Finally! 90g scrubber - 40sq inches

[kerry]

Thats good growth!! Its getting better every time.

[Floyd R Turbo]

If you let that go 2 weeks, you want to do an interim cleaning where you don't scrape hard, just rinse it in FW to kill pods and rinse away any dark slime (rub with fingertips) that has built up, or rubbery stuff, because that blocks lights to the lower layers and will kill the roots. You want to leave the green hair on the screen. you could even just swipe a credit card lightly across it and rinse, it would take about 20 seconds total.

[mess7777]

After the last cleaning, my screen has gone back to dark brown/nearly black covering in a couple of days.

The one difference is that the flow has increased substantially after cleaning the tubing from the pump to the ATS.

Another strange occurrence.....my exquisite wrasse went MIA for the last couple days, but the screen was brown before that. Maybe the ATS is telling me something else is going on.

I just can't buck these friggin nitrates, they were well over 20ppm again this weekend. 10% water change again, I will just keep on doing that. My zoas are still mad, and the couple euphyllias continue to hate life. I am going to resort to daily target feedings for my LPS in the hopes of saving them.

I think it's time to bit the bullet and buy a $10 150watt light to see if it makes a difference or not. I need to get something working before it's all gone.

I really don't know where all my nitrates are coming from. I don't feed ridiculously (max 2 cubes a day) in a 90 g tank, I clean detrius during water changes. The ATS is always getting covered......my chaeto and caulpera both grow well and I harvest regularily. I must have something in my tank that is just spitting out nitrates....it's really weird.

[kotlec]

I clean detrius during water changes.

I have attempted to clean sand bed once for detritius removal and got N and P spike next few days. Can it be reason for you as well ? It is very delicate occupation as I understood. Lesson learned and now I just make a little storm in my tank on occasion and let the filter pad do the rest.
Filter pad is removed immediately just after storm is over and water clears up in order not to let my catch to decay further.

Just sharing my experience

[Floyd R Turbo]

Yeah I don't touch the sand bed anymore. I have an engineer goby that just moves it back to where he wants it so I leave it alone. Plus I read that unless you run a UGF you should not touch the substrate, or at least not deep gravel vac ever, just skim the surface if you think you need to otherwise leave it be.

[mess7777]

I don't actually disturb the sandbed, I just get the siphon close enough that any crud sitting gets sucked up. The sand pretty much stays in place, the water doesn't cloud or anything. I don't think this is spiking my nutrients....but I suppose it is possible that it's lurking so close to the surface that any disturbance releases more. I have a sand sifting star, maybe it's constant movement in the sand is causing it to steadily release bound N from the sand? Problem is I like how it keeps the sand clean!

[kotlec]

I have a sand sifting star, maybe it's constant movement in the sand is causing it to steadily release bound N from the sand?

I would not believe that.

[mess7777]

Well cleaned off the dark brown/black gunk again this week. I have some nice GHA growing on the glass on one of the sump baffles and on a couple rocks in the sump. I pulled it off and stuck it to my screen. Maybe it will help to encourage this type of algae.

Also, I pulled a bunch of dark red spongy algae off the sump rocks(is that cyano?).

Fingers crossed that it starts working before I lose ALL my corals!

[mess7777]

Well as my euphyllia have continued to die off.....the nitrates still hang around 20ppm. I have tried leaving the algae to grow thicker. It's gotten really red on one side and starting to see some cyano. I'll have to clean tonight. I picked up a 150watt CF light to try on one side to see if it makes a difference compared to the 100 watt. At $10 each I didn't want to get both at the same time. If it gets more and greener algae to grow I will buy a 2nd one.

I thought after 2 months I would be closer to reucing nitrates than this......but hey I am staying the course.....more to come.

[Garf]

I would take a step back from the scrubber for the moment. 99% of reefers ( reducing all the time ), successfully keep corals without a scrubber. I suggest you have a system parameter problem with your water. Ie temp, salinity and all the other basics like ammonia. I would re- check and find the parameter problem. Although scrubbers can sort a lot of water quality issues, the basics must be maintained and these will also affect algal growth. I guess you think that nitrate is killing your corals, it's probably not.