help, live rock still looks crap!!

ive had live rock in my tank for 4 months now, it's cycled and still has hardly any coraline alge. Ive just bought a metel halide with 2 actanic bulbs in it. Im adding all the right stuff, salt is right, carbinate hardness is fine, calcium is fine, all supplements are being added weekly. Please help!!

 

I've got a tank that's a year old that I started with dead base rock and it's just now starting to get covered in coralline. As you can see, it can take a while for coralline to grow but if your water parameters (alk/ca/mag) are in check, you should start to see some growth within the next few months.

Now, when you say that your water parameters are "fine", can you post what levels they are at?

Also, coralline algae prefers actinic blue light so the addition of metal halides won't help it grow.

Just be patient...it'll come

 

ok is it better to have the actanics on for longer or? with my old lights i had them on for 10 hours, cos ive got these think putting the actancs on for longer than 10 will premote the coraline alge? and the halides on for for 10. Ive done some tests, nitrite 0, carb hard 200ppm, ph 8.2, calcium 450ppm.

 

sorry more to write sorry marine is very new to me, had fresh tropical for 6 years. Sorry if it doesn't make sense....but it seems 'fine' hehe, thank you or your quick reply also. Ive got heaps of questions so if thats cool?

 

Heaps of questions is definitely cool. That's what we're here for

I run my actinics for about 16 hours and my halides for about 12 hours so you might want to extend the time that your actinics are on.

Once the coralline starts to grow, you might notice that it will grow in the lower parts of the tank first, where the light is the "weakest". Eventually, it will cover everything but it starts where the light is the lowest first.

 

the levels that i posted before do they seem right?? so spending heaps more on lights u think will pay off in the long run instead of t8's? I have actually already starting noticing difference!
Also i got some grey colour rock from the beach and i use it as base rock good or bad idea???
cheers guys

 

If you want to speed up the process, get a couple of pieces of live rock with coralline algae on them. Then, get the product called "Purple Up"!!! It will encourage the growth of coralline and the results will rewarding shortly there after! I have used the product in the past with great success!

 

I am a big fan of purple up... That stuff works wonders! LoL the onlly problem I found with purple up is, I dont have much purple/pink coralline. Mine is more burgandy/red. It looks cool, not many people I have seen have it. Makes me feel all fuzzy inside

 

I prefer metal halides so I'm biased when it comes to lighting

You want your dkh at 12 dkh (450-500 meg/l), your calcium at around 450, and your magnesium at 1200-1400 to encourage coralline growth.

Are you currently running a skimmer? What about a UV sterilizer? I ask because running both of these pieces of equipment will work against you when you're trying to grow coralline in a new tank.

 

A combination of lots of patience (my favorite ingrediant) , seeding with a few coraline covered rocks and of course from what I'm told the purple-up does seem to help