nuclear option for bubble algea

[Dave McReeferson]

As for what you have mentioned:

I feed a variety of foods from pellets to flake to froze brine and mysis. Although I do not rinse the frozen food, I guess thats a first place to start. I feed every other day.

I do about a 15% water change every two weeks. Should I start doing bigger changes every two weeks or smaller every week.

As for my bio-load I only have a Clown, Watchman Goby, Fairy Wrasse, and a Coral Beauty so I believe I am on the lighter side of that.

I do not have a RO unit but do my water changes with pre-mixed water from Skiptons and use RO/DI from the local grocery to do my top offs with. I have tested this water and have not tested and phosphates in it.

No Sump

Absolutely rinse frozen foods, the "juices" they are frozen in are huge contributors to phosphate levels, get yourself a little strainer or small fish net and rinse off your food after thawing and immediately before feeding.

For nutrient removal, bigger water changes are better. Changing the same amount of water in smaller batches is less effective than one large water change. If it is practical, I would move to larger changes. I would say moving to 30% once per month would be better for your purposes.

 

[Frag Freaks]

Absolutely rinse frozen foods, the "juices" they are frozen in are huge contributors to phosphate levels, get yourself a little strainer or small fish net and rinse off your food after thawing and immediately before feeding.

For nutrient removal, bigger water changes are better. Changing the same amount of water in smaller batches is less effective than one large water change. If it is practical, I would move to larger changes. I would say moving to 30% once per month would be better for your purposes.

Thanks alot Dave. I think I know what I need to start doing now. I will start doing one large water change a month and I think I have a smaller extra fish net lying around which I will definitely start rinsing the food. In the meantime I will keep manually removing what I can and I will get maybe 5-6 emeralds to hopefully get a few spots that I will not be able to get into by hand.