+C Lo Slice Posted January 2, 2012 Share Posted January 2, 2012 My wife HAD to spend 9 days in Dallas visiting family over the holidays. I didn't have the option of staying home. She also doesn't trust anyone in our home that we don't know, so hiring someone for tank maintenance was out of the question. I had everything on auto-pilot while we were gone, except ATO. This is what I came home to last night. Second pic is my $90 Sunny D frag. I'm hoping after suctioning the GHA and cyano off, I can find a living polyp. At least all the fish are alive. Time for some MAJOR tank cleaning! Lesson learned... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
(Bio)³ Posted January 2, 2012 Share Posted January 2, 2012 Omg this looks like my thanksgiving day disaster. A couple elephant slugs/limpets paired with only 4 hours a day lighting plus reduced feeding and its clearing up for me just now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robb in Austin Posted January 2, 2012 Share Posted January 2, 2012 Wow! Are your inverts still alive? A massive outbreak would have to be caused by a die off of some type. I can't imagine how 9 days of no maintenance caused this. Temp drop? Too much sunlight? Just for future reference, I like to do a nice WC and skimmer cleaning a day or two before I leave town. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaJohn Posted January 2, 2012 Share Posted January 2, 2012 autotopoff.com and a bucket = priceless Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+C Lo Slice Posted January 2, 2012 Author Share Posted January 2, 2012 Wow! Are your inverts still alive? A massive outbreak would have to be caused by a die off of some type. I can't imagine how 9 days of no maintenance caused this. Temp drop? Too much sunlight? Just for future reference, I like to do a nice WC and skimmer cleaning a day or two before I leave town. It looks like the only thing that died while I was away was a Red Footed Moon Snail. I had GHA issues before I left, but it has never been THIS bad. Temp was fine; I had a heater installed. No sunlight, just my 4-bulb T5 fixture which is on a timer. I did a 10 gallon WC (60 gallon tank) and cleaned the skimmer about an hour before leaving on the 23rd. I'm assuming the outbreak was due to lack of control while I was away. I typically do two 5 gallon WCs a week in order to keep GHA under control. I pick off as much as I can while I siphon with a 1/4" airline tubing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post pbnj Posted January 2, 2012 Popular Post Share Posted January 2, 2012 Wife With Guilt = New, Big Tank For You....it's a proven formula! 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robb in Austin Posted January 2, 2012 Share Posted January 2, 2012 If you were fighting GHA before the trip, the outbreak makes sense. Your initial post made it sound like it was fine before the trip. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+etannert Posted January 2, 2012 Share Posted January 2, 2012 How long have you been doing this 5g x 2 times a week water change routine? In a 60g tank with sufficient live rock (which you seem to have), a skimmer, and RODI water, that seems excessive unless the tank is super heavily stocked (which it doesn't seem to be). Have you tried running GFO? How old are your bulbs? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robb in Austin Posted January 2, 2012 Share Posted January 2, 2012 +1 to ^ That said, I think that the GHA/cyano outbreak most tanks seem to have is a part of the normal tank algae cycle and will pass eventually. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+C Lo Slice Posted January 2, 2012 Author Share Posted January 2, 2012 If you were fighting GHA before the trip, the outbreak makes sense. Your initial post made it sound like it was fine before the trip. My apologies. I have posted a ton of problems with my GHA and I assumed the majority of people here knew about it. But, I guess you know what they say about when you assume... How long have you been doing this 5g x 2 times a week water change routine? In a 60g tank with sufficient live rock (which you seem to have), a skimmer, and RODI water, that seems excessive unless the tank is super heavily stocked (which it doesn't seem to be). Have you tried running GFO? How old are your bulbs? I have been doing this since about mid-late August. My 60g has ~120-130 lbs of LR. I just added a skimmer a month ago, and I have a RODI unit installed that I use for my top-off and WCs. You are correct in that my tank is not super heavily stocked. But since August, I have had GHA issues. I bought a Sea Hare a couple months ago, he did his job, and I passed him on to one of our sponsors. I'm looking to grab another one and possibly trying to keep it longer, with substitute feedings of nori after the GHA is gone once again. The first time I got rid of the GHA, I did not have my skimmer so I'm hoping for different results this next time around. I have not tried GFO. I had a canister filter on there since the tank's birth in mid-April until about two months ago when it sprung a leak. Since then, no filtration whatsoever other than two powerheads and the month-old skimmer. RCA suggested I had enough LR in my size of tank to be successful without a sump or canister filter. When the canister was running, I did have carbon bags in there. My 4-bulb T5 has not had the bulbs changed since I purchased it, which was probably around mid-to-late May. +1 to ^ That said, I think that the GHA/cyano outbreak most tanks seem to have is a part of the normal tank algae cycle and will pass eventually. I wish that were the case, Robb. As stated above, I have had this issue for about four, going on five, months now. It sure gets tiring and tedious picking all that excess algae off by hand Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robb in Austin Posted January 2, 2012 Share Posted January 2, 2012 I battled mine for about 6 months, then it went away. I did lots of manual removal, GFO/GAC, new lamps, new RODI filters, stopped feeding flake food and it just stopped happening. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+C Lo Slice Posted January 2, 2012 Author Share Posted January 2, 2012 I battled mine for about 6 months, then it went away. I did lots of manual removal, GFO/GAC, new lamps, new RODI filters, stopped feeding flake food and it just stopped happening. That's good to know. I have been researching new bulbs lately, as I want a little more of a blue tint to the tank anyways. I think with my next paycheck, I should be able to afford it. I also do probably need new RODI filters. I don't feed flake; only frozen, which is rinsed well in RODI water and defrosted before actually putting into the tank. I'll look into GFO. Thanks for the advice, buddy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+etannert Posted January 2, 2012 Share Posted January 2, 2012 You can run GFO and carbon passively in an HOB filter such as an AquaClear or even Top Fin. I would agree you have more than enough LR for good biofiltration but it's nice to be able to run filter floss, a carbon bag, and some GFO or whatever you like. The HOB filters are less expensive although they are a little smaller. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timfish Posted January 3, 2012 Share Posted January 3, 2012 I'm in agreement with Robb, a lot (not all) algae problems will resolve themselves on their own as the system matures and animals start growing. Nilsen and Fossa on pages 115 and 163 in thier book "The Modern Coral Reef Aquarium" V1 shows live rock at 6 months totally covered with nuisance algae a lot worse than your pics and again after the conditioning process nicely covered with corals and no algae. They give the conditioning process as taking as long as 300 days. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bimmerzs Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 Ton's of good info so far but how about a slightly different look at the situation. You mentioned added a skimmer but what brand/type of skimmer did you add, not all skimmers are equal, some are more efficient than others and some are not good at all. Your LR...130lbs of liverock is a lot in a 60G tank and once again, not all live rock is created equal, having heavy boulders is not equal to light porous pieces of liverock. The more porous, the greater the surface area for nitrifying bacteria to colonize and efficiently do it's job. Also.... depending on the source of the LR, it could have came from a system that was very high in phosphates for a prolonged period and now the phosphates could be slowly leaching from the LR, helping to fuel the GHA. How's your clean-up crew, a couple of the large mexican turbo's will help keep algae, including hair algae, cyanobacteria and diatoms at bay if it is a maturing issue, hermit's help also as well as Ceriths, nerites and astrae's but I would suggest going light on a cleanup crew so they don't stave once the algea level's decrease. I would make sure your skimmer is skimming efficiently, along with running gfo as suggested. Keep in mind that GHA needs light along with nitrates and phosphates in order to grow and flourish, break the food chain and the GHA goes away. Cheers, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+C Lo Slice Posted January 4, 2012 Author Share Posted January 4, 2012 Ton's of good info so far but how about a slightly different look at the situation. You mentioned added a skimmer but what brand/type of skimmer did you add, not all skimmers are equal, some are more efficient than others and some are not good at all. Your LR...130lbs of liverock is a lot in a 60G tank and once again, not all live rock is created equal, having heavy boulders is not equal to light porous pieces of liverock. The more porous, the greater the surface area for nitrifying bacteria to colonize and efficiently do it's job. Also.... depending on the source of the LR, it could have came from a system that was very high in phosphates for a prolonged period and now the phosphates could be slowly leaching from the LR, helping to fuel the GHA. How's your clean-up crew, a couple of the large mexican turbo's will help keep algae, including hair algae, cyanobacteria and diatoms at bay if it is a maturing issue, hermit's help also as well as Ceriths, nerites and astrae's but I would suggest going light on a cleanup crew so they don't stave once the algea level's decrease. I would make sure your skimmer is skimming efficiently, along with running gfo as suggested. Keep in mind that GHA needs light along with nitrates and phosphates in order to grow and flourish, break the food chain and the GHA goes away. Cheers, The skimmer is an AquaC Remora HOB with Maxi-Jet pump. I know 130 pounds of LR is quite a bit, and I didn't intend on adding that much when setting up the tank. Some of the corals I have bought from other members here were on medium-large rocks so that kinda added to what I already had. The majority of the rock is dense and heavy, with only one piece being fairly porous. Regardless, they are all very large pieces. My initial CUC consisted of the following: 30 Dwarf Ceriths, 17 Florida Ceriths, 9 large Nerites, 7 small-medium Nerites, and 15 assorted Hermits. Those were all added on May 5th, which was 25 days after the tank's initial setup. My tank also has 3 Peppermint Shrimp and a Fire Shrimp. There has been considerable die-off on my CUC over the months and I was actually planning on boosting it back up in the next couple of weeks. Diatoms have been non-existent for a few months now, and the cyano has receded considerably as of late. GHA is my chief concern right now. I assume my skimmer is skimming efficiently, but it's my first one so I don't know how to tell if it is skimming inefficiently. Also, nitrates have never been above 5 and nitrites have never registered on any tests. I don't have a phosphate test, but may see about taking some tank water with me to my LFS on Saturday. Thank you for the help, bimmerzs Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerrickH Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 GHA seems to be the puberty of every tank. GFO + tangs + WC(0 TDS)and mine was history. Cyano on the other hand is the byproduct of a high nutrient count in your column. I would dose this tank with chemiclean, do a 40% WC afterwards, then wet skim and lots of WC. This combined with GFO should take care of it. I will agree with bimmerzs though, that the rock could be leaching out phosphates. With no GFO, WC wont be enough to get it under control. All that said, time will cure it. Once the GHA eats up all the bad stuff in the column it will die as well like most of your CUC did. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robb in Austin Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 GHA seems to be the puberty of every tank. Love it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bimmerzs Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 There has been considerable die-off on my CUC over the months and I was actually planning on boosting it back up in the next couple of weeks. That's not really normal imo over that short period of time. Acclimation, heat, nitrates, ph/alk or salinity swing's can impact this but but probably better discussed in another thread. Cheers, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+C Lo Slice Posted January 4, 2012 Author Share Posted January 4, 2012 There has been considerable die-off on my CUC over the months and I was actually planning on boosting it back up in the next couple of weeks. That's not really normal imo over that short period of time. Acclimation, heat, nitrates, ph/alk or salinity swing's can impact this but but probably better discussed in another thread. Cheers, Acclimation was fine, I would think. Everything survived for at least 6 months, I would say, with an occasional hermit death here and there. My tank is consistent at about 76-77 degrees, nitrates have never registered above 5, and SG is consistent at 1.025, as well as PH at 8.3-8.4. I let alk go down from about 11 to 9, but that was intended as I simply stopped dosing and relied on regular WCs to maintain a level I wanted. It was mainly my dwarf ceriths and some larger hermits that died off. Everything else has been okay. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woods Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 What have you done with your lighting duration? Cutting that by even 30 minutes or an hour can also make a huge difference. Especially combined with other options already listed above. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+C Lo Slice Posted January 5, 2012 Author Share Posted January 5, 2012 What have you done with your lighting duration? Cutting that by even 30 minutes or an hour can also make a huge difference. Especially combined with other options already listed above. Actinics come on around 10 AM every day, give or take 15 minutes before or after. I manually turn on daylights about 30-45 minutes after actinics come on. Lights turn off around 7:30 PM every night, again, give or take 15 minutes before or after. Daylights get manually shut off about 30 minutes before that. The 4 Lunar LEDs are typically always on at night; every now and then I'll turn them off and give the tank complete darkness overnight. About two or three months ago, my wife accidentally busted a mounting leg while trying to help me get something out of the tank, and while waiting for Coralife to send me a replacement, the tank had four complete days of darkness. I thought that would help with GHA, since the thing we were getting out was the Sea Hare that mowed down the GHA. Yet, the GHA has been worse off, if anything, since that time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woods Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 Yeah, your lighting sounds reasonable so nutrients, phosphates or nitrates must be the culprit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+C Lo Slice Posted January 5, 2012 Author Share Posted January 5, 2012 Yeah, your lighting sounds reasonable so nutrients, phosphates or nitrates must be the culprit. I'm convinced it is nutrients, although I have never tested phosphates. I know nitrates are in a reasonable range. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robb in Austin Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 At this point, I wouldn't test for PO4. The GHA is taking it up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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