GHA has me irritated. Don't know what to do. Ughhhh!!!

[Clint24]

Well as uall know I have been battling GHA in my tank for quite some time now. It doesn't matter what I do, it just doesn't go away. I've never had this problem b4 & now I'm at the point of exhaustion & don't know what to do... I've installed a GFO/carbon reactor( BRS), I changed over to filter socks to catch the unwanted floaters, I've been changing 20 gal of water a week for months now, I run Seachem phosphate media in bags, I've changed all the bulbs in my 250 watt halide fixture & I manually remove as much as I can on a daily basis. I'm currently on my second go around of dosing hydrogen peroxide in my tank... Nothing works. If it's my rocks causing the problem, what do I do at this point??? I'm frustrated
220 gal display w/30 gal sump. 20 gal refugium. Reef octopus SRO 5000 int skimmer. My parameters all test good with salifert kits-
Ammonia-0
Nitrites-0
Nitrates-.05
Phosphates-0 (could b false reading cuz of all the algae)
Magnesium-1320
Calcium-420
KH/ALK-9
Strontium-10
Salinity-33/1.025-1.025
PH-8.2-8.3

If anyone was has some helpful advise on how I can defeat this battle, I'm all ears. I'm about to pull everything out & start over. All of my fish are healthy & doing great so I don't really want to tear down my tank but I'm at the end of my rope....
Achilies tang
Flame angel
Black/white clownfish pair
2-blue/green chromis
Six line wrasse
Starry blenny
3-shrimps

Hopefully some of the experts here can chime in and help me out b4 I give up... Thanks a bunch.


CD

 

[mikecc]

Try the three days lights out thing? Cover your tank with a blanket to cut out all the light.

 

[Clint24]

Oops. Sorry mike & everyone else, forgot to mention my handful of corals so I can't go lights out...

Rose BTA
Green/red/purple plate monti
Green frogspawn
Green birds nest SPS
2 plate corals
Few other corals that my wife picked out & can't identify!!


CD

 

[sirrealism]

Ok we have talked before and it sounds like you have done everything right. I know its frustrating and it seems like it will never go away. Its time!!!! get a sea hare! You have the perfect situation for a sea hare. They are HA eating machines and they eat the roots to so unlike when you pull it off you leave the roots so it just grows right back. You just need one and I bet with in a month the HA is gone or very close. I did it and it was just amazing.

 

[Clint24]

Yes sirrealism we have talked about this b4. I tried 2 sea hares. One didn't make it over night & the other one only lasted a couple of days. Idk if something was picking on them or what but I didn't have any luck with them. U think I should try it again? I don't like to witness livestock not make it.


CD

 

[sirrealism]

completely understand. What is your livestock list? If you dont have anything picking on it then I would try again. If you can get one from a different supplier. A lot of time they are kept at the lfs to long with out hair algae to eat so they are starving to death when you get them. If you can have the LFS order one and pick it up before it even comes out of the bag. Also can you post an up close pic of the algae. Want to make sure its plain HA. When you had the one that made it a few days did you see it eating the algae? could it be bryopsis? If so the seahare wont eat that which is why I want an up close pic of the HA

 

[wscttwolfe]

What is your water source?

 

[Oxylebius]

+ 1, I was gonna ask about if you tested your mixed salt water before it went into the tank also.

I dealt with unwanted hair algae, which ended up not being the standard hair algae that most people get but a type of algae that has herbivore deterrent properties (Chlorodesmis spp.). Haven't seen pics of yours, so don't know what you have, this may be something you may want to look into if your cuc is avoiding it.

 

[Clint24]

the two that I got from my lfs store, I picked up the day they received them so they only got acclimated to my water. When I first opened the one that only lasted a few hours, the bag already had a foul odor to it so I wasn't surprised that it didn't make it. The other one I really thought was doin great. From what I saw I thought he was leaving a clean trail behind him. Then found my shrimps eating him three nights later.

. I know the photos aren't great. Takin with my phone. Sorry.


CD

 

[mikecc]

Post them pics in http://reefcleaners sponser forums and see what they say.

 

[mikecc]

Tap water for your source water?

 

[Clint24]

No mike, I strictly use RO/DI water for everything. I will try posting em there, if I can figure it out. Thanks.


CD

 

[DaveK]

I've got a few questions for you -
What was the source of your live rock?
Did you always have the GHA problem with it?
What make up your clean up crew? How many and what species?

 

[wscttwolfe]

No mike, I strictly use RO/DI water for everything. I will try posting em there, if I can figure it out. Thanks.


CD

Does your RO/DI filter have a TDS meter/what is the reading? If not, when did you last change your RO/DI filters?

Or are you sourcing "reverse osmosis" water from an LFS or store?

 

[Oxylebius]

Whoa! That is a crazy amount you have going on there!
Agree with your first post, it is as if the rocks are causing the problem. Leaching?!?

Leaching from rocks is not unheard of. Where did you get your rocks from? That doesn't really look like what I had, well maybe? Mine was more of a structured plant... but here is a website about it that you may be able to compare to. And here were some pics of mine.

What cuc do you have?

 

[Clint24]

Wscttwoll... I have a spectra-pure RO/DI unit with a tds meter. I change all of my filters & membrane as soon as it reads other than 0. Last time I changed em was a couple of months ago but they r still good. I double check it with a hand held tds meter as well.

Oxy & Dave. I used the rock from my old set up(same tank, new sand bed but old rock). I also used a few pieces from a 75 gal tank that a friend was tearing down to seed my old rock with. I never had any issues with any kind of algae in the past but my old set up was up & running for 10+ years tho. My rocks (weather it's my old ones or the ones I acquired) is about the only thing I can think of. I have pulled the majority of them out & scrubbed with a wire brush & it comes right back. After my ich outbreak in febuary, I left the lights off for 2 months during my 3 1/2 month fallow stage... It came back.
The thing that really gets me is I have some of the same rock in a 55 gal tank & none of it has algae on it. But if I swap some rock it dies in the 55 gal but flourishes in my big tank. I'm stumped. I just received my new LED lights today & am curious if I should wait to switch lights until I get the algae under control. My water tests good like said originally( but could be false phosphate readings) so could it be my lighting. All the bulbs in my fixture are new--14000k Hamilton tech medal halide bulbs with new blue actinic bulbs as well.
I'm stumped...... Please keep trying to help before I tear it down. Thanks for all the input. Ughhhhhhh


CD

 

[Clint24]

Also I have ordered two orders from reef cleaners. Over 200 snails & over 200 crab (well my achilies tang has ate a few crabs!!) it seems like they try to manage it more right after a hydrogen peroxide treatment but they can't keep up with it...


CD

 

[DaveK]

...

Oxy & Dave. I used the rock from my old set up(same tank, new sand bed but old rock). I also used a few pieces from a 75 gal tank that a friend was tearing down to seed my old rock with. I never had any issues with any kind of algae in the past but my old set up was up & running for 10+ years tho. My rocks (weather it's my old ones or the ones I acquired) is about the only thing I can think of. I have pulled the majority of them out & scrubbed with a wire brush & it comes right back. After my ich outbreak in febuary, I left the lights off for 2 months during my 3 1/2 month fallow stage... It came back.
The thing that really gets me is I have some of the same rock in a 55 gal tank & none of it has algae on it. But if I swap some rock it dies in the 55 gal but flourishes in my big tank. I'm stumped. I just received my new LED lights today & am curious if I should wait to switch lights until I get the algae under control. ...

You have some very old LR that's been in use for a long time. From what your describing, I think you have a case where the rock did absorb a lot of nutrients. Also you had a disease outbreak. What did you use to treat the disease? This could also be a factor, especially if any copper was used.

Also, see how you don't have a lot of algae on the sandbed. This tend to tell me that the issue is more with the rock, rather than the rest of the system.

As for how to fix it.

First, I would replace the lighting fixture with the new LED ones. That can sometimes help. If that works, then great. I suspect that it will not do too much either way, because your existing light bulbs are fairly new.

If the lighting change doesn't do much, then I suggest that you "cook" your live rock. This is a process similar to curing new live rock, but is done for a much longer time.

What you do is get a large round rubber maid trash container, fill it with SW, and outfit it with a powerhead or two. In other words you set it up just like your going to cure new live rock. You can use the SW you remove as part of a water change. It need not be newly mixed SW.

Then put half your live rock in the setup, and add the usual deli shrimp as if you were going to cycle the system. Keep this setup covered and in the dark to kill off the algae. Now you wait and wait some more. Test the water for SG, and adjust as needed. You should see a cycle similar to a new tank set up, ammonia and nitrite will spike and drop back to 0. Then you'll see a rise in nitrate. So far, it's still like cycling a tank.

Now here is the difference. You continue to wait until the nitrate drops back to 0. In other words, you wait for the bacteria that support nitrate reduction to grow, which is mostly inside the rock. This can take several months. This is also why it's called "cooking live rock".

At this point the rock should not have any algae on it, since it's been kept in the dark all this time. At this point, you put the cooked live rock back in the display tank and repeat this process with the other half of the rock.

This is a long slow process. You could do all the rock at once, but you need a certain amount to support the biological filtration of your system, This is why it's done in two batches.

It is easy to think, why not just tear down the tank and set it up again? If you did that, you wouldn't get the nutrients out of the rock. So, you would end up with the same problem.

You could also replace the live rock, but this would be a major expense, even if you used dry base rock.

Good luck!

As a note, yes I have done this myself. I did it after the system crashed due to a power failure. I was able to to all the rock at one time though, because at this point, I didn't have anything in the tank.

 

[sirrealism]

Yes thats good old GHA. Nothing special about it. You can fallow DaveKs Idea or try the clean up crew with another seahare. I really have had great luck with them. If you were planing on going LED then do it. Yes the bulbs might not be that old but maybe they sat on a shelf to long or something crazy like that. Or maybe they produce just the right spectrum that this HA likes and buy putting the LEDS on maybe that spectrum will change. "MAYBE" but you have nothing to loose. The fact that if you take rock from this tank covered in HA and put it in your other tank and the HA goes away makes me think its the lights. I am sure you use the same water for both so if it was water it should be in both. What do you use for light on the other tank?

 

[Clint24]

Thanks Dave. If all else fail I will try to cook my rock.

Thanks sirrealism. Yes the water is all the same. The lights on my 55 are just simple fluorescents because this was my hospital tank until we spoke last time & u mentioned I might have to much rock in my big tank. I removed enough to from my DT to the 55 & it almost filled it. Same water, same rock. I am also thinking something with the lights... In the past I ran 20k bulbs & this time I replaced with 14k. Might be a shot in the dark but I'm willing to try anything. I don't wanna get beat down by GHA but I'm pretty frustrated at this point. Thanks again.


CD