I never have a coralline covered tank?

[danmhippo]

Been in this hobby for years and have seen people's tanks fully covered with coralline of all colors. I never had this happened to my tanks. I always have a flouorishing corals, algae and inverts, but never coralline that covers every inch of bare surfaces. Is is the NO3 PO4 level higher the culprit? OR, the tank light is too strong??

My tanks are always MH and the rocks are either bare looking or green, never completely pink/purple.

Anyone else having the same problem as I am? Or, am I the only one out here?

 

[JeremyR]

Have you tested po4? Do you use RO water? What type of halide are you running? I assume you keep your ca/alk up..

Customers that have trouble growing coralline in my experience suffer from a couple of problems.. tap water use, or high po4 from some other source such as overfeeding. The other "cause" I've noticed is 400w iwasakis.. coralline doesn't particularly like that bulb, but every other halide I've used has grown it nice and thick.

 

[danmhippo]

PO4 0.4, NO3 20ppm, MH 20,000K 400W Dual. Water change using Catalina Water. Top-off & Kalk mix using tap water (our tap water registers PO4-0, NO3-0. Test done about 2 months ago)

But, its not just now, I don't have good growth since the first tank I got into the SW (like about 10 years ago?)

 

[JeremyR]

A couple of thoughts..

.4 po4 IMO is high enough to affect coralline growth.

Tap water may have no nitrate/phosphate.. but what is it's mineral content? Hard water will affect how much kalk you can dissolve.. reducing the effectiveness of your drip, and you didn't mention what your alk/ca levels were.

 

[Anonymous]

I don't think you should be able to detect phosphate at all with a hobbiest test kit. That could be the problem. Also an alk around 4 is good along with high flow rates.

 

[Anonymous]

I've always had this problem too. In tanks that I wanted it to grow it didn't. In tanks that I didn't care, it flourished.

Glenn

 

[todd22]

I think its the tap water. I have had this problem and have checked all aspects of my system (all perfect), but I use tap water for top off. I heard from a very trusted source that tap water contains tons of unwanted minerals that let the bad algaes thrive. I was using tap for my water source for about 9 months and my nitrates, nitrites ,and phosphates all tested perfect my water seemed fine but as soon as I switched to DI my problems were solved.

 

[zspeed32]

...i use tap water as well.........no no3, po4 from the tap...........my po4 is 0.3...no3 =0.........and my coralline growth is pretty high..................however, i use pc's, not halides........i do feed fairly heavily......no kalking, just add supps......maybe the lights??.........how heavy are you skimming, maybe??........

 

[todd22]

J.Kempf,
I think a lot is determined by where the tap water is located. Some places have much higher standards than others. I live in southern california and I know the tap water has tons of impurities. Tap is loaded with toxic substances. They even can have trace elements of Dibromomethane, which is highly toxic. I mean its in small amounts, but I use the stuff at work and its no joke a VERY toxic solvent. I dont want it in my tank! Not sure what all your water contains but you might want to find out.

 

[Bryan]

I second that, I have a heck of a time getting coralline to grow under the 400 watt Iwasaikis

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Jeremy Russell:
<STRONG> The other "cause" I've noticed is 400w iwasakis.. coralline doesn't particularly like that bulb</STRONG><HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

 

[davelin315]

My guess is it's the lighting as well. I had a lot of coralline algae growth in a tank using normal flourescents when I first started out, then I switched to MHs and I got very little. The place where it grew the most was in the overflow which had indirect light from the MHs and a lot of actinic lighting. In my tank now, which has PCs, I get coralline algae mostly on the front wall and the sides, and a lot on my substrate and snails as well. Not a lot on the rock in the tank, though. I also had a breeding container in the tank with some frags in it trying to get them to attach, and the coralline populated under the breeding container in a matter of a week.

One suggestion if you want more coralline would be to turn off your MHs or reduce their cycle and let your actinics turn on for a couple of hours before and after the MHs go on.

 

[wwinters]

my tank usually has some detectable phosphates I don't add Kalk and I live in an area with hard water I use for top off. I also use Catalina for water changes.
yet I get great coraline growth.

I can't imagine what is causing your lack of coraline but good luck figuring it out

 

[North Bay 101]

I am running a single 400 watt Iwasaki on a 46 Bow. The coraline has almost covered the complete back of the tank in 6 months. Not very fast but good growth. I started with some rock with coraline on it and started dripping kalk for the SPS's. New growth was observed in 3 weeks doing the kalk and MH lights. I have started using B-Ionic only about 2 months ago and have seen improved growth of coraline and SPS. I am using Safeway Brand Purified water only in the tank, as top off and for water changes. My local water will cause an algae bloom in two days if I us it. I have only good macroalgae growing in my tank. Hope that this helps.

 

[redneck]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Bryan:
<STRONG>I second that, I have a heck of a time getting coralline to grow under the 400 watt Iwasaikis

</STRONG><HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I'll third that! Corals like it, but only pink coralline seems to grow.

The sump, however, is covered w/coralline.

[ October 16, 2001: Message edited by: Redneck Cowboy ]

 

[SPC]

What in the world is Catalina water?
Steve

 

[JeremyR]

Catalina water is NSW that is pumped in from off of california.. pretty popular down there, alot of wholesalers use it, and it's also sold to hobbyists.

 

[2poor2reef]

Hippo, when you say your rocks are sometimes green are you talking green corraline or something else? I've noticed that pink/purple corraline likes lower par levels. My 250w iwasaki tank only grows green and light blue corraline. Of course you have to have some corraline spores to get any corraline to grow. I once had a tank that wouldn't grow it because I never seeded it. Once I did it took off nicely.

 

[danmhippo]

No, I meant green algae & diatom. Not hair algae.

However, I do find white coralline algae growing on the underside of the LRs. Still, its not pink and purple, and it soesn't grow on the visible side.

I am going to pick up acouple of 5Gal watter bottles to fill up RO in the LFS now for future top off. I am going to try that for a few weeks and see if there is any difference.

 

[Ocyurus]

I always had all my rock completely covered ever square inch with beautiful purple coraline but I upgraded the 37 gallon from NO fluorescents to 96 watt PC's recently and have been watching all of my coraling slowly dieing away, it is rather depressing do you think there is anything I can do to keep it?

 

[mgk65]

I recently had a die off in my coralline on the rocks.

I believe there were several factors:
1) Adding dual 400w MH Iwasaki
2) Adding a clam (4"+)
3) More small polyp stoney corals.

I top off 24/7 with limewater(kalkwasser) exclusively.

I found my alkalinity to be around 8.5-9 dKH or around 3 meq/l. My Ca++ was around 380-400.

I have since started supplementing my talk with Seachem Reef Builder and Seachem Advantage Calcium to increase alk and Ca++. In a matter of a week, I noticed a great improvement and growth of coralline and my SPS have also responded noticeably. My alk is now around 12-14 dKH or 4.5 meq/l and Ca++ is around 450.

mgk