A little bit of Slime/GHA

I recently destroyed all but a little bit here and there of GHA. Now I am starting to get the slime again. So basically I have started doing some more serious and continuous testing of my parameters. The problematic ones I am noticing is both the Phos/Nitrate.

My Nitrate is starting to climb towards the 20 range (according to my test kit anyways) and the Phos is around .2, which is .2 too much. I buy my water so I can only assume it's pretty clean however I have only tested the Nitrate and not the Phos.

In short, my nitrates are moving high within a week's-worth of a water change and that is noticeable on my test kits. I have 5 mangroves and a healthy chunk of chaeto. So there has to be a reason my nitrates are moving upward more rapidly than my macros can eat.

My sump isn't the cleanest and my skimmer could use a little bit of husbandry. Are these causes for nitrates? I try to clean my sponges every 1-2 weeks which I think isn't bad and they aren't terribly dirty. Also, I feed a 1/4 cube every other day so feedings are pretty light - of course my fish eat everything like they're starving children.

So, is this the cause or is there somewhere else I should be looking? I can't seem to keep the sump clean so another question arises, should I be using filter socks on the two inlet's to alleviate the use for sponges in my baffles and stop the crap from building up next time?

Much appreciated sorry for the short novel :-/

 

Here are my algae and cyano notes. They might help.

1) I would definitely do a thorough test of your source water. Don't assume.
2) Are you overstocked? I am wondering about the source of nutrients in this question. They have to be coming from somewhere.
3) Skimmer...try increasing the amount you are skimming to increase export. Trim chaeto.
4) Old light bulbs??? Lights on too much???

Some thoughts. Look at the checklist in the write up, you might find some more ideas.

Mark

 

1) I will check the source water. I wish I wasn't apartment living so I can use a RO/DI unit!
2) I have only two fish (Clown/wrasse) and some inverts for a 40ga. understocked IMO
3) I can run a little more wet and export more
4) Bulbs are brand new

 

You can run an RO/DI in your apartment.... they make attachments so you can just hook it up to a fawcett when you are using it.

M

 

So I can just run a line from faucet to unit, then unit to water tub? I noticed when I bought my freshwater it's only RO, no mention of DI. Would that be a cause for concern?

 

First, you hook the RO/DI unit up to the fawcett, run the waste water down the sink and put the RO/DI product water in a jug.

Second, RO is good but RO/DI is much purer. THe DI... de-ionized... means that it is taking out ionized minerals, metals, etc. out of the water. You definitely want RO/DI if you can. Here are my Water Source Notes.

M

 

I will look into this. Thanks so much!!

 

Glad to help
M

 

the reason you are seeing the rising levels is because the GHA was eating up those nitrate levels, it will take time to get your chaeto large enough to take care of the levels as well. Mangroves are pretty, but don't build the biomass needed to really get the job done without ALOT of them. My RO/DI is under my bathroom sink, i have a hose attachment i run to my sink above it and then a 20ft supply line i can put in my sump/tanks/fill buckets just about anywhere.

 

You could also try Caulerpa in your fuge. I started with Cheato and Mangroves, but the Cheato withered away to nothing, so I threw it out. I got some fern Caulerpa from Reefcleaners.org and that, combined with the Mangroves, keep my Nitrate and Phosphate levels near zero. I say near zero only because I don't think API test kits can detect minute levels. But once the Mangroves and Caulerpa took off, the nuisance algae in the main thank slowly disappeared.