pico reef pest algae problem challenge

[pscott99]

6. Shrimp

[brandon429]

Ha! Yes the Lysmata genus nice one, they are wimps

[brandon429]

This is cool!!

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showth...1#post20230479

Look at the bottom pictures. Rocks absolutely covered in mixed algae communities, invasive macro algae even in the presence of excellent clean up crews ranging in the millions. I would expect Cayman Island water to test somewhat better on a hanna meter than we get in our tanks.

I find it patently amazing what we consider a wrecked tank is actually exactly what nature looks like.

[thebanker]

Very true. Having just gotten back from snorkeling the north shore of Oahu I have to agree. Macroalgae everywhere. It's just the way nature is. It is amazing that we can get our tanks so clean.

[adnup]

Originally Posted by adnup

Ok I'm dealing with Bryopsis in a newly cycled tank. The rocks were soaked in muratic acid 6 months ago. Sand was rinsed and dried. The rocks are placed "perfectly" in the tank and stuck together with aquamend so I do not want to remove them. I have been dosing Tech M for a couple of weeks now with little change.
Btw it's a 120 with no fish or corals (all in a 40 breeder) only a couple of crabs and some nassarius and Cerith snails

I plan on doing the in tank 1ml per gallon. Question is how many days of dosing?

Ok update:
3 weeks and I dosed a total of 32oz of peroxide with some improvement. About 4 days ago I hooked up a reactor with some GFO. Wow instantly made a difference. The algae got a lot lighter, almost white.
After thinking about having 0 phosphates. I realized that I never treated the sand so the PO4 leached from the sand into the rocks. Oh well, I did a 60 gallon water change today and we'll see how it goes. I'll post pics once I get the canopy back on

[adnup]

Originally Posted by adnup

Ok update:
3 weeks and I dosed a total of 32oz of peroxide with some improvement. About 4 days ago I hooked up a reactor with some GFO. Wow instantly made a difference. The algae got a lot lighter, almost white.
After thinking about having 0 phosphates. I realized that I never treated the sand so the PO4 leached from the sand into the rocks. Oh well, I did a 60 gallon water change today and we'll see how it goes. I'll post pics once I get the canopy back on

Pics from iPad so not the best

[nebraskareef]

My 180 that's just recently been setup has gotten bryopsis from a seed rock. It's quickly going crazy over the lighted portion of the tank. It's on the overflows and the glass - Can I dose directly? I have no livestock.

[adnup]

Originally Posted by nebraskareef

My 180 that's just recently been setup has gotten bryopsis from a seed rock. It's quickly going crazy over the lighted portion of the tank. It's on the overflows and the glass - Can I dose directly? I have no livestock.

That's what I did. Started out with 3ml per then just started dumping it in. The bryopsis got much lighter in color but it wasn't until I ran the GFO that I saw a huge difference. A couple of days after my above pic I got in there with a tooth brush and it all brushed away. Here we are 11 days later and no regrowth I've even started adding some corals

[adnup]

Look mom no bryopsis!! Coraline starting to get going now too.

[brandon429]

Adnup thank you for -striking- before and after pics. May I have permission to repost those, with credit, on other peroxide threads

[adnup]

Originally Posted by brandon429

Adnup thank you for -striking- before and after pics. May I have permission to repost those, with credit, on other peroxide threads

Yes please do. It worked great!

[nebraskareef]

Originally Posted by adnup

That's what I did. Started out with 3ml per then just started dumping it in. The bryopsis got much lighter in color but it wasn't until I ran the GFO that I saw a huge difference. A couple of days after my above pic I got in there with a tooth brush and it all brushed away. Here we are 11 days later and no regrowth I've even started adding some corals

I was hoping you would share your experience, I actually found this thread from your original post.

I didn't measure a thing. I just had my wife bring home 3 bottles - I didn't realize there was nearly 1000ML's in a bottle. I didn't measure as there is nothing living in the tank but marco rock. I dosed last night, I will try to wait until tomorrow to dose again.

I appreciate your feedback and will plan to get some GFO online soon. No FTS, but I grabbed a couple from my phone. It's really bad in person, some 6" long....

[brandon429]

Did you grab some before pics ~
Your cycle info is helpful to know since you overdosed, those against peroxide use in the tank are just certain a slight overdose is antibiotic

its not


Nebraska if you have fed your reef or maintained life in it/no ammonia since the overdose that is helpful proof this stuff isn't nuclear/mega risky. People online against it, in recent posts, have taken up cause recently to say we are harming things in our tank.

Mine has never looked better and i'm all 35% now...in a gallon sps reef.
Also, I wish Napi Napoli would update, his tank was a challenge.

[nebraskareef]

Ill grab some updated pictures this weekend but in short.....this works for real. I haven't lost anything live in the tank, albiet only zoas and pods but its something.

I'm putting in a fish order this week and won't hesitate to put them in my "overdosed" tank. Lol people can say what they want but i am a believer .

[5ergio]

Do you know about vodka dosification to control and eradication algae?

[brandon429]

Sure its a common method. I have no problem with it, the only reason I don't use it is direct kill seems easier, if someone recommended carbon dosing/vodka i'm fine with that.

It works by boosting bacteria colonies said to increase fixation of excess nutrients. Its taking a community that exists in a smaller mass in tanks where the total carbon addition is daily feeding, and boosting them to larger masses with the intention of binding n and p better than with natural balances(more carbon input sequesters more nitrogen and phosphorous via bacterial mass). Its cool science i'm for it if someone likes it.

Id contrast direct kill options with prevention methods like carbon dosing/phosphate binders like gfo by saying direct kill methodologies allow you to work within the realm of average nutrient measures instead of constantly striving for perfect params. Both methods can suffer from overdose and threads exist on both sides of the equation revealing similar tank stresses (both overdoing peroxide and gfo/vodka dosing can bleach corals for example)


I'll stake a claim to this-
Peroxide dosing is no more legitimate or ill-legitimate than carbon dosing, using binding media, sulfur based nitrate reducers, bio beads etc

These are all part of what I call the new wave of algae control, post 2000's. In the 2000's it was dsb and refugia

Like there are masters of different musical instruments, each of these methodologies has purveyors who wield them particularly well. This is the thread for prodigy peroxide ticklers.

[Aquaman101]

Brandon429, what is the latest recommendation for a full tank application? You've seen my other post regarding a 10 blackout. I've tried the 1ml per 10 gallon trick before to get rid of Dino's and it didn't work for me. Shall I double it? I have sps, lps, softies and clams in my tank. I can't take the rocks out unfortunately

[brandon429]

Excellent! a true challenge.

You have more coral to worry about compared to that really bad red cyano thread where we can just burn it out

But that's the heart of the challenge, max results under constraints thanks for posting

Can you post a full tank shot, critical detail is found in them.

Also, was the bottle a new/unopened bottle of 3% peroxide from a pharmacy or grocery store, no where else? I say it like that because twice now the poster said it was a new bottle and after pages of analysis it turned out it might have been opened before, they didn't think it was really that important to have a new bottle.

We need to do two things along with your updated full tank shot

-not just broadcast dose the tank, take the amount you are using and spot inject it underwater right on the Dino strand test group of your choosing, with pumps turned off to maximize contact time

I found ways of maximizing the dose being used before upping the dosage, using a new bottle and changing the application approach to a submerged spot treatment test with pumps off for a few minutes.

Ideally, get a true medical syringe and needle for injecting if you can. Drug abusers have ruined our ability to get these for such legitimate science use...most places won't sell but some will.

There are new tools that are -great-for peroxide injection, thirty bucks, google
'Julian Sprungs thing coral feeder'

Direct contact time, even if briefly underwater with no current, massively boosts the effectiveness of an initial known safe dose you have already tried


If a new spot test shows quick rebound, or no effect, we have other choices and one involves upping the dosage or the percentage of peroxide.

The best way is to get a pic, spot test using this method until we see dieoff begin and then ironically stop dosing.

Don't keep pumping in the max safe dose we can see will elicit a reaction in the target; you stop dosing when an effect can be measured/seen and take time to manually clean/remove/siphon all the Dino out of your tank one last time

Now you know the preventative dose and you inject that amount now generally into the tank a few times to hit any regrowths in hiding, or if you see a new patch arise after this last thorough manual removal.

Based on full tank shot pics, that's what i'm about to recommend

[laugh]

My tank is just over 1 year old. GHA is finally dying back but I am starting to get lots of green and red bubble algae and some bryopsis. Some of my rocks are just too large and epoxied together to remove. I was considering doing some in tank spot treatments but I have a blood shrimp, crocea clam, fromia star, and RBTA . The tank is a 35 hex so it wouldn't be to difficult to drain most of the water for treatment.

[Ohiomom]

Laugh I'll "hold" everything for you.. seriously though it does work but would be worried about some of your stuff..

[brandon429]

Wow you have all the sensitives!! We're pretty spoiled so far in that a huge portion of our dose tanks had only 1 or none... Before you get started let's brainstorm I say

The algae you describe is treatable with peroxide so that's a plus, of course with these sensitives in mind. If you can contact peroxide on it, those invaders will die it won't be a waste of time.

Can we see a full tank shot just to get a guess? There is not any problem in using non peroxide approaches if we can't find some way, we are mindful of your inverts...

Those inverts aren't immediately killed by brief emersion, so is any of the target up high where you can lift out a rock for an external treatment or guided by Murphys law like I assume they are all buried within a complex rock structure down lo

Lol

[brandon429]

I still cruise weekly the big peroxide threads online for details/recurrences, info to transmit to our threads here and at nano reef

Threads bigger than this one can be found on r 2 r and Manhattan reefs for examples of threads where my heavy bias is not there or at least flooding the posts...I have seen posters claim both Lysmatas and clams and rbta's were successfully treated by an in-tank variation, a low dose

There are multiple posts about it, but there are more posts of stress/loss than success so that's where the list of 6 (so far) originates, from collected and repeating online anecdotes.

The wet paper towel technique, laid over a target while tank is drained, has shown effective at spot delivery and runoff prevention. Still just brainstorming

Its nice we have time to contemplate using or not using it before taking action.

[brandon429]

One of the challenges with an online reference thread are the incompletes...we would be greatly benefited in having the neomeris updates started a few pages ago, napoli's tough tough green rock issue and aquamans Dino update.

I enjoy starting any new challenge but without those updates a very critical portion of data is missing

I would estimate between here and nano reef there are 30+ pm tanks who never followed up as well. Its predictable if they had trouble we'd still be in contact...but those update pics, without them this thread is useless. Pics are the closest thing to proof we can get, testimonies don't mean much to the skeptics (pics don't either for permaskeptics but with enough, for long enough, they'll have to change slowly)

To track long term results, the only way to win skeptics, we must have at least a first update! Ohiomom's update was the critical first that got us rolling here with pics

[laugh]

I will work on a full tank shot this weekend. The clam can be removed, as he is attached nicely to a 6x6 rock that is seperate from my main rock structure. He has some bubble algae on his shell. I believe I can get to most of the problem areas by draining the tank and or removing rock to treat outside of the tank. My concern with the fromia is his diet is believed to consist solely of micro film algae. So complete irradication of this would be bad. So I really dont want to dose my entire tank. Also my tank is very full of frags. Last count I believe was around 75. Not bad eh? Nearly two frags per gallon!

[brandon429]

That's excellent, I like to pack pico reefs like that but the $ and patience to do that in a large tank makes me enjoy looking at all these big tanks someone else is working! I hate not ever getting to own fish or a mature crocea that part of ultra micro pico reefing stinks.