Dro and Mermer's first 29 gallon reef"

[Droskie20]

Your tank is gorgeous! I love that red sponge! Wow!
I don't know about a UV sterilizer ridding you of the algae. Best bet there is manual removal and keeping your nitrates and phosphates down, maybe getting your magnesium levels up to around 1450-1500ppm. I thought all a UV sterilizer did was kill bacteria. Am I wrong?

to my knowledge a uv sterilizer gets rid of algae, parasites, and bacterial diseases and it really clears your water, but I could be wrong I'm only repeating what my friend said...and thank you for the compliment on the tank :)

 

[little_fish]

UV sterilizers do hardly anything, at most they are going to kill single celled algae, but they arent going to do a thing for parasites and diseases. I would get rid of it especially now that you have a sponge. The UV is going to kill what little filter food the sponge might be able to eat. They are pretty tough to keep, I wish you good luck with it. You might try dosing your tank with filter feeding formula, but that is going to make the hair algae worse.

 

[Amba]

There are a lot of mixed opinions on using UV. Some say it really clears their water and some say it does nothing. A lot of it is how you use it, and placement. I run a 8W UV made by aquatic uv; I run it similar to how people run bio pellets with the effluent going to the skimmer. I have no algae issues, but that doesn't mean it's all thanks to the UV.

 

[little_fish]

Having recently completed a project dealing with UV sterilization, I can tell you with a fair amount of certainty that the UV bulbs we put on our tanks arent doing squat.

 

[Droskie20]

so today I'm finally going to get rid of the bio balls in my wet dry filter and switch them out with rock rubble, any tips you guys have for me?


should I use small medium or big rocks?

 

[AnthonyTheNewbie]

Depends on how big of a area you have. I'd do a bunch of small though personally lol (I actually did in my 29g Biocube :p)

 

[Droskie20]

Depends on how big of a area you have. I'd do a bunch of small though personally lol (I actually did in my 29g Biocube :p)

I have a 15 gallon wet dry, today I put 10 pounds of big solid rocks, and 2m I'm going to add 5 rocks of rubble the size of chicken nuggets lol

 

[AnthonyTheNewbie]

That'll work just fine lol. I put about 8lbs of small rubble rock in mine lol :p

 

[salt_for_brains]

so today I'm finally going to get rid of the bio balls in my wet dry filter and switch them out with rock rubble, any tips you guys have for me?


should I use small medium or big rocks?

Don't get rid of all your bioballs at once as this is going to cause problems. You will be removing good bacteria with the balls so it should be a slower process of removing some balls every week until they are all gone.

 

[Droskie20]

Don't get rid of all your bioballs at once as this is going to cause problems. You will be removing good bacteria with the balls so it should be a slower process of removing some balls every week until they are all gone.

yea I got that part, but what I can't figure out is why bioballs suck lol

 

[salt_for_brains]

They trap a lot of waste and produce nitrates which you don't want. Live rock or rubble is a much better alternative to the bio balls.

 

[Droskie20]

They trap a lot of waste and produce nitrates which you don't want. Live rock or rubble is a much better alternative to the bio balls.

But what's the difference? Ill still collect waste with rocks won't I?

 

[salt_for_brains]

(This is a great explanation I found on another forum that saved me a lot of typing) "Bioballs only process parts of the nitrogen cycle: Ammonia to Nitrite then to Nitrate. There are no oxygen deprived parts of the bioball so Nitrate cannot be converted in to Nitrogen gas (N2). This is why they are called nitrate factorys, because the breakdown stops there.

LR has both aerobic and anaerobic regions in its structure that can process Ammonia all the way to harmless N2. Its also important to note that LR does a better job of taking ammonia all the way to N2 than just converting Nitrates in the water-column to N2. This is because the anaerobic regions of the rock are deep inside it and Nitrates in the water column have a difficult time getting converted. Water changes help with the reduction of free Nitrates".

Hope this helps explain things a little better:D

 

[Droskie20]

(This is a great explanation I found on another forum that saved me a lot of typing) "Bioballs only process parts of the nitrogen cycle: Ammonia to Nitrite then to Nitrate. There are no oxygen deprived parts of the bioball so Nitrate cannot be converted in to Nitrogen gas (N2). This is why they are called nitrate factorys, because the breakdown stops there.

LR has both aerobic and anaerobic regions in its structure that can process Ammonia all the way to harmless N2. Its also important to note that LR does a better job of taking ammonia all the way to N2 than just converting Nitrates in the water-column to N2. This is because the anaerobic regions of the rock are deep inside it and Nitrates in the water column have a difficult time getting converted. Water changes help with the reduction of free Nitrates".

Hope this helps explain things a little better:D

hell yea that helps! Lol

 

[AnthonyTheNewbie]

It's because they breed nitrates (I think)


Sorry, didn't see the other posts lol >_>

 

[Droskie20]

2 months have gone by............algae is still winning. ive gotten rid of all bio balls and have 10 pounds of rock in my filter... I dont know how much more fight i have left in me :(

 

[tooned out]

I'm a complete noob just starting to set up my very first tank but I read your thread.. nice read by the way.. I happened to read something about tangs and lawnmower blennys being good for getting rid of hair algae. I have no idea if that helps but just thought i'd pass it along.

 

[reefnoob]

A tang would not be suitable for a 29 gallon. I didn't read your thread, but how often do you do water changes? What is your lighting schedule? How much do you feed? Have you tried macroalgae?

 

[reefnoob]

And I just found this link, it could be helpful:
Algae eating fish for a nano-reef - General Discussion - Nano-Reef.com Forums

 

[Droskie20]

What's up everyone!! Hello to all the new faces! Over the next couple weeks I will be redoing my tank bc I can't get rid of the algae and it's driving me nuts so I'm going to start by removing the fish then the coral then let the cleaning and re aqua-scaping begin, once all that stuff is done ima wait for my numbers to get back in check then ima start over