Downgrading to a shallow aquarium!

[rdwilson91]

Hello everyone, just in time for Passover, I'm staring a cleaning and declutterring project by downgrading my 29 gallon hell hole to a shallow 20L. I love the look of 20Ls, and even though my tank looks awful, all the the livestock is extremely healthy. I have a couple of SPS that are growing rapidly and a derasa that's doing tremendously better than I expected and has put on about an inch in length the last 4 months.

I have so much more knowledge now than I did when I started my current system. I converted a high-salinity brackish to a full reef, and that was a terrible idea. I'm trading my dwarf fuzzy for a frag at my LFS, and going with a shallow sand bed since my HOB fuge has a DSB. Despite having a fuge, remora, and relatively low bioload (The fuzzy is the lone fish and he's only 2 inches), I still cannot beat the hair algae. I realize now that the reason I have so much HA is that I added sand gradually to a gravel bed, knowing nothing about substrates, and now the trates have no hope but to leach out in abundance, but are soaked up by the HA so it reads 0 ppm.

Anyway, after all of this rambling, my plan is to have a shallow sand bed with 10-15 pounds of fine sand in the display, and the 6" dsb in the fuge, unless someone of superior intelligence tells me I need more. I have about 35 pounds of rock, but I'm only going to transfer the large pieces and leave the rubble behind. In the downgrading process, I'm going to wait about 2 months before I start adding coral to see how things do. I think this downgrade is going to turn out to be a huge upgrade in the future.

Please give me some tips and criticism. I appreciate all of the knowledge and experience on the forums.

 

[DaveK]

It sounds like you though it out and made some good plans. Long term the dwarf lion will outgrow the tank, as will the clam and SPS corals. Of course you can always frag the corals to trim them back.

I'm not sure if the DSB in a hang on refugium is going to help or hurt, but since you already have that, I'd go with it. If you still have a problem in the new tank, you can just circulate the water in the refugium and in effect cut it off from the system. The if things get better, you know you don't want a DSB in there.

You also could consider using GFO (Phosban or equivalent) in the filtration system.

 

[rdwilson91]

I don't have a problem with phosphates anymore now that I got rid of my clownfish, which was increasing the bioload and I think the food was adding phosphate. I know there is some fueling the algae, but I used to have a gigantic problem with red slime, which is completely gone now. I'm getting rid of the lion, and my montis are so small I can go years with those guys. As for the clam, I had a good network of reefers around and it'll have a good home once it's football-sized. I really don't understand how the macro in my fuge looks like a giant wad of astro-turf and and the HA is still roaming free. Since the fuge went crazy, the algae in the display has gone from thick dark green wads to pale and thin, but it's still a pain.

 

[GlassMunky]

I really don't understand how the macro in my fuge looks like a giant wad of astro-turf and and the HA is still roaming free. Since the fuge went crazy, the algae in the display has gone from thick dark green wads to pale and thin, but it's still a pain.

This is a good sign and means that the fuge is doing its job. when the HA gets all light colored and thin like that, its dieing off. so to me, it sound like the fuge was doing its job and just needed more time to complete it. also maybe adding a few extra water changes while doing this all?????

 

[rdwilson91]

Water changes? That sounds like an activity I used to enjoy....long, long ago...

 

[DaveK]

Water changes? That sounds like an activity I used to enjoy....long, long ago...

If you guys keeping reef tank baulk at the typical water changes of 10% a week, or 25% a month, consider what is recommended for a FW planted system using the EI (estimative index) for fertilizing the plants. That method uses 50% water changes per week! (No I don't use that method on my planted tank. I'm too lazy.)

 

[rdwilson91]

Wow.. I do 5 gallons, a little over 15%, every two weeks. Like I said above, I attribute the nuisance algae to the rocky sandbed I never should have created.