Mobile Bay Reef Keepers

Ok so I'm a little pissed at my 120 right now. The Hair algea was/is really out of control! So I decided to Take all 150 Lbs of rock out and scrub it and also to let it sit in the sun and bake for a while. Then I will scrub it again. Also will do a 75% water change this week. How long should I keep the rock out in the sun? A week? 2 weeks? I just want the algea gone!!! I cut a the corals off and put them in my nano before I dried the rocks out. Do you think this will work. I have tried tangs, ALL kinds of snails, Lawnmover Blennies, nudibranches crabs EVERYTHING and it didn't work!!! So it had to come to this. Any knowledge or opinions would be GREATLY appreciated.

Thanks,

Dave

Well it needs to be completely bone dry, if not the dying stuff on the rock will cause an outbreak that is way worse.

I would like to know the secret of what REALLY causes it. We have several tanks and have had others in the past. We have one tank that has never shown signs of hair algea and the others riddled with it.

Do you have the time to "cook" it? If there are phosphates or organics in the rock no amount of time in the sun will remove them. I don't have any first hand experience with this method so you may want to check out Reef Central. There are lots of threads about it.

Scott, I have all the time in the world just not all the money in the world that is why I was trying this method. What do you mean by "cook" it?

The biological process is a little harder to describe but the system changes from an algal driven system to a bacterial driven system. The bacteria are using the PO4, detritus and other nasty stuff that is locked up in your rock and is feeding the algae to live off of and they produce turgor to push the crap from deep inside the rocks. You end up with extremely clean, white rocks that are still full of life. The biggest expense is the salt and time.

Pretty much the method goes like this:
1.fill a tub with new sw and put rocks in it with a powerhead, cover it so no light can get in.
2.after a week take all the rocks out and rinse them off with new sw (most people have a couple buckets and they dunk it in each)
3.repeat weekly until there is little to no sediment in the tub, some people say that it takes 6-12 weeks.

I would imagine a skimmer, heater and maybe a PO4 remover might expedite the process. I have been thinking about doing it. If I can find some more rock or base rock and a pump to drive my skimmer I may. The salinity of the water doens't have to be as high as you tank (some are doing it at 1.017) and it seems that higher temp increases the metabolism of the bacteria so they work faster.


Being uneducated I hope that I explained it right,
Scott

dave3112 wrote:Scott, I have all the time in the world

Can you sell me some of you time? It seems that I am losing too much recently and could use some just 4 more hours in the day.

Well mabey not all the time but I think I can devote some to this project. I will just have to get alot of salt it looks like. I spent 5 hours scrubbing the rock today. I am thinking of just starting the tank from scratch. Do you think I can get the sand clean enough for the algea not to come back after I cook the rock? Or should I just toss it out and get more sand too?

I am almost to the point of getting rid of the tank, rock and stuff and just keeping my 16 gal nano. I have a sump for it that is in need of some macro but other wise it is great. My corals seem to like it there better and are growing like crazy.

Dave

Don't dry it. Do as Scott recommends.

Phil

Too late for half of it. It is already dry. but the other half will be cooking as soon as I get off work tonight. I will keep all of you posted on the differences in the 2.

Dave

We have dried live rock before... but then it is no longer live rock so to say... We haven't had any problems with that rock at all you just have to re-seed it with flora afterward. We had to do this to rid ourselves of macro-algea not hair algea but it did work. If you have time to do as scott suggested though it would probably be better to keep it alive that way.

I do not believe that drying is a practical option. It destroys the diversity that a reef tank needs to remain healthy in the long run (years). Many people I know of have had nutrient control problems some time after drying their rocks. At least in the "cooking" process, you preserve a little of the diversity that the rock once harbored. But contrary to what some state, I think that the cooking process does starve out its fair share of beneficial organisms--bristleworms, etc.

Well sometimes practical lies in the hands of what is necessary when you have small tanks and it isn't practical or humane to put in a fish that will eat macro algea you have to resort to what you have to resort to. Our tanks were so over run with the macro it was killing the corals and wasn't being controlled by hand pruning. I wasn't happy about having to dry out the rock but our tanks haven't suffered due to it and they have been up and running for going on two years now, since resorting to drying out the rock.


Now the only thing I seem to have a problem with now is Aptasia (sp)....

Yeah actually that dried out live rock looks kickass today. I just added 10lbs of live and it has colored up the dried dead rock nicely.

Well since it looks like I will be starting this tank all over again then I will probably save the money on the salt and "cooking" time and use it to start over. Any suggestions? FOWLR? Aggressive tank? Who knows I am sure I will think of something. Probably another reef.

Thanks for all the advice. I know I can always count on you guys and girls here!

Dave

dave3112 wrote: Do you think I can get the sand clean enough for the algea not to come back after I cook the rock? Or should I just toss it out and get more sand too?

I would toss the sand. it's not worth the effort to clean your rocks and then put them back on a dirty sandbed.