Start over or rehab?

[kid_sublime]

Alright guys, so I've gotten this tank used on Craigslist, it's a 60 gallon cube i guess. Since starting it back up I have run into aptasia, lots of green algae, bubble algae, brown algae and I've seen a couple worms. I'm thinking about just scrapping it out and starting fresh. I just don't want to deal with ALL these problems right from the get go. What do you all think about just dumping the sand, bleaching the live rock and just re seeding everything?

 

[jase]

how long has the tank been running since u got it?? For Aiptasia use Aiptasia X. Green algae and brown algae are easy to get rid of just use a good mix of snails will do the job and maybe a 20% water change
For the bubble algae is it only on one rock and have u tryed to manually remove it? if not i would remove the rock as it's safer than speading bubble algae through ur tank. I have used emerald crabs to take care of bubble algae and they do work quite well though they wont eat any of the big bubbles....You will have to pull them out urself

 

[Bifferwine]

Can you post some pictures of the tank? That will give us a better idea of how bad it is.

 

[kid_sublime]

I don't know exactly how long it was running but my guess is well over a year. I do know that it was maintained with only tap water though and it came with a dried up bottle of aptasia x. The previous owner was all to uninformative when it came to maintaining the system. Also wondering what the big whitish yellow ball is growing on the LR :zombie:? Thanks for the input guys! Oh and sorry for the quality...

 

[Bifferwine]

The ball is a sponge. It's a harmless critter. :)

The tank doesn't look too bad. There's a lot of bubble algae in the third picture. You should be able to remove that by hand fairly easily -- gently pull it off the rocks by the tendrils, making sure not to pop the bubbles in the tank. If you can, remove the rock to a bucket and do it outside the tank.

The hair algae on the glass can be scraped off using a magnet. You would also benefit by getting a lot more snails. Astraea snails for the glass, nassarius snails for the sand.

Buy some Aiptasia X to take care of the pest anemones. Zap a few every day. If they spring up again, keep zapping them until they are all gone.

It would benefit you to start doing some large water changes using RODI water on a regular basis. I would do about 20% a week for the next month or two, and see how things start looking. After that, you can drop down to smaller water changes less frequently.

 

[kid_sublime]

Wow 20% a week! I was going to do 5 gallons a week, but i can handle it. Should i worry about the LR leaching the PO4 at all or just go with the flow? I actually already nuked the real bad rock with bubble algae this morning. I used bleach and vinegar (separately). That's cool you don't think it looks too bad, I'm so used to looking at everyone's crazy nice rigs that put mine to shame! Anyway, whats a tendril? I don't just grab the bubble and pull? What about a brush of some sort? THANKS!

 

[Bifferwine]

The bubbles are connected by a thin green tube. Those are the tendrils. If you take the bubble off but leave the runners (tendrils), the algae will come back. So you want to try to get the whole thing. You can use a toothbrush or scrub brush to clean hair algae off of rocks too. Be sure to do that in a separate bucket though, not in the tank!

The rock may not be leaching phosphate. It might be just fine. You won't know that unless you let it run for a while.

 

[Ted]

If the bubble algae is just on a certain rock or only a few of them, what I did was sun bleached them. I had tried scrubbing them with a nylon brush in a bucket of tank water. Still came back. My hands have hit to many heavy bags through the years to be delicate enough to pull the bubbles off with out breaking the bubble. (you should see me with eggs...its funny) Anyway thats how I got rid of the bubble in my tank. The rest will be easy enough with good water quality, rodi for water changes and a macro algae in the sump/fuge.

 

[kid_sublime]

Does sun bleaching work in 20deg weather?

 

[Ted]

Hmmmm good question....it got 20 here once....I would think if you gave it a vinegar scrub and then let it air dry in a window sill getting direct sunlight...That would more then kill it..

 

[kid_sublime]

good call