Hi everyone! I'm starting a new reef tank, and I'm doing it in an interesting way, so I'm very curious for advice. But first, some background. I've been keeping freshwater tanks as long as I can remember, mostly simple 10g guppy tanks. Most recently, though, I had a 29g low-tech, dirted tank. It was a really interesting and fun experiment, but I dismantled after a year or two when I moved apartments.
My new tank is a 36g bowfront. I got it from a guy who was getting out of the hobby. It had been sitting in his living room just cycling without any fish in it for 6-9 months, just looking dirty and accumulating "slime algae," as he called it, on the substrate and the live rock. Well, I picked up his entire operation: HOB sump system in a 10g tank down below, a Jebo "Quadplex Spraying" protein skimmer, and a couple of powerheads (none of which seem to fit the skimmer...). Oh, I also got his rocks, the substrate, heck, even the water!
He attributed the algae to his aging flourescent lights, though I suspect phosphate buildup. I'm afraid the rocks and substrate have accumulated as much phosphate as they can hold and are gonna keep letting it as long as the water can handle more of it! Now, I bet a lot of you are shaking your heads and saying, "this sounds like so much trouble. If you don't have fish yet to worry about, just start fresh!" Part of me is with you, but I'd like to play a little bit in the mean time and learn a lot about water along the way.
I've gotten a bunch of really cool suggestions for how to proceed. Everything from pitch the substrate and bleach the rock, to scrub down the rocks and sift the substrate by hand and then buy a PhosBan Reactor. Personally, I could go either way on the substrate but I'd rather not kill the live rock. I'm very, very curious if anyone has tried anything like this before, and what successes you had, as well as what you'd have done differently.
Here's a picture of my tank today (really, just for before & after documentation). It's murky (the new Hydor powerhead really kicked up a lot of stuff) and I'm sure the lights aren't right for picture taking. Any suggestions welcome
View attachment 19024
Thanks!!
My new tank is a 36g bowfront. I got it from a guy who was getting out of the hobby. It had been sitting in his living room just cycling without any fish in it for 6-9 months, just looking dirty and accumulating "slime algae," as he called it, on the substrate and the live rock. Well, I picked up his entire operation: HOB sump system in a 10g tank down below, a Jebo "Quadplex Spraying" protein skimmer, and a couple of powerheads (none of which seem to fit the skimmer...). Oh, I also got his rocks, the substrate, heck, even the water!
He attributed the algae to his aging flourescent lights, though I suspect phosphate buildup. I'm afraid the rocks and substrate have accumulated as much phosphate as they can hold and are gonna keep letting it as long as the water can handle more of it! Now, I bet a lot of you are shaking your heads and saying, "this sounds like so much trouble. If you don't have fish yet to worry about, just start fresh!" Part of me is with you, but I'd like to play a little bit in the mean time and learn a lot about water along the way.
I've gotten a bunch of really cool suggestions for how to proceed. Everything from pitch the substrate and bleach the rock, to scrub down the rocks and sift the substrate by hand and then buy a PhosBan Reactor. Personally, I could go either way on the substrate but I'd rather not kill the live rock. I'm very, very curious if anyone has tried anything like this before, and what successes you had, as well as what you'd have done differently.
Here's a picture of my tank today (really, just for before & after documentation). It's murky (the new Hydor powerhead really kicked up a lot of stuff) and I'm sure the lights aren't right for picture taking. Any suggestions welcome
View attachment 19024
Thanks!!
