Red And Slimy Algae Taking Over My Biocube

[bvillalta]

Hey everyone! Forgive me but im still somewhat of a beginner when it comes to water conditions and fixing them. Ive got a bit of aa problem and it annoys the heck out of me. I have this red slime algae thats growing on my live rock and taking over my green star polyps. No matter how much i get rid of them it just grows back immediately after. Now I think the polyps are ruined because they wont open anymore. It seems like its still okay but they just refuse to open. Its starting to grow on the glass and on the sand. I try to change my water about every 2 weeks but lately with my hectic schedule its been about once a month.

Do you think it needs major water changing or any type of sloutions to get rid of this infestation? Anything you can advise me on would be greatly helpful!

BTW - The tank is a 14 gallon biocube and i just replaced the 50/50 bulb about 2 - 3 months ago.

 

[dilbert]

At first, normally are weekly water changes for such a small tank recommended.

My guess is that the water changes alone won't fix the problem but more frequentwater changes could be a first emergency measure.

The tank has simply too much nutrients for algae in there. What are your water parameters? Important is that nitrates and phosphates are as low as possible, preferable zero.

Water changes can fix that, too, but make sure that the new water doesn't have any nitrates or phosphates. RO water I would double-check at least once to see if it's really what it's been promised.

The nutrients come into your tank most probably through (over-)feeding or deacaying animals or plants, sometimes through nitrates and phosphates in water. Our tap water, e.g., has no nitrates but 0.3 ppm phosphates.

There are anti-bacterial "anti red slime" or so additives that I never tried and they surely won't stop a second outbreak later if conditions in the tank don't change.

You can keep on doing what you are doing and stir up the sand and try to remove as much of those cyano bacteria from the tank as the dead stuff will be converted from the nitrying bacteria in the live rock again into nitrates.

Another more durable measure is to raise the water flow as cyanobacteria grow with preference in area of low flow.

Then there are phosphate remover in form of tablets and the like or you use a Chaetomorpha algae ball even free floating in the main tank if a sump or refugium isn't an option. Some people have Chaetos also in a net or in a kind of soap holder in their main tank. This Chaeto algae eats up nitrates and phosphates and stores it, so the cyanobacteria have less food. But Chaeto grow slowly.

And I almost forgot the skimmer.

The buzz word is "nutrition export" but it's somewhat cumbersome in a nano tank.

 

[jeasko]

Agreed with above

Need to increase frequency of water changes and certainly at the moment I would be tempted to possibly do a few water changes in the first week followedby weekly there after, and place a phosphate remover in the filter ie rowaphos or such like and reduce feeding, i currently only feed everyother day a present which makes a difference.

Couple of other things to consider

I take it you are using RO water? tap water can be high in nutrients to start with.
also how long are you lights on for?
and if opossible steer away from chemicals to remove this as it wont help you discover what caused it in the first place.
as for skimmer if you are lacking one it may well be worth investing in one..

 

[Lynden]

Okay, a few myths to dispell here...

Cyanobacteria can fix nitrogen gas as a nutrient source. The result is that they can thrive with zero nutrients present. Even very clean tanks can get cyano problems.

Secondly, they can grow in high flow just as easily as in low flow. They settle easier in low flow, but they won't be stopped by the addition of an extra powerhead. Mine used to grow on the powerhead, blowing like tassles in front of the output.

Antibacteria solutions are a very poor choice as mentioned, since they
1) rarely kill all the cyano
2) often take down your biofilter
3) the large amounts of dead cyano release toxins and nutrients (more cyano)
4) as we hopefully all know, using antibiotics and not killing all the bacteria can create resistant strains.

The only way to "cure" cyanobacteria, in my opinion, is to have competitors. These include corals and true algae.

Lastly, I do not recommend weekly small water changes as they are inefficient. 25% every two weeks is what I recommend.

Edit:
Spotted another myth... nitrates per se are not harmful to most livestock, but they can and do indicate other problems.

 

[@ombomb]

While I appreciate the argument for less frequent, larger water changes, in a tank of that size weekly water changes are more appropriate IMO.

 

[Lynden]

Either is fine really, just larger/less frequent is less efficient.

Either is fine really, just larger/less frequent is more efficient.

Edit:
Bit of conflicting info above (edit acted as another post for some reason)... go with the latter.

 

[@ombomb]

hehe make your mind up

 

[bvillalta]

Thanks so much for all that help guys! I do use RO water along with the saltwater i buy from my LFS. One thing comes to mind when reading all of your reponses. I have never thought to test the water i buy from the LFS. I know how to test the saltwater, but what would i test for in the RO? Another thing that could be causing it is i had a goby die in the tank but cant find it anywhere. Im thinking i may have to remove all the rock and corals and clean them in a seperate tank and also clean out my sand. This way i can find the fish and possible replace the sand. Im thinking start over with new sand?? Do you think this is a good idea or will it harm the livestock if i do something so drastic?

 

[Lynden]

My goby disappeared for about three months, then popped up one day and grabbed some food. Still pretty plump too, so he must have found something to eat.

 

[bvillalta]

My goby disappeared for about three months, then popped up one day and grabbed some food. Still pretty plump too, so he must have found something to eat.

That could be it too! I just havent seen him since i bought it a couple months back.

 

[dilbert]

I would test the RO water simply for nitrates and phosphates. There are also TDS meters to test impurities in general but the lack of nitrates and phosphates is what distinguishes RO water from most tap water.

If you think that this major cleaning action would save the corals it's maybe worth to do it. On the other side, only polys keeping shut doesn't necessarily mean that they are going to die.

With my tank it was always present with a few spots mainly on the glass. When I stretched overfeeding once too much I got a real outbreak but it went somehow magically away by itself. I didn't understand that really. I bought a third powerhead and installed a fourth spare one I had already but my impression was that might have had only a little impact.

The red stuff was mainly on the glass, on the sand, and only on a few pieces of live rock, again magically not at all on the piece of rock where my zoas sit, so I was really lucky.

 

[SkiFletch]

but the lack of nitrates and phosphates is what distinguishes RO water from most tap water.

At the risk of being a stickler for details, this isn't really a great statement. The presence of Nitrate and Phosphate in tapwater is entirely dependent upon the locale. Many areas don't have any nitrate/phosphate in their water supplies. Thus testing "RO" water for them is useless. The best test for RO water by far is a TDS meter. High TDS readings would indicate a failing membrane.

 

[dilbert]

Well, the wording was maybe somewhat sloppy, but when my tapwater doesn't have any measuable nitrates and phosphates and everything else seems ok than I have really to question myself if I want to use RO water if there are no measurable differences. (Probably, RO water will also have 20% silicates less to be fair.)

On the other side, and that was the question and my point, if I would detect nitrates or phosphates in RO water, then is surely something completely wrong with that water. The RO unit might have a failure or the LFS selling RO water must have a mistake. I know an LFS where all sorts of negligence happens and they swap sometimes containers mindlessly, salt up again containers, that were already salted, and it might be quite possible that mistakenly they will give you something completely different than RO water.

This is at least one possibility to rule out with two simple water tests if you are puzzled with a problem you don't have an explanation for. You don't need a TDS meter. You simply check nitrates and phosphates and you can rule out that an error happened witth your RO water.

 

[Lynden]

In my opinion and experience the main reason to avoid tapwater are the impurities we can't test for (easily), such as silicates, fluoride, and the like.

 

[SkiFletch]

In my opinion and experience the main reason to avoid tapwater are the impurities we can't test for (easily), such as silicates, fluoride, and the like.

Amen to that Lynden. And lest we forget copper, sulphates, bromine and ammonia