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Too much algie (1 Viewer)

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jesusq

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I've had my tank for almost a year. Currently have a six T5 48" lighting, a reef octopus skimmer and am using GFO and Carbon reactor for filtration, I also have two refugium one on back and one on the sump.

In the last few weeks, nothing has changed, but am getting a large amount of brown and green algie. I would think the refugium algie would compete, but it's actually working the opposite, the algie on the refugium are dying off. I've checked the levels, and everything is on acceptable levels, I've cut back on the lighting, and have reduced the amount of frozen and pebbles I'm feeding the tank.

How can I troubleshoot this all of a sudden algae problem?
 

webster1234

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Something is out of whack. The first thing to look at are your nitrate and phosphate levels. Those are what feeds the algae. Then you need to address the cause of the excess nutrients. I had a similar issue and determined my skimmer wasn't dialed in properly and I had too much flow through my sump. Once I got that straightened out, the algae quit growing, but wasn't going away. What was dying off was feeding what was still there. The only way to finally get rid of it was to create a nutrient imbalance, meaning I needed more bacteria consuming nutrients than algae producing them. I used a product called Start-smart Complete which just a bacteria that competes for the same nutrients that fuels the algae. I chose it because it is all natural and you are not adding chemicals to your tank. I know others will have their own ideas about how to get rid of algae, but if I showed you a before and after of my tank, you wouldn't believe it. In fact this product is so good, I dose it with every water change and I have absolutely no algae. I have over 50 fish and feed 3x daily and still no algae. The only additional filtration I run is carbon and Poly-filter. Getting rid of algae the right way will take time though. Expect it to take at least 2 months. It took a while for things to get this bad, so it only makes sense that it should take a while to fix it. Don't go too fast and disrupt the balance of your tank or you could have bigger problems.
 

webster1234

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My nitrates run around 10 ppm, phosphates around .05. My tank is 400g and I have many different sizes of fish. I have a several tangs that are 6-8", several more that are 5", a 7" trigger, and about 30 anthias, clowns, dottybacks, etc that are about 3-4". I have quite a bit of bio load and found that the key to nutrient removal is excess skimming. I skim kind of wet so I pull out almost a gallon of skimmate (tea colored, not coffee colored) every day. But when I don't, I can tell it is stressing the tank as the algae starts to get on the glass and my LPS's don't look as happy.
 

Reefkeeper

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You only have the t5's over that tank ... Interesting with those levels that you have algae, something is feeding the algae, what is the flow rate through the sump? What type of flow with power-head in the tank? How big is the sump.... With that amount of livestock you would need some serious amount of macro.... With those levels I'm perplexed...are you getting sunlight on the tank during the day... ? Any missing fish ..... Skimming wet is fine , but this to me is a bandaid. You might want to consider some sort of mechanical filtration to help with nutrients... If your water looks yellow or thick Use some macrbactor 7 or zeo reef snow FJW has both in stock... Will solve immediate issue but as before you might want to consider A longer term solution. Assume you have the live rock for bio filter? 400 lb ?
 
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webster1234

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You only have the t5's over that tank ... Interesting with those levels that you have algae, something is feeding the algae, what is the flow rate through the sump? What type of flow with power-head in the tank? How big is the sump.... With that amount of livestock you would need some serious amount of macro.... With those levels I'm perplexed...are you getting sunlight on the tank during the day... ? Any missing fish ..... Skimming wet is fine , but this to me is a bandaid. You might want to consider some sort of mechanical filtration to help with nutrients... If your water looks yellow or thick Use some macrbactor 7 or zeo reef snow FJW has both in stock... Will solve immediate issue but as before you might want to consider A longer term solution. Assume you have the live rock for bio filter? 400 lb ?
I think you are confusing my response to his asking about my tank with his original post. I don't have an algae problem. He does and he hasn't posting anything about his tank yet.
 
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