ive lost the hair algea battle

[nanoman123]

im in a hair algea battle, and sorry but, i give up. now, i do have an idea though, that i think is pretty good.

i will buy a seperate 10 gal tank. in it i will have

1 bag of LS

and ill put in all of the LR from my current tank now. i have a spare light i can use on it why its cycling. for the tank watre ill fill up the tank 1/4 with my current tank water, and then use distiled watter with IO salt. im buying a CPR backpak from my friend for filteratoin, along with my powerhead, and penguin mini. ill let it cycle until all ammonia surges and spikes are done and all levels are perfect, then i can slowly add my fish and corals over the course of a month. does this sound good?

i htink i might like it better anyway. ic an re-aquascape, and now ill have live sand. im getting sick of the crushed coral look.

~Matt~

[cich1]

sounds like you have a plan but unless you learn whats causing the problem in your current tank whats to prevent you from having the same problem in the new tank

[nanoman123]

yes but in the new tank, i can catch it before it gets too the point where i cant stop it. by the time i got in the cleaning crew, there was too much. i also figured out the problem. iw as using tap water until after it got relly bad, and i realized that tap water was not the thing to use. also, i just upgraded from a 32 watt light to a 80 watt light.

[upstoday]

Crushed coral is now seen as being a big contributor of phosphates in the tank, no?

That might be one of the things causing the algae. I think switching to sand is much better.

[nanoman123]

yea i thought the same thing. i also personally think sand looks better too.

[upstoday]

And I think its better for the fish also, I thought I heard somewhere that the fish will sometimes scracth themselves on the CC.

[nanoman123]

yea ive haerd that too

[MikeS]

yes but in the new tank, i can catch it before it gets too the point where i cant stop it.

Maybe, maybe not....

Don't give up the fight yet. You can beat the algae. :-D

Moving your stuff to a new tank IMO may be nothing more than a temporary solution to a permanent problem. A certain set of circumstances led up to the outbreak, what's to say the same thing won't happen in the new tank?

99% of the time, microalgae outbreaks are caused by excess nutrients, namely nitrates and more importantly, phosphates. Although a change in lighting, like old bulbs or newer more intesne bulbs can help fuel algae, the main culprit is still almost always nutrients.

Getting rid of the algae is just a matter of starving it to death. The first step is to export as much of it as you can out of the tank by manually removing the algae. There is a considerable amount of nutrients tied up in the algae, simply removing as much as possible every few days is a great means of export.

Limit what goes into the tank by means of using RO/DI water, not overfeeding, ect. Use carbon, skimming, water changes, and phosphate removing filter media (most recommend iron based brands like phosBan). The use of kalkwasser will also help improve skimmer efficiancy and help reduce phosphates.

The important thing to remember is that this does not happen overnight. It usually takes weeks or even a month or more to beat a bad outbreak. But it can be done. I've been keeping marine tanks for almost two decades now, and I've battled some pretty nasty algae and cyano problems. But they can all be beat, it just takes paitence...

Hang in there.... :-D

Mike

[nanoman123]

i did what you said, and i didnt give up :)


read the results of my actions in my thread entitled "hair algea goes or tank does" in the 911 HELP ASAP section.