I have some Algea Problems...

Brief description of the problem.
Well for the past few weeks I have started to see A LOT of green algea grow all over the glass inside my tank and the sand. I clean it and its back within a few(overnight) hours. I have also started to see this reddish type of algea start to grow on some rock and sand as well. There are also a bunch of air bubbles trapped everywhere...

A picture(s) will also help.












PARAMETERS (important)
Temperature:78-80
PH:8.2
Ammonia:0 ppm
Nitrite:0 ppm
Nitrate:0 ppm
Salinity: 1.025
dKH/KH/Alkalinity: 14.7 dKH
Magnesium: 1500 mg
Calcium: 500 mg
Phosphate: 0-0.1 mg

Tank size? 20 Gallon High
Estimated total system? About 17 gallons of water

Reef, fish only or, freshwater? Reef

Current inhabitants? What and how many? look at signature
Clean up crew? look at signature

How long has your tank been set-up? August 13th, 2008

Substrate.
Type? Fine Sand
Depth? about 1 inch

Live rock? Yes
How much? about 30 lbs
Did you recently add some? Nope

Filtration.
Type? Penguin 200 with carbon and a tbs of phosphate removing media
Protein skimmer? Taam rio nano skimmer
Do you wet or dry skim? wet
Maintenance schedule for filtration? monthly changed
Drilled tank/hang on back overflow? N/A
Sump/refugium. What's in it and how much? N/A
Macro? What kind?

Lighting.
Lighting type? 130 Watt compact (actinics 03 for 15 hours and 10k for 11-12
Age of bulbs? about 2 months old

Feeding
What? Pellets, Flakes, frozen mysis shrimp,frozen prime reef, frozen brine shrimp plus, cyclopeeze
How much? just a small pinch
How often? once daily (in the morning). I alternate between frozen and dried everyday. Also like every 3 days or so I feed some cyclopeeze in the afternoon


Water change schedule.
How much? None
How often? Never
What salt brand? I have some Instant ocean
Water source? I have recently(past 2 weeks) been getting it from Publix vending machine (it says it doescarbon, uv, RO, carbon, then UV again)

Additives/supplements used? I use epsom salts for Mg, have calcium I got from Roger(Tangster) at ATT, I also have purple up, and Reef Plus (which I think I have used once)

Do you have a ground probe? Nope
What kind of flow does your tank have? 2 Koralia #1

Any additional info you would like to share.... Including anything different that you have done/not done.

Let's get to the bottom of this. Any of the above info that is questionable to you is pertinent to keeping a happy/healthy tank/wallet.

 

One of my thoughts are I wouldn't keep the lights on for that long of a time. Maybe I'm wrong but that's just me.

 

I would imagine with the amount of algae and the type, you are still going through the "new tank" Algae.
Reading zero Nitrates and phosphates just means your algae is consuming it there fore you do not read any.
I would start performing 10% water changes per week on the system.

the bubbles in your sand is the nitrogen gas escaping. this is a good thing and normal in a system that age.

you also have cyano bacteria (the Red slime) this will take longer to rid your tank of but can be done with less feeding and water changes.

J

 

I think that this is what is causing the problem, I used to buy my RO/DI water from the LFS. I will go get some tomorrow and do a 10% water chagne and see what happens from there...

 

1. Too much lighting! Cut down to 12 actinic and 10 daylight

2. No water changes!!!! You need to do water changes, especially in a 20 (nano). Waterchanges in a nano tank is vital!!! Bad things happen fast in that small amount of water. I RELIGIOUSLY change at least 10% weekly!! Sometimes twice weekly. You need to replace trace elements in the water. Your coral will love it. +1 on LFS water.. best bet is to make your own! You can actually get a DI unit if your strapped for cash at Pet Supplies, Dog Supplies, Cat Supplies, Pet Meds & Pet Products for 39.99.. at least do that. I've gotten bad LFS water, and had hair algae breakout.. 2 turbo snails cleaned out the tank in two days.

3. Turbo snails.. 3-4..

4. did I mention water changes.. no really... do it! Good luck!

5. Kalk drip.. I drip 24 oz. 2 times a week. It will precipitate your phosphates starving the algae and make available calcium for you corals and mostly coraline to steal, and compete for space with your nuisance algae. Also get a better protein skimmer.. I'd say the AquaC remora or Octopus bh100. $100-160 new.

 

I agree with aqualung about the lighting, in my 14 gal Biocube I would run the actinic (if separate) for 2 hours first, then my daylight come on for 8 hours and the actinic go 2 hours after daylight go off for a total of 12 hours of light. So, a little different but close.
I would add a phosphate reactor and run Pura Phoslock. If tank is near a window that will need to be addressed. Eliminate the flake and pellets for now and cut back on amount. In that size tank, water change should be done at least bi-weekly of 30%.

 

P04 reactor, lights are on a little to long, slow down on the feeding, switch to a better water supplier or get yourself a ro/di unit, and filtration seems to be lacking a little so bi-weekly water changes of 4-5 gallons will help a lot

 

Ok, I am plain and simple tired of this red algea(cyanobacteria) problem I have. I was able to get rid of the green algea with a small buffer adjustment. But this red algea stuff does not go away. I tried turning the lights off for one day and it seem to have killed a lot of it but it just came back in a day or so and the fish seemed to be abit stressed from no light. So I decided to use a more aggresice technique and I ended up purchasing some ChemiClean.

Well the first time I used it I took out as much of the red algea by hand as I could and left the lights on as normal (actinics for 11 hours and 10k for 8) for the next 48 hours there was no cardon/phosphate remocing media or skimmer on, just powerheads, coiled denitrator, air stone and lights. But duringthe 48 hours I saw zero improvement in the red algea, it just kept growing. So after the 48 hours of treatment I did a 4 gallon water change which is just over 20% of the water in my tank. I then waited a few more days to try the treatment again or hope for some algea to disapear but nothing.

So on the next trreatment I decied to go lights out and see what happened. I left the lights off on entire day and saw that most of hte red algea had died, so I proceded to treat the tank once again for a second time with chemiclean. Did the excat as above but left the lights of for a total of 3 days(the day before I dosed with chemiclean and thenext 48 hours thereafter). Well to my sight the tank was about 99% clean of the red stuff, but literally less than 2 hours after light came on and after while I was performing the 4 gallon water chagne again there was red stuff everywhere. Below are pictures that were taken just 6 hours after lights came on:


















Moreover, Here are my water parameters for today:
Ammonia 0 ppm
Nitrtite 0 ppm
Nitrate 0 ppm
ph 8.2
Salinity 1.024
Temperature 78-80
dKH 13.6
Magnesium 1425
Calcium 460
Phophates 0.5-1.0 ppm ( This is what right now I am seeing is the problem, but this might be so high because of the days that the tank was without the phosphate removing media...)
*** My tank inhabitants and equipment is listed in my signature*** I have also only been using RO water from LFS.

BTW thanks to all who read and Happy New Year to ALL!!!!!!!!!

All my corals are doing well, all my shrooms have split and zoas are growing new polyps, kenya tree was fragged, candy cane just grew a new mouth, so did the ricordia, and the frogspawn is growing new baby heads.

 

more current on the red slime that worked well for me