i got three more turbo

[motorslave]

Oh, and a tang needs a much bigger tank to be happy.

Robert

[nobody]

i am very careful..............having two fish only for years i did those things in the beggining of my first tank................my ammonea hit 0 2 1/2 weeks in ............weather it was because of the LS or LR i dont know but im not arguing.............the nitrites hit 0 3 days later.............andnitrates are fine...............

[motorslave]

Im not trying to argue either! There is more to a cycle than the ammonia and nitrates. There are several algae blooms and such that must take place. The sysle is a long process of the tank finding its own equalibrium. Whe you have that much being added to the tank so early on it makes it harder for the tank to settle. Just trying to help you avoid some problems down the line...

Robert

[nobody]

oh god i had that brown alage bloom...............made my reef sand and water look like crap for about a week...................oh i have a dump question....................never used this before so i dont know..................are you suppose to siphon live ref sand...............first of all if i siphon it ............it will get sucked up with the water becaus eits so small

[motorslave]

Thats a tricky one. Ive alwayts done BB tanks but, you can and should siphin. Either do it so the siphon is up off of the sand enough to just get the l;ight detritus that has settled on the surface or pinch the tube a bit to slow the force of the flow. The trick is to just get what settles and not the sand. Im sure others can give you better info on this subject!

Robert

[VWD]

Yes You can siphon that snd just becareful and only allow a small amount inthe tube at a time and don't let it get to high in the tube. That real fine sand is hard to siphon.

I will add to the clean up crew thing here . They will tell you you need 15 red leg and 20 blue leg and 50 of this snail and 30 of that snail and 4 stars and who know what for a 50 gallon tank on alot of sites. Just like needing 1 1/2 to 2 lbs of liverock per gallon of water. Not true.

[pastina]

but everyone seems to believe that you can have zero algae?
how is that possible? i dont think it is
all of you clean your glass right??? what are you cleaning off? a slight algae haze correct?
as long as we have fish we will have fish poop and we will have algae, there is nothing that can take that 100% out of our tanks unless we all do massive total water changes daily, similiar to flushing a toilet.
so how can everyone always point their fingers and say "you have to fix the problem"?? true in the beginning we all go through our algae phases but once things balance out you still will have that light coating of algae on the glass, do i think i have a nutrient problem because of this?? no of course not, its just common sense, light causes algae and as long as you have even one thing in your tank pooping or add any kind of food that combined with the lighting will promote algae. there is no way to stop it. now im not talking about nuisance algae im talking about normal healthy algae.
so unless someone can tell me they run their lights for at least 8 hours and never clean the glass i will believe my own theory

and about starving snails, most likely they died of something else
the only algae thats in my tank is the thin film on the glass that occurs every few days or so, i see my snails poop, oh and that turbo really lets out some big ones, so they can survive on minimal algae

[VWD]

I agee with You that not 100% clean and algea free , I will say pretty much no algae, I have 3 turbo's and a yellow eye tang in my 90 and they are all I need , I don't have to clean the front very often. I wipe it down about once a week, But not a problem for me. I get more coralline on it then green algae

[pastina]

yeah thats what i find a nuisance, the corilline algae on the glass
that stuff is strong! my tank looks like it has a disease with all those purple spots

and spirobid worms i must have over a thousand easy, their all over the rocks, in my filter and on the power heads. i cant clean them off the rocks but i got them off the power heads and they came back a few days later
how do you get rid of them?
ahh sea life, once you get past one problem something odd always pops up

[motorslave]

I hardly think my snails died of anything other than starvation. but that will never be determined as I cant ask the ones that lived!
Total lack of algae no. But if you check at the beginning of the thread he was adding snails to eat algae. This to me says issue. Like Vince I have to clean my panels about once a week and my lights are on about 10 hours. I have no Nuisance algae at all. I have had one outbreak in my time with sw tanks and it was short lived. As far as saying fix the problem, its alot less frustrating in the long run and less expensive than fighting it with all kinds of fix it quick remedies. Fix the problem and the symtom goes away!!!!!

Robert

[pastina]

but in a new system you just have to ride it out
it fixes itself
alot of people panic and try and fix things only to do more harm than good
adding some snails at the beginning of setup is no cause for alarm and wont hurt anything
ive had my cleanup crew since the first week of setup, my tank cycled with them, i added no fish at that time so the cycle was very short, amonia never got higher than 0.50 with live rock
its now about 7 months later and i still have the same cleanup crew, minus one peppermint shrimp that got into a scuffle with the cleaner shrimp and died.
i never had hair algae and i really do have the cleanup crew to thank for that. if i wouldnt have added them soon after start up i probably would have been plagued with it.
i do this will all my tanks, same thing all the time, and ive never had an algae problem or cleanup crew deaths
everyone does things differently i understand that, but you cant send people into panic mode which alot of these forums do

[motorslave]

yes, you have to ride it out. But, we also have to do many things correctly to prevent future problems. Adding a clean up crew at the right time is needed, yes. But, they also add detritus. As you said pastina, turbos leave some big ones. So, the nutrients are still there. just because algae is part of the processes in a new tank doesnt mean that we should just add a bunch of poo makers to clean it up. Blasting rock, water changes and good husbandry habits are still a must. Clean up crews are not the answer as much as they are an aid. They dont remove anything, they just process it and transfor it into a different type of detritus. We must remove the nutrients. Throught strong skimming in conjunction with adequate flow and proper care. Hopw we handle the issues in the beginning is a big factor in the future of the tank.
Everyone does things a little different, yes. But some things hold true no matter what!

Robert

[pastina]

of course you need water changes, skimming etc
i didnt mean not to do anything to our tanks

everytime i look at my turbo snail hes going to the bathroom, its like hes on laxatives or something

[VWD]

Now lets act like adults here. read your PM's ironracing

[Geoff]

just to have some fun. light does not cause algae, phosphates do.

phosphates are the limiting factor when algae is involved. it takes very little light to grow algae if phosphates are present. even incidental light from the room can grow algea. on the other hand you can have a 400w MH over a 20g tank and not have an algae problem. if the phosphates are not there then the algae can not grow. if you can export the phosphates fast enough than you will not have an algae problem. hence the reasoning for having a really big skimmer. this thinking is the reason why BB are so popular now. you can immediately remove all phosphate causing detritus.

right now my 125g has 4 Trochus and 5 or so Ceriths. i do not have any algae at all. i actually am having to feed the tank flake to get enough phosphates into the system to grow anything to feed the snails. i really need to get some fish in there.

G~