SomeOne Help Green Again!

[Josh]

I suggest removing the bio wheel if you haven't already. To my knowledge, those are effective for urea producing animals, not necessarily a reef tank.

A Fluval 200 series should be like $100-150. They have three compartments so you can run carbon, a granule type nitrate sponge (Kent or Seachem come to mind) and Kent Silicate and Phosphate sponge in the smallest part. Run ONLY that 24/7. Do not reattach the skilter or the bio-wheel for a couple of weeks, but you should see an improvement in the water in a few days.

If that doesn't at least change the general water conditions, the tank is cursed and requires serious witchdoctor or voodoo magic.

One other thing. If you already got rid of the fish and corals, decrease the lighting period. How many hours a day are you currently running your lights? If you still have any fish or corals, list them here so we can decide how low to cut the lights.

 

[kimoyo]

chris5

do you have snails in your tank?

 

[Chris5]

No inverts at all but have 2 tangs and a small damsel which has been with me forever....Lighting is schedule usually followed this series:

8-9am Actnics
9am -6:30pm PCs
6:30-9pm Actnics again...

 

[DRZL]

You can kill off all the rock (cook it) and put a single piece of rock in to start everything over again, that would be the "purest" way to get started.

not to start another rock cooking thread, but cooking does NOT mean killing your rock.

chris take all your rocks, put them in a garbage can filled with saltwater, put a powerhead and a heater, and close the lid of the garbage can. wait 2 weeks go into the garbage can scrub the rocks do a 50 percent water change and do it for another 2 weeks.

cooking is the best way but you seem to have had enough

however, do NOT shut the lid! there still needs to be gas exchange and there will respiration, otherwise you will prbly kill everything

Have you done any research on google or RC like I suggested? your not the first or the last that has had this happen...maybe Deanos can link u some stuff but u need to also look for urself

 

[Josh]

I would immediately change it to:

11:00-12 actinic
12-8 PCs
8-9 actinic

This will keep it close to what you currently have so you will still get to inspect the tank during lighting hours. This alone should cause a change in the rate of algae growth.

Think about what I said about shutting off the skilter and putting the fluval on for now.
I would turn off the wet dry immediately, but you may want to give the fish to someone who has a quarantine tank to hold them for a few weeks while you straighten things out, they will thank you for it. If you are attached, keep the damsel, but give the tangs to someone else.

 

[Chris5]

Sounds like a plan i mean i will try anything at this point but question if i turn off the wet dry all i have is the skilter for now you think that will be ok? I cant run the bio wheel bc it got so dirty when i came home from vaca that i had to break it down....

 

[kimoyo]

chris5 - The green tint in your tank is dissolved algae. Skimmers work by taking out dissolved algae and bacteria. Here is a link to an article by Dr. Randy about Protein Skimming: How It Works (although the link isn't working for me right now). Since you have that green tint your skimmer should be pulling out a lot of stuff. If its not, then the skimmer is either not working properly or its not a good skimmer. Once you have a skimmer working well for your tank size you won't have to worry about all the other filters.

Nah the tank is my friends old tank 65g and i have had it running for about 6 months now without any problems until now....i did at one point have corals and inverts but they died off randomly but fish still healthy as ever....

If you can't keep corals or snails it sounds like you have a copper issue. Low levels of copper are deadly to inverts (corals and snail)s but fine for fish. Copper is a common fish treatment for ich, a parasite. You can read more about it here. The problem with copper is it binds to sand and liverock. Once that happens, if you put that rock into a tank without copper it can be released and bound to other rocks and sand. To see if it is really copper or not, I would get a salifert copper test kit (not seachem they have been giving out bad batches recently) and just test the water. If it comes up postive for copper you can either try to treat the sand and rock or throw it away. If you really can't keep inverts I would test for copper before doing anything else with the rocks.

 

[Chris5]

Its def not copper bc the corals are thriving, but inverts in the beginning of the water deterioting before the green tint surfaced they were dying off....Fish are healthy...so prob an algae of some kind....

 

[Josh]

Nothing can hurt at this point. Those fish are doomed if you don't find the problem. Find someone (with a quarantine tank) to take the two tangs and explain to the damsel that you and him/her are going to figure out this problem together hell or high water.

So here are my immediate suggestions:
Turn off and remove the wet/dry and all tubes, pumps, plumbing
Change the photoperiod as per my last post
Check prices on a Fluval 200 or 300 series and the media listed
Do not put ANY food in the tank (NOTHING). If you get rid of the tangs, the damsel can deal with no food for a little while. If you still have the tangs, put them on a diet until someone can take them off of your hands
Make sure one of your powerheads is near the top of the tank so the water is "broken", i.e. it shouldn't be flat. It shouldn't spray water or splash too much, but you should be able to see the current coming from the pump.

Can you put the skimmer (what model is it btw?) on the tank itself so you can shut down the sump? Just something to look at and start to think about. The other things are more important.

 

[Chris5]

Ok well changed the photo period as per your post, skimmer has been on the back of the tank already so and is foaming again with junk, will place one power head at surface to break water tension,

looked on Fosters and found very cheap Fluvals but wondering if thats the one your talking about, they are very cheap only other one is a multi fluval thats the one for about 100$ ...the others are smaller ones rated at max 260gph....
Should i be running the skilter as a filter now if the wet/dry is turned off?

 

[kimoyo]

Its def not copper bc the corals are thriving, but inverts in the beginning of the water deterioting before the green tint surfaced they were dying off....Fish are healthy...so prob an algae of some kind....

So were the corals and snails dying off at one time?

And is your skimmer pulling out anything?

 

[Chris5]

Corals died awhile ago due to what i believe was a deep sand bed issue (hydogen sulfate) so i cleaned the tank out of all the sand and water and did new sand and water about 4 days ago up until that point no inverts or corals lived....Now with new sand and water corals are thriving but havent tried putting inverts in yet....green tint still trying to surface around tank....making the water cloudy....

 

[kimoyo]

looked on Fosters and found very cheap Fluvals but wondering if thats the one your talking about, they are very cheap only other one is a multi fluval thats the one for about 100$ ...the others are smaller ones rated at max 260gph....
Should i be running the skilter as a filter now if the wet/dry is turned off?

Instead of getting a canister filter or using a bio-wheel which will lead to excess nitrates that will fuel the algae growth. Maybe you should look into getting a better skimmer. Spykes did are really nice mod to one of the cheap coralife skimmers or maybe you could look into the asm's. I just hope you don't spend more money in vain. A good skimmer should have no problem clearing a green tank.

 

[Josh]

Can you post a photo of the skimmate (the crap)? I know it sounds wierd, but it is a good indicator of the biology of the tank.

If you don't have the Fluval, keep the Skilter running for now. Look for a Fluval 204, 304 or 404. Price it with a tub of activated carbon, Kent or Seachem nitrate sponge, and the Kent silicate/phosphate sponge (it is an all in one). Get three filter media bags, but the Fluval probably comes with them. Do not use the media that comes with the filter (actually, the carbon is ok, but not the little tube things with the holes in them). Get the Fluval as soon as you can to replace the Skilter.

Find someone to take the tangs.

As far as copper goes, unless there is a pile of pennies under the sand, it can't be that bad. He has done several water changes and one 100% change. Unless it is a big piece of iron at the bottom of the tank, it shouldn't be leeching that much copper. Even people with copper problems don't see such a rapid growth of algae, at least I have never seen it like this.

If he changes the filtration to the lowest common denominator (the Fluval), and there is still the same problem, well, the rock/sand/tank is definately tainted with something and should be disposed of.

 

[Josh]

Kimoyo,

I certainly agree that the skimmer is a good idea, and will fix just about all problems. But unless he is willing to get a super duper skimmer, I think it will just clear the water so that more algae can form (he already did several water changes including one 100% change). Something needs to be done to cut off the food supply to the algae, either no lights or no additions to the water chemistry. Maybe something is wrong with the current plumbing or filtration causing waste to leak back into the tank?

I'm just trying to help him get the tank back to the most basic form of aquarium until we find the source of this crazy algae growth.

 

[DRZL]

That is for a tank under normal conditions, this green explosion is a living phyto bloom not residual algae

u have a wet/dry? when did u post that? is it full of bio balls?

chris5 - The green tint in your tank is dissolved algae. Skimmers work by taking out dissolved algae and bacteria. Here is a link to an article by Dr. Randy about Protein Skimming: How It Works (although the link isn't working for me right now). Since you have that green tint your skimmer should be pulling out a lot of stuff. If its not, then the skimmer is either not working properly or its not a good skimmer. Once you have a skimmer working well for your tank size you won't have to worry about all the other filters.


If you can't keep corals or snails it sounds like you have a copper issue. Low levels of copper are deadly to inverts (corals and snail)s but fine for fish. Copper is a common fish treatment for ich, a parasite. You can read more about it here. The problem with copper is it binds to sand and liverock. Once that happens, if you put that rock into a tank without copper it can be released and bound to other rocks and sand. To see if it is really copper or not, I would get a salifert copper test kit (not seachem they have been giving out bad batches recently) and just test the water. If it comes up postive for copper you can either try to treat the sand and rock or throw it away. If you really can't keep inverts I would test for copper before doing anything else with the rocks.

 

[DRZL]

Instead of getting a canister filter or using a bio-wheel which will lead to excess nitrates that will fuel the algae growth. Maybe you should look into getting a better skimmer. Spykes did are really nice mod to one of the cheap coralife skimmers or maybe you could look into the asm's. I just hope you don't spend more money in vain. A good skimmer should have no problem clearing a green tank.

I agree there is no need for unnecessary canister filters (nitrate traps). This is time to figure out the problem not go old school, no offense

 

[kimoyo]

Corals died awhile ago due to what i believe was a deep sand bed issue (hydogen sulfate) so i cleaned the tank out of all the sand and water and did new sand and water about 4 days ago up until that point no inverts or corals lived....Now with new sand and water corals are thriving but havent tried putting inverts in yet....green tint still trying to surface around tank....making the water cloudy....

Thats cool. If the corals are fine, the snails should be also. I'm glad your keeping inverts again. I just thought hydrogen sulfide was deadly to fish also. If it wasn't that and you start having problems in the future I would just check for copper. You could have cleaned a lot of the copper out of the system with the water changes also.

 

[DRZL]

BTW what skimmer are u using?

 

[Josh]

I know most people don't like canister filters, but this is temporary measure, something to take the load out while he has no other filtration.

Say all you want about canisters, but with dilligence and fresh media they are fine for this tank. He doesn't have any corals. He can add a decent skimmer once he finds out what is causing the problem. As far as we know, it could be the skimmer itself.

Right now, IMO the wet/dry (big nono) and the photoperiod are suspect. If not the cause, they are not helping the situation.