expensive lesson in why to not stop testing the water and cleaning it regularly.

Speaking of that, I had been doing small 2-4 gallon water changes twice a week, when I was faithfully doing that it seemed to work well, everyone was happy. I also am using the Petco brand salt which i'm sure is lower in mag than other salts so, as soon as I'm done with what I have left, I'm changing to Instant Ocean, it's worth the extra $ if I don't have to dose as much mag[/QUOTE]

We have all been there and done that. Post your params. Dont care what salt you use just become familiar with it. test it and know what you have to add to it to bring it up to snuff so it does not throw your tank out of whack. Start working it into your budget to change the light bulbs one at a time over a few week period. I think the others already mentioned that.

Be patient with your skimmer. Might take a day or 2 to get broke in and running good. What kind is it? Lets know how to set it up before it gets here.

[dinor2]

Originally Posted by jimw369

Well you did ask for advice/critcism.

Yeah I get bothered sometimes when people put stuff in their tank and cant post params or even tell what they test for a year down the road. You are going to have problems...just plain fact. If your skimmer is to blame then why werent you watching it? Your algae problem did not show up over night. I guess there are those here that think all this should just be overlooked and just hand out all this wonderful advice that will make everything fine again. Unfortunately you didnt take care of your tank and now its time to learn a little more. I hope you get the algae issues worked out and read some more on water chemistry and Marine Husbandry. There is a lot for you in the RB library if you want to read on these subjects.

Get your params where they should be (Whatever you think they need to be cause you didnt post them in the last day or 2) cut back on your lights and best of all remove the hair manually. Just get it out of your tank. Scrub it or pull it off with velcro it doesnt matter just get it out. Best to take the rock out and get it off. All the crab does is eat a small bit of it and chop down the rest and it lays on your substrate unless you suck it up. If you dont it causes more problems. Never seen an emerald eat bubble algae yet.

Good luck.

I understand what you're saying, maybe it's a girl thing, drives my husband nuts when I'm that way with him sometimes too! It's just so hard to decide what to do sometimes because there's so much information and experience!

Ok, speaking of parameters, here is what, as I understand it, they need to be, please let me know if this is good.

Ph. 8.0-8.2
Mag 1300
Cal. 450-480
Alk 4-6
Temp 76

I plan on having mostly soft corals with a couple lps and only 4-5 fish from now on, the 5th one being a while since it'd be a dragonet and I know they eat only pods.

I think my last post came up right after yours so you'll see I totally agree that I went lax on my tank a few months and I'm paying for it. Going to find a way to stick to the maintanance and schdule though so it doesn't happen again.

Thanks for bearing with me! Btw, your tank is awesome!

[dinor2]

Oh ya, I've been hand harvesting both the bubble and hair algae, that does seem to help the most so far. Leaving the lights off a day or two would probably help more. Going to be testing and cleaning it as soon as the kids are done with their school, will post what I find out from the tests and another after pic from harvesting more bubbles and hair.

[jimw369]

Be nice to know if you had a reading on nitrates but we know they are in there even without the test. Phosphates also Im sure. Just keep an eye on your critters and if they start to look a little sick it could be from elevated nitrates. Just be ready to do some small water changes in case the worse should happen untill you get that skimmer up and going.

Try and remove some hair algae when you can. Out side of the tank if possible. One of the ways algae spreads itself is thru fragmentation. Just letting pieces of it go into the water to get hold in another place. By cleaning it in the tank you could be helping it do so.

[dinor2]

Originally Posted by jimw369

We have all been there and done that. Post your params. Dont care what salt you use just become familiar with it. test it and know what you have to add to it to bring it up to snuff so it does not throw your tank out of whack. Start working it into your budget to change the light bulbs one at a time over a few week period. I think the others already mentioned that.

Be patient with your skimmer. Might take a day or 2 to get broke in and running good. What kind is it? Lets know how to set it up before it gets here.

Thanks, may stick with the petco salt, not sure though, guess i should wait and see what my water is like after it's 'back to normal' so to speak.

I have a great skimmer Deltec - Aquarium Equipment - protein skimmers, turbo skimmers, calicum reactors, fluidized reactors, kalkwasser stirrers

I had a good conversation with Marvin at D-D Aquarium Systems about how I thought it would be good for them to add something to the manual about being careful with the impellor when cleaning it and removing/putting it back as it is the strongest magentic impellor I've ever handled and I wasn't aware of how fast it was going to get sucked back into the housing.

So, first time I removed the impellor, I wasn't thinking about how tough it was to remove so it slapped back into the housing and therefore shattered the ceramic end of it! I didn't even see where I broke it, had to send it back to Marine Depot for Grant to look at. $130 to replace the impellor!
Anyways, talked to marvin about adding a warning or sentence in the manual like, "Have a FIRM grip on the impellor as you place it back in the pump SLOWLY" that kind of thing, he seemed to be interested in getting that done.

I'm amazed it worked at all after I broke it, bought it in May or June and broke it about a month or two later, and was turning on for another month or so before it just wouldn't work at all.

So, learning a lot recently! Water, skimmers, magnets!...

[WhatReef]

Hi again,

how long has your skimmer been broken? you should fix that ASAP or get some air stones in your tank while your waiting i always keep one handy for emergenices and for when im adding fish put air in the bag water but if you dont have that perhaps change a lil more water than usual, if there are fish in there they need it lol. but yes 20% weekly water change should be good i dunno about doing it twice a week seems like alot of work you might want to just have a specific day to changing water like me every sunday i change 30 gallon of water out lol i use a huge garbage can with a mag drive and a heater and i just dump my saly in and let it mix and heat up to the right temp for an hour or two then i drain the old water out and every month I save some water in bucket and use to the scrub my power heads and anything in the tank that needs cleaning (like the skimmers motor and drive shaft)

question does your skimmer hang on the side of your tank or in a sump?

[dinor2]

Originally Posted by WhatReef

Hi again,

how long has your skimmer been broken? you should fix that ASAP or get some air stones in your tank while your waiting i always keep one handy for emergenices and for when im adding fish put air in the bag water but if you dont have that perhaps change a lil more water than usual, if there are fish in there they need it lol. but yes 20% weekly water change should be good i dunno about doing it twice a week seems like alot of work you might want to just have a specific day to changing water like me every sunday i change 30 gallon of water out lol i use a huge garbage can with a mag drive and a heater and i just dump my saly in and let it mix and heat up to the right temp for an hour or two then i drain the old water out and every month I save some water in bucket and use to the scrub my power heads and anything in the tank that needs cleaning (like the skimmers motor and drive shaft)

question does your skimmer hang on the side of your tank or in a sump?

It's been broken too long! About 2 months, that's how long it took me to find someone to help me with it! Deltec apparantly is dissolving into D-D so that's why I never got someone to talk to there.

Anyhow, should have the skimmer and replacement impellor all hooked up on Wednesday, ready for it! Going to go work on the tank now. Will post results later.

[WhatReef]

2 months toooooo long lol, the nuts you shouldn't ever leave that for that long lol and a good rule of thumb is buy from a local fish shop that you know they keep things in stock. I run a 220 coralife skimmer it works great and have only replaced the shaft once and am very impressed with it and another good rule is keep a few extra parts if you don't mind spending the money lol But the biggest rule of all is CLEAN your equipment and it will last longer!! cheers and good luck with the "War on Algae"

[dinor2]

Ya, I was cleaning it though! Just didn't thnk I'd have to hold it so tight so I wouldn't break it!

It's a goodskimmer though.

Ok, here are my water params for today:

Ph 8.0
Calcium 480
Alk 2.0
dKh 7
Mag 1200
Nitrites 0
Nitrates 0
Ammonia 0
Phosphates 0

I was harvesting algae and my corals started freaking out! I'm sure there wasn't anything on my hand! I wonder if they didn't like me moving the light back to fit my arm in there... Seem to be perking up now... goign to do a water change tonight.

[WhatReef]

your corals were freaking out lol, i assume you mean they retracted when you went near them our casted a shawdow over them.

[dinor2]

I guess, usually they don't get THAT unhappy when my hand's in there! Still have some bubbles to get off though so I'm taking the pic in a few days and leaving the lights off a day or two, now that most of the hair algae is gone! Hoping the dark days will kill what's left!

How do the params look iyo? I think I'm going to start doing a half dose of the alk buffer, just doesn't seem to be moving yet and don't want it to go too long with it this low... but I automatically don't do a recommended dose right off the bat, would rather underdose first, just in case!

Also just did a four gallon water change tonight, will do another in a couple days I think, just to make sure the water stays clean until the skimmer is back in action.

Any thoughts on what plant I can add to the refugium/overflow besides cheato? I have about three feet clearance from bottom to top of the overflow for plant(s)... I'm thinking mangrove? But not sure... Would like to have a plant the pods like and that compete for nutrients the algae likes... any thoughts?

[WhatReef]

mangroves are good but not cheap unless you can find a mangrove smuggler, i found one in my area who sells them for $5 a piece but in most stores there between $15-$25

[Hosser]

Dana, talk to Adam J about mangroves he just bought like 20 of them for like 16 bucks or something like that. Not sure if he has gotten them in yet but Im sure he owuld point you in the direction as to where to get them cheap.