3 Months In And The Algae Is Still Driving Me Nuts
So the tank is now three months+ old and the corals (except the zoas) are growing like weeds. :) The hammers, the frogspawn, the Elegance coral, the clam, the Duncan, the mushrooms and the Gonis (except the dreaded death Goni from hell), the fungi, slipper coral and so on are all growing really well and very happy. Half my zoas simply don't grow, melt and disappear and I still have no idea why. I am the zoa grim reaper I think .
The fish (Foxface, blue tang, 2 x clowns, 4 PJ cardinals and the blue/green chromis are all very happy and healthy. One of the clowns (both cute little misbars) has grown more than the other so I suspect that's going to be my female. They're not hosting in anything yet though. Still little tackers still.
The two redline shrimps still consider themselves kings of their domain and continue to moult once every 3 weeks or so. They are both near on 3" long already! The three peppermint shrimps have found their permanent homes in the rocks and are doing well. The last of the red handed shrimps that I caught myself last summer are still growing like weed with the biggest one now about 2" long!
The two storm snails cruise the tank relentlessly cleaning up but I notice they leave this strange "poop" behind them which is a sort of gelatinous roll of sand about the same size as they are. The two big trochus snails continue to cruise the back wall and rocks eating algae and they do a sensational job actually. The back wall is now algae free. Interestingly, they NEVER cruise the side or front glass, only the back wall. The remaining snails are helping to battle the algae. The nassurius snails have started laying eggs again and this is the first time since I transferred them from the seahorse tank so they're obviously feeling settled again now.
Have been gently dosing with Randy's recipe and this week got the all, calcium and Mg to spot on levels so am happy with that.
NSW top ups are going great guns so I'll be sticking with that instead of ASW from here on in.
However, the dreaded algae war continues. It is is getting better but soooooooooooo slowly. The sandbed still grows a lawn within four days. This algae is defiantly a light feeder as it doesn't grow on the sand under the rocks where the shade is. However, there seems to be a different sort of algae growing on the rocks because that only grows in the shade. Additionally I still have a crop of GHA growing in the sump which I clear out once a week. Phosphates are reading as zero on the Hanna egg and nitrates are also reading zero o the Salifert tests. So this dam algae is still doing my head in but I am bouyed a little because I do think its nowhere near as bad as it was but just dam persistent.
I think my plan of campaign at this point is to add a lot more trochus, turbo etc snails to help shift the algae and add some more nassurius snails to eat the additional snail poop that will be generated. I have nowhere near enough snails. I had enough for the seahorse tank but that is 1/3 the size of this tank so I obviously need lots more. Buying additional snails was something that got missed in my planning it seems!
The fish (Foxface, blue tang, 2 x clowns, 4 PJ cardinals and the blue/green chromis are all very happy and healthy. One of the clowns (both cute little misbars) has grown more than the other so I suspect that's going to be my female. They're not hosting in anything yet though. Still little tackers still.
The two redline shrimps still consider themselves kings of their domain and continue to moult once every 3 weeks or so. They are both near on 3" long already! The three peppermint shrimps have found their permanent homes in the rocks and are doing well. The last of the red handed shrimps that I caught myself last summer are still growing like weed with the biggest one now about 2" long!
The two storm snails cruise the tank relentlessly cleaning up but I notice they leave this strange "poop" behind them which is a sort of gelatinous roll of sand about the same size as they are. The two big trochus snails continue to cruise the back wall and rocks eating algae and they do a sensational job actually. The back wall is now algae free. Interestingly, they NEVER cruise the side or front glass, only the back wall. The remaining snails are helping to battle the algae. The nassurius snails have started laying eggs again and this is the first time since I transferred them from the seahorse tank so they're obviously feeling settled again now.
Have been gently dosing with Randy's recipe and this week got the all, calcium and Mg to spot on levels so am happy with that.
NSW top ups are going great guns so I'll be sticking with that instead of ASW from here on in.
However, the dreaded algae war continues. It is is getting better but soooooooooooo slowly. The sandbed still grows a lawn within four days. This algae is defiantly a light feeder as it doesn't grow on the sand under the rocks where the shade is. However, there seems to be a different sort of algae growing on the rocks because that only grows in the shade. Additionally I still have a crop of GHA growing in the sump which I clear out once a week. Phosphates are reading as zero on the Hanna egg and nitrates are also reading zero o the Salifert tests. So this dam algae is still doing my head in but I am bouyed a little because I do think its nowhere near as bad as it was but just dam persistent.
I think my plan of campaign at this point is to add a lot more trochus, turbo etc snails to help shift the algae and add some more nassurius snails to eat the additional snail poop that will be generated. I have nowhere near enough snails. I had enough for the seahorse tank but that is 1/3 the size of this tank so I obviously need lots more. Buying additional snails was something that got missed in my planning it seems!