What would you do?? PLEAE READ and HELP

[cbort]

Ok my 55
LIVE STOCK:
Black volitan
2 reef chromis
sally lightfoot
misc. hermits and snails
PROBLEM: Fighting red slime for months (probably half a year)
TRIED: Chemi-clean, turning lights on for only about 4 hours a day, feeding once a week basically just feeder guppies to my lion, fed only once in the last week and a half, will feed tomorrow about 4 tiny feeders. I have sifted my entire sugar grain sand bed with a large net, getting all of the waste and red slime out of it. Cleaned all LR and glass, 10 gallon water chan and it still comes back within a week.
POSSIBLE SOULUTIONS
1. Clean entire tank all over again and cross fingers
2. Put all live stock into other tanks, and start all over again by pulling all live sand out into large bowls and completely clean, rinse, and kill everything in it??
I think that the problem might be my lights its about the only thing i haven't yet tried, when i got my ice cap 660 the guy gave me 3 bulbs that are 110 watts 1 uri daylight, 2 coralife trichromatics and i am using a (saltwater) 40 watt bulb. as my 4th.
First of all, the trichromatics have stickers on the ends, that say they are 110 watts, but i am yet to find a 110 watt coralife bulb?? so i think he may have gotten ripped off when he bought them so maybe i am only using 1 110 watt bulb and 3 40 watt bulbs? Not sure on the ages of the bulbs either.
I really don't want to start over with this tank, but i just want a tank that i don't have to clean the entire thing every week, it looks really ugly 2 days after i clean it! Ofcouse when i have the lights on for only 4 hours a day it grows slower, but after a week its everywhere!
I have a 20 gallon that only has 2 regular T-5 flourecents on it. I used the water out of my 55 to start it, and i still have no red slime. Its been up for over a month and has a firefish and a blue Gudgeon in it. It looks beautiful with 15 lbs of live rock. I want my 55 to look the same. I am going to add (new) lights to it possibly 1 or 2 150W metal Halides to it, but am afraid that the more powerful light may also bring the red slime?
Please HELP and thanks in advance!
Curtis

 

[xoxox]

I found that red slime loved to grow because of excess nutrient levels. Are you overfeeding? Also, what kind of skimmer are you using? Your lights could be adding to the problem but I believe something more is going on.
Black Volitan? Is that a Lionfish? Don't they eat livefood? If your feeding him live feeder fish/shrimp that might be something to look at. If hes not fully eating the feeders, say, killing them and letting them rot, or stashing the dead fish somewhere? (This is a wild guess since I'm unfamiliar with their habits) the decaying fish would add a high nutrient level to the tank.

 

[snipe]

I would replace the bulbs "they may be to old and that can help with algea growth" and then clean the tank.
And the metal halide if you you want to stop the algea growth get the 20,000k bulbs "the high end kind that dont look yellow" they are expensive but will dramticly reduce algea growth "so I hear I dont have them I am going by hear say" I know that large coral sellers use 20,000k bulbs only with no supplement.

 

[mana_man19]

For treatment of the red slime there is this medication that is normally used to treat fish with fin and tail rot. The brand my fish store carries is called Mardel and the medicine is called Maracyn. Because the red slime is actually a bacteria NOT AN ALGAE, normal algea treatments arent very effective. They come in tablet form, just drop in a couple, probably 3 or for a 55 gal, and you will see the red crap dissappear really fast.
So, clean up the tank as best you can by hand. And take two or three of the tablets and place them in low-flow areas of your tank. The slime will dissapear in a matter of days. And you dont have to worry about the medicine harming your fish since its original purpose is to treat fish. Best of luck!

 

[mana_man19]

BTW. How much waterflow do you have in your tank? A lack of flow makes it a lot easier for this kind of stuff and normal algae to get started. A couple of powerheads can be a good investment in keeping your tank looking good.

 

[arkey.d]

Read This Thread

 

[ophiura]

What are your specific water parameters, especially nitrate, phosphate?
Do you use tap water?
Does your lion eat frozen or other food (this is an aside....) guppies/feeders are not a good diet for lionfish.
What clean up critters do you have?
Your sand is not the problem - messing with it might be....it is just where the stuff is growing. You might however want to get critters that stirr like nassarius, ceriths, conchs and hermits as well as adding a booster pack for worms, pods, etc.
What circulation do you have?
Do you have a skimmer?