Dbigfish
Aquarium Advice Activist
- Joined
- Oct 24, 2012
- Messages
- 136
Story time. I have a 20 long stocked with a clownfish cleaner shrimp and 3 nerite snails. The tank had long since battled bubble algae for over a year. I would remove rocks individually to get large clusters off the rockwork. I used a length of tubing and would siphon out bubble algae in the tank to reduce the spreading of spore. I even tried a 3 month treatment of vibrant marine 1ml per week. The algae would stay down and then explode again. I finally had enough and since there were no corals in this system I decided I would bleach the rock work and start clean. Never had and buble algae in the sump so I left the ceramics in that way I wasn't worried about losing all my good bacteria.
So I removed the rocks put them in a 20 gallon container added 15 gallons of water 1 gallon of 100% no additives bleach and let it sit for a week outside. While the tank was empty I painstakingly removed every speck of buble algae for the substrate.
After the week I removed the rocks and sprayed each one down with a garden hose spending a few minutes on each rock.
I then took the rocks and placed them in a 5 gallon bucket and filled it with warm water and added 200ml of prime dechlorinator.
Satisfied I arranged the rockwork into the tank and within 10 minutes I found my clownfish upside-down on the overflow grate gasping.
I mixed some new saltwater and removed the clownfish and did a 70% ( all the water I had) water change on the tank added a bag of carbon and a bag of chemipure. Protien skimmer was pulling a full collection cup every couple hours of chemical smelling grey water. Clownfish is fine the rest didnt make it.
Not sure where I went wrong but obviously I did it very very wrong. Not worth the price of no bubble algae
So I removed the rocks put them in a 20 gallon container added 15 gallons of water 1 gallon of 100% no additives bleach and let it sit for a week outside. While the tank was empty I painstakingly removed every speck of buble algae for the substrate.
After the week I removed the rocks and sprayed each one down with a garden hose spending a few minutes on each rock.
I then took the rocks and placed them in a 5 gallon bucket and filled it with warm water and added 200ml of prime dechlorinator.
Satisfied I arranged the rockwork into the tank and within 10 minutes I found my clownfish upside-down on the overflow grate gasping.
I mixed some new saltwater and removed the clownfish and did a 70% ( all the water I had) water change on the tank added a bag of carbon and a bag of chemipure. Protien skimmer was pulling a full collection cup every couple hours of chemical smelling grey water. Clownfish is fine the rest didnt make it.
Not sure where I went wrong but obviously I did it very very wrong. Not worth the price of no bubble algae