SantaMonica

Congrats on getting most of the trouble fixed. Can you remove the foam pad you have stuck in the partition? It is stopping food from circulating, and causing the food to rot and add nitrate to the water. Make sure you clean every 7 days, and the blue-green slime should start going away.

SantaMonica

Update of the Day: New Research on Skimmers and Organics:

The whole point of scrubbers is that they remove Inorganic Nitrate and Inorganic phosphate, which are the things your test kits measure, and which are also the things that cause nuisance algae to grow. The other good point about scrubbers is that they leave Organics (food) in the water for the corals and fish and bacteria to eat (the bacteria also then become coral food.) People who prefer skimmers, however, say that skimmers removes Organics (food) before they break down into Inorganic Nitrate and Inorganic Phosphate.

I say, why not just feed less, instead of feeding more and then removing it with a skimmer? Let's look at it from their viewpoint. Their viewpoint is "Feed more, and remove the excess Organics (food) with the skimmer." Well, the current January 2009 issue of Advanced Aquarist just published extensive research into how well different skimmers remove Organics. They refer to Organics as "TOC", which is the Total Organic Carbon; TOC is the the combination of Dissolved Organic Carbon (DOC), and Particulate Organic Carbon (POC). Here is the article, and this is what it said:

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2009/1/aafeature2

"In addition to some dissolved organics, small particulates and microbes (bacterioplankton, phytoplankton) can be removed at the air/water interface of the [skimmer] bubble as well (Suzuki, 2008). The skimming process does not remove atoms/molecules that are strictly polar and readily dissolve in water, such as some organics, salts, inorganic phosphate, carbonate, etc.

"The skimmer pulls out all of the TOC that it is going to remove by the 50-minute mark. Beyond that time point, nothing much is happening, and the TOC level doesn't change much.

"Thus, all skimmers tested remove around 20 - 30% of the TOC in the aquarium water, and that's it; 70 - 80% of the measurable TOC is left behind unperturbed by the skimming process. It may be possible to develop a rationalization for this unexpected behavior by referring back to Fig. 1. Perhaps only 20 - 30% of the organic species in the aquarium water meet the hydrophobic requirements for bubble capture, whereas the remaining 70-80%, for whatever reason, don't."

So, the strength of skimmers (since they don't remove Inorganics) is supposed to be that they remove Organics before they break down. But this research shows (once again) that they don't even remove the Organics. Here is additional 2008 reasearch that shows the same:

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/8/aafeature3
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/9/aafeature2

JRunyon21

I have read up on this thread for a few days and have become very interested in making one of these. I have an old reptile light fixture that has a clamp I am all setup there. My question is about the bulb. The bulb listed in the first part of the forum is only 23W, is a CF bulb from Lowes rated at 40-60W ok for this application?

SantaMonica

Depends what they mean. If it's something like 12W that is "rated" at 40-60W, then no. The 23W is "rated" at 120W. But if it's 40W that is rated at 200W, then yes. You want a bulb that actually uses at least 23W of real power. And it should be a "plant grow" light from the garden dept., or a 2700K "soft white".

JRunyon21

So I want low temperature lighting? The one I bought is 26W(real) at 6500K. Should I take it back and get one that is 2700K?

SantaMonica

Yes. And if they have a "grow light" version, get that instead.

hop2jr

I think a light bulb just went off. So what you are saying is 2700k for aglea and 6500k are for plants the t8 lamps I bought are for plants and are 6500k they are my hood lights.

SantaMonica

Algae and plants are same. 2700 is more for growing both of them. 6500K is for viewing displays. If will work, just not quite as good. Best are "grow lights". They look pink.

JRunyon21

So how much of a difference does the lighting make for plants? I was never able to get my plants to live with the 6500k(I was told to buy 6500k specifically). Should I give it another go with 2700k/plant bulbs?

On the topic of algae remover.
Will this hurt my chance of being able to have live plants? It seems this scrubber will eat up most if not all the nutrients my plants will need to live.

SantaMonica

Lower K is for growing, and higher K is for flowering. But we are not trying to flower.

A scrubber will indeed remove stuff needed for plants. You could supplement C02, but N and P will be low. But if you are having nutirent issues now with plants,then you have excess nutrients that need removing.

SantaMonica

In my related research of reducing Inorganic Nitrate and Inorganic Phosphate, overfeeding was always an issue. Scrubbers help, by introducing live (instead of dead) copepods to the tank, but the rest of the feeding always causes excess food to get stuck in the rock and sand, and rot. The solution to this could be an Automatic Continuous Feeder. The writeup is here:

http://www.fishlore.com/fishforum/ge...us-feeder.html

SantaMonica

Results of the Week:

jtremblay on the MD site: "the last few strands of HA have disappeared from my 40's display, and the build-up of detritus is continuing to go down, despite there being no skimmer on this tank."

nitschke65 on the SWF site: "My biocube is currently being filtered by my custom [nano] turf scrubber in chamber two; there is also a ball of chaeto in the bottom af chamber two, and a bag of Chemi-pure Elite in chamber three. My protein skimmer stopped working two or three weeks ago. (My mushrooms and zoas have never looked better!) I also have some polyps, hammers, and galaxia. There's a few nassarius, and a few hermits, an emerald crab, and possibly a pepermint shrimp. There's a lawnmower blennie, two green chromis, a scarlet hawk, and a Potter's angel. I haven't cleaned my screen or done a water change in 2 weeks [bad!]. This mornings readings: ammonia - 0 Nitrites - 0 Nitrates - 0

Skunkbudfour20 on RC: "Yes i built one, Yes i am running it, and YES my nitrates, nitrites, ammonia and phosphates all dropped to almost 0 within the first 3 weeks, and yes algae growth in my display has come to a stop, and slowly recedes... I am still running my skimmer, even though it doesnt seem to be doing AS much, its still doing something for now."

Worley on the AS site: "As for lights, I have seen an improvement in the type of algae growing and in the overall amount of growth since changing bulbs to the lower 3500K colour temp. I've been getting more hair [on the screen], macro algaes, some interesting dark green very very long hair-like algae (6"+ long). The cyanobacteria [in the display] is nearly completely gone, along with less brown slime algae, both in the tank and on the screen. And best of all, still no water changes, nearly 5 months on, with good calcium, DKH and pH. I've easily saved the price of the equipment used to make the scrubber from not having used an entire bucket of salt, and everything in the tank looks more healthy than I've ever seen in a marine tank I've kept before, I'm loving it, and so is my girlfriend!"

SantaMonica

Update of the Day: Freshwater Cleanings

You absolutely must use freshwater, in your sink, when cleaning your screen once a week. If your weekly cleaning gets delayed, at the very least turn the pump off and pour RODI over the screen to kill the pods. Otherwise the pods start growing underneath, eating the algae, then falling off into your water. You will not see the holes they make unless the algae is very thin. It becomes an issue of the scrubber not removing as much nitrate and phosphate, because the pods eat the algae you've grown, and then re-introduce the nutrients back into the water. FW of course, kills the pods. SW does not. So use FW weekly. And don't worry about getting rid of all the pods; you won't. The next day there will be millions more.

SantaMonica

Part 3 of 7:

Taken from "The Food of Reefs, Part 3: Phytoplankton" by Eric Borneman
http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-10/eb/index.php

"Phytoplankton are the major source of primary [food] production in the ocean, and one of the most important driving forces of global ecology. In fact, phytoplankton production influences all life, by being at the lowest rings of the food chain.

"The reason [phytoplankton] are so important on a regional or global scale is simply by virtue of the fact that the upper 200 [meters] of oceanic waters is filled with phytoplankton and covers over 70% of the earth's surface.

"What eats phytoplankton? In the water column, zooplankton [food] are without question the primary consumers of phytoplankton. Zooplankton grazers vary according the area and the time of year, but include primarily ciliates, copepods, amphipods, and tintinnids.

"Stony corals are generally not well adapted to the sieve or filter type feeding that characterizes the soft corals (Fabricius et al. 1995, 1998). They are, however, well suited to the capture of zooplankton prey.

"It is of paramount importance to recognize that the biomass of potential grazers [which need food] in an aquarium is many times what it would be in the same volume of water or surface area as the bottom of oceans or on reefs, and also, that the availability of water column borne food is many times greater in the ocean than in an aquarium.

"Perhaps most importantly, is the almost ubiquitous interaction between bacteria and phytoplankton. Phytoplankton release dissolved organic substances, and bacteria utilize them as nutrient sources. Most phytoplankton cells, especially large ones, are coupled nearly continuously with coatings of bacteria [which are consuming the dissolved organic substances].

"The amounts of phytoplankton present in reef aquariums are not known but are probably considerable. However, they are also probably rapidly removed by grazing and export devices [skimmers].

SantaMonica

Bob the (reef) Builder on the SARK site made this PDF for a club presentation three months ago, and I just found it; maybe it could be used by others:
http://www.radio-media.com/fish/AlgaeFilters.pdf

SantaMonica

Scrubber FAQ 3.0 is now up, with about 50 percent new info:
http://www.algaescrubber.net/forums/...=68&p=386#p386

JRunyon21

So how often do I clean the scrubber if it only has a light on one side? Once every two weeks?

SantaMonica

Weekly. Always weekly. Just clean 1/2 of it, but wash the whole thing in FW.

SantaMonica

Results of the week:

Broder on the SARK site: "I have been running my tank with an algal filter for about 3 months now. I removed the skimmer on the 10th last month. My display has never looked better. The [nuisance] algae has almost totally dissapeared. My SPS colonies are thriving. Not only are they growing well, but the colouration has become vibrant due to 0 PO4 (Salifert test) and 0 nitrate. I've seen better colouration in systems that were using Zeovit, but I'm more than happy with the results the algal filter achieves."

Sly on the SWF site: "The back glass used to be absolutely covered in green algae, but now it's staying clean on its own. I have never cleaned it. The rocks weren't that bad, but there were some patches of cyano in places that are now gone. It now seems to be staying cleaner on its own. My ORP has started rising again and is a 270mv without ozone. I don't know if it's related but as my tank levels have improved lately, my Mandarin is coming out more in the day time. This is the first picture I have ever been able to get of him in the open... and I've had him for over 2 years. The live rock and the substrate both have zero algae on them"

TODJ2002 on the SWF site: "i added a scrubber several months ago after reading this thread. my nitrates and P slowly lowered and went to zero for the first time. they have both been at zero since. everytime i check levels i am expecting to see a rise, but always zero. i also added cheato to my system and i believe boths items are a must for any system."

Adee on the SARK site: "Ok so its been about 6 weeks since i fired this scrubber up. Did the 1st "harvest" on just the one side; i'll do the other side next weekend. My phosphate reading is a zero according the Elos color chart... and for the very first time the complete back glass pane has broken out with coraline algae. Its never done that before due to the back always being covered with the normal glass algae/diatoms. Since the latter no longer appears, the coraline is now growing. I'm sure in a few weeks I'll have a complete pink wallpaper at the back. The fact that the scrubber makes the ideal platform for all this gunk to grow OUTSIDE my display tank, was well worth the investment."

Bob the (reef) Builder on the SARK site: "Both my filters are going great guns. Probably the best is the sun [powered] one, it's big and now that its settled, grows algea like crazy. My phospates down to 0.00 - 0.01ppm on a Hanna meter. Never seen it this low before. My corals are starting to grow and colour up really well now."

RentalDeceptionist on the UR site: "Ooh the [nuisance] algae. Well, it has certainly receeded massively. It's not 100% gone but I feel I'm on top of it. The hair algae which virtually smothered every flat surface is now down to about 20% of its mass, and there is more rock than algae. I do believe decreasing the lighting has helped."

SantaMonica

"Kcress" on the algae scrubber site has just finished his version of a G2 LED scrubber, for testing. A G2 is a self-contained scrubber, but the LEDs themselves are not the screen, like they are with a G3. Anyways, for testing purposes, he only has LED's on one side of the screen, and he only used low-power LEDs to avoid heat issues:

SantaMonica

Part 4 of 7:

Taken from "The Food of Reefs, Part 4: Zooplankton" by Eric Borneman
http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-12/eb/index.php

[Note: "Zooplankton" are tiny animals (food) floating in the water]



"Copepods comprise by far the largest fraction of total zooplankton - more than all the other groups combined.

"Zooxanthellate corals (many diverse species) could survive "indefinitely" if provided with adequate zooplankton, even if totally deprived of light. In contrast, corals provided light and deprived of zooplankton did not survive.

"One of the greatest myths among reefkeepers is that "SPS" corals depend mostly on light, and require less food than "LPS" corals. This is entirely untrue. As an example, consider the data from [pic not shown]. This graph shows the capture rate of an equivalent biomass of two corals, the large-polyped Montastraea cavernosa and the very small-polyped Madracis mirabilis. For those unfamiliar with Madracis, it is related to and somewhat resembles Pocillopora and Stylophora. The capture rate of the small polyped coral was 36 times greater than the large-polyped coral! Furthermore, M. cavernosa has been shown in other studies to be a voracious zooplanktivore.

"Many other studies confirm the predatory [feeding] abilities and requirements of "SPS" corals. It should not be surprising, given the fast growth rate and fecundity of many small polyped species. In other words, more growth and reproduction requires more energy, especially nitrogen for tissue growth. The difference, if one exists between "SPS" and "LPS" corals, lies primarily in the size of the food captured. Most of the prey of small polyped corals may just be too small to see. Aquarists have a tendency to be strongly visual, and so if gross observations don't indicate that a coral is consuming food offered to it, they wrongfully assume the coral must not need to be fed.

"Some species rely more on zooplankton than others, and if anything, the "SPS" corals feed on zooplankton a lot. In fact, most corals show linear feeding saturation dynamics under all but extremely high particle concentrations. What this means is that corals have a hard time "getting full." They continue to capture prey, and do not get satiated until prey densities become so great that such levels are almost never possible. To put it another way, even if you were to pour a pound of food per day into an average sized reef aquarium, the corals would still "be hungry."

"In a September 2002 coral reef conference in Cambridge, several papers were presented that should give an idea of not only the very latest information, but also emphasize what is written above.

"Many years ago, one of the only [food studies] for a coral was done for what might be considered the ultimate shallow-water "SPS" coral, Acropora palmata (Bythell 1988, 1990). The study showed, basically, that 70% of this coral's nitrogen needs were met by feeding, and that 91% of its carbon needs were met by light. [In 2002] three more corals, the larger polyped Montastraea cavernosa, M. annularis and Menadrina meandrites [were studied, and the researchers found] zooplankton to provide 20-80 times the carbon and 112-460 times the nitrogen previously shown for Acropora palmata. Finally [in 2002, researchers studied] the role of zooplankton consumption on the metabolism of the small-polyped coral, Stylophora pistillata under 3 different conditions of light (80, 200, 300 µmoles m-2 s-1) and 2 feeding regimes (Artemia and natural plankton). They found that regardless of light, fed corals had higher chlorophyll-A concentrations, higher protein levels, and had photosynthesis rates 2-10 times higher than those deprived of food. This group also measured calcification rates, both in the dark and in light, and found that calcification, as is well known to be the case, is enhanced by light. However, for the first time it was shown that feeding results in calcification rates 50-75% higher than in control corals (not fed). It was also found that feeding does not affect the light-enhancement process of photosynthesis on calcification. To make these results completely understandable, if corals can feed on zooplankton, they will calcify 50-75% faster irrespective of light levels provided.

"Of all the many things that can potentially increase respiration, photosynthesis, and calcification -- and have been shown again and again to do so absolutely -- feeding and water flow are the major players. Light, of course, is critically important as well, but aquarists by and large can and do provide enough quantity and quality of light for corals. Period. Phytoplankton, while a very beneficial addition to aquaria, does not feed most corals (Borneman 2002). Something as significant as zooplankton to both coral and coral reefs would seem worthy of the highest efforts in trying to produce, add, grow, substitute or in some way provide to tanks. I cannot think of a single greater accomplishment and advance for aquarists than to provide by whatever means (higher export and higher input, larger refugia, purchase, plankton tow, culture, etc.) significantly greater levels of zooplankton or zooplankton substitutes to their corals. I hope I am being dramatic enough by writing this, for this is among the most important steps that must be made to realize the majority of those lofty goals and ideals that are so often stated and desired by those keeping corals in aquariums.

[Skimmers remove zooplankton; Scrubbers add zooplankton]
.

hop2jr

Well Ok I'm the freshwater guy and just cleaned my screen for the second time. It was more crusty brown then green and was hard when I scrapped the screen but came off easy . Ammonia was .25, nitrites 0 and nitrates 20. Also I have been fighting Blue green algea and was afraid that how close the lights wher under the stand to te bottom of my tank would start BG aglea growing there. You said no but the answer is yes will post pics tommorro but it is growning on the bottom of the sand at the bottom of the tank.

SantaMonica

Clean all of that brown stuff off as soon as it grows.

hop2jr

I did that the blue green aglea has taken hold under the tank on the bottom of the sand check it out

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SantaMonica

Well I can't see much, but just leave it. Won't do any harm. And should be less and less as you clean your screen each week.

SantaMonica

Update: Pod Size

All the talk of how a scrubber "grows pods" has given some folks the idea of trying to catch the pods in a net. I think they might be expecting large pods like they see crawling around their sand and rocks at night. But actually what grows in scrubbers is the microscopic baby pod, which look like a spec of dust. This is because the weekly scrubber cleaning (in FW) kills most of the pods before they can eat too much of the algae. While this makes the scrubber work really good at removing nutrients (since the pods will not have a chance to eat the algae and put it back into the water), it also limits the growth period of the pods to 7 days. So what you get are millions of tiny white pod specs that fall off the scrubber and float through the water; if you have good circulation, the water might even look "dusty". This is exactly what you want: Large numbers of live zooplankton (baby pods) floating through the water, feeding your corals and small fish. Just like a real reef.

SantaMonica

Update: Ultra Low Phosphate

Many people, after having great success with their scrubbers, have brought their phosphate down so low that their test kits can't measure it. And the nuisance algae has been mostly cleared out of the display. However, these people start seeing a fuzzy detritus-looking accumulation on some parts of the rocks, and sometimes on the sand. They clean it off, but it comes right back. What is it?

What they are seeing is phosphate coming out of the rocks(!). This is a great thing to happen. It requires two situations: (1) You previously had high levels of phosphate in your water (higher than .1) for several weeks or more, and (2) You now have very low levels of phosphate in your water. It's very counter-intuitive, and it will make you think that things are going wrong, especially since this type of algae growth looks just like "detritus" (but it's not.) Things are actually going very right, and here is why:

Phosphate is like water: It flows from higher levels to lower levels. For example, if you have two aquariums connected with a pipe at the bottom, the water levels would be the same in each tank. But if you poured extra water into one tank, it's level would rise for a second, then the water would flow into the other aquarium until the levels were equal again (although both levels would now be higher). Now, if you removed some water from one of the aquariums, it's level would drop for a second, then the water from the other aquarium would flow into it until they both evened out again (although both levels would now be lower). If you kept removing water from just one of the aquariums, the levels of both aquariums would keep falling, until they both reached the bottom. This is exactly how phosphate works.

Situation (1): In the previous weeks or months, when your phosphate levels in your water were high, the phosphate was flowing from the water INTO the rocks and sand and anything else that is made up of calcium carbonate, such as coral skeletons and clam shells. The phosphate did this because it's level in the water was "higher" than the phosphate in the rocks and sand. This part of the process is invisible, since Inorganic Phosphate is invisible. You don't see it going into the rocks and sand, but your rocks and sand are indeed being "loaded up". And if your phosphate in your water goes up even higher (say, .5), then even more phosphate goes into your rocks and sand, until it evens out again. You probably also see nuisance algae on your glass and other non-rock surfaces, because there is enough phosphate in the WATER to feed the algae anyhwere it's at. And that's the important point to remember: There is enough phosphate in the WATER to feed the algae ANYWHERE.

Situation (2): Now, you've been running your scrubber (or any phosphate remover) for a while, and your phosphate in the WATER has been testing "zero" on your hobby test kit. Nuisance algae has been reduced or eliminated on your glass and everywhere else. This is because there is not enough phosphate in the WATER to feed the nuisance algae. However, since the phosphate in the water is now very low, guess where it's still high? IN THE ROCKS! So, phosphate starts flowing FROM the rocks and sand, back INTO the water. And as long as your scrubber keeps the phosphate low in the WATER, the phosphate will keep flowing out of the rocks until it is at the same level as the water. You can visualize the phosphate as heat coming off of a hot brick; you can't see it, but it's flowing out of the brick. Anyways, since you now have all this phosphate coming out of the rocks and sand, guess where algae starts to grow? ON THE ROCKS AND SAND!

There is a striking differece between the algae in Situation 1 and 2, however; in (1) the algae is on everything: Glass, rocks, sand, pipes, thermometers, pumps, etc., and the algae is a typical algae that you normally get in your display. But in (2), the algae is dark, short and fuzzy, just like detritus, and it's only growing on the rocks and sand. And if you look closely at the rocks, it only growing on certain PARTS of the rocks (usuallly narrow parts that stick out), and not growing on the rocks right next to it. This is because certain areas of the rock have absorbed more phosphate than others, and thus are releasing more phosphate into the water. Glass, plastic, etc, don't absorb phosphate, so thats' why there is no algae growing on them now, since they are not releasing phosphate back into the water. So the algae now grows only where it can find enough phosphate, and for now, this is only on certain parts of the rock and sand where enough phosphate is flowing back into the water.

But just like the aquarium example above, the levels of phosphate in the rocks and water will eventually even out, and the flowing will stop. When this happens, the nuisance algae will disappear from the rocks, never to return again (unless of course your phosphate levels rise again for some reason.) The time for this to happen is weeks to months, depending upon how much phosphate is stored in the rocks. So don't give up!

SantaMonica

Update: Grow Bulbs

The best bulbs to grow algae are "grow bulbs", which are pink in color. Sometimes these bulbs are called "plant grow" bulbs. But don't confuse these bulbs with "plant bulbs" which are blue or green. Blue bulbs have a different purpose, and green bulbs are just to make plants look nice. It's the pink bulbs that give the algae the type of light that it grows best with. The light won't seem as bright as a white bulb, however, but it works much better. You can find grow bulbs at any garden store, home improvement store, hydroponics store, or online. Each bulb should be at least 23 watts.

SantaMonica

Update: Cross-cuts

Making cross-cuts in the slot is now recommended for all pipes. The biggest advantage of cross-cuts is that when algae grows up into the slot, a cross-cut will still allow water to flow out on top of the algae. Cross-cuts do require more flow, so if your pump/pipe combination is having trouble delivering the recommended 35 GPH per inch of slot (53 LPH/cm), then you might want to get more flow first. Start with one cross-cut every inch (2.5cm), and later try one every .5 inch (1.25cm):

na.george

what type of pump would you rec, for a 20 gallon tank with a whisper ex power filter, i have ideas but just looking for some input