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Taking action against bryopsis.


youcallmenny

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As many of you have heard me complaining, I caught bryopsis quite a while ago. It's been up and down with this stuff and I've thought it was eradicated several times only to have it spring back up. Luckily it has been confined to my sump and has never been spotted 'upstairs'. My nutrients are in check and my macro fuge is full of macro. Unfortunately the bryopsis keeps popping up clumps inside the other macro.

 

I've done the tech-m thing with no success. I've been doing and am currently doing the Vibrant thing to no success. I run a heavy load of carbon at all times that is replaced frequently. My skimmer runs wet and I have a lot of those porous balls for filtration.

 

Long story short, I'm losing this fight. This stuff is gradually spreading in my fuge and I'm mostly concerned it's going to make that jump into my display. Something drastic needs to happen because I'm pretty sure that if it jumped into the display, it'd be game over.

 

Here's my idea: remove all macro from my sump, scrub it down as best as possible to get as much plant matter removed and turn the lights off for a few weeks. This doesn't seem like it would be a big deal except I'm losing my macro filter for a while. I've never had any algae in the display aside from the initial cycle so I don't believe my tank is prone to it and I have faith that the overall mechanical filtration is pretty solid.

 

I've been considering this for a while now but it seems like it could be disastrous. However, the consequences of not dealing with this are very much outweighing the potential problems the dark period may cause.

 

Please, poke holes in this. Tell me why or why not this should happen. Any better ideas? Any input is welcome and appreciated. Thanks in advance everybody, I have faith that I can beat this beast.

Edited by youcallmenny
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This is probably very difficult, but could you swap sumps for a while? Just throw something temporary under there while you go ballistic on the current one. Full force bleach baby! Then clean all the equipment that goes in the sump.

 

TBH, you could probably just do this without putting a new sump online and just remove the sump for an hour or two. The DT will be fine with just the internal flow going for quite some time.

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Great suggestion! I think you're absolutely right that it needs to be a very thorough cleaning. If this is the route I go, I'll definitely take your advice and toss all current macro. It wouldn't survive several weeks of dark period anyways and I wouldn't want the bio spike from it dying off.

Edited by youcallmenny
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I second swapping out your sump. You'll be hating life if it shows up in your DT.

 

Edit: If your tank is glass, that center support is doing nothing for supporting the tank, it's more of something for the doors to close against. If you're still spooked on taking the brace out to swap out the sump, you can drain your tank way down and do it then. I have a bunch of 5g jugs you can borrow if you need to.

Edited by xmas_one
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I second swapping out your sump. You'll be hating life if it shows up in your DT.

Yea, I'd be starting over without a doubt. This is bad timing because everything is finally running super well and growing like crazy.

 

Edit: saw your edit.

 

Haha thanks for the offer but I've got plenty of buckets. If that center brace isn't a problem to remove then I will remove it and pull the sump out. Yes, the tank is glass. Yikes, that sounds scary but probably is the most realistic answer.

Edited by youcallmenny
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I have been skimming though the progress of a thread on RC with using Fluconazole, it seems to be working for them, only time will tell i guess.

 

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2607958

 

With some goggling (Fluconazole and bryopsis) I've found some info and am currently reading up more on it but translating may be a problem.

 

We have similar systems in terms of water volume and having a tied in frag tank.

I also tried Kent and now on the second dose of Vibrant.

 

I went a little nuts with my battle and tore all my infected rock from my display (Mostly due to turf algae) and scrubbed my frag tray out the best i could. The only thing in the frag tray is a pond basket with all my nems, this is proving to be one of the hardest parts to eradicate it from.

 

I left a large infected rock in my sump/fuge for a couple months and blasted it with light in an attempt to "out compete" it from getting any sort of foot hold on the new rock in the display, this worked for the most part but is a horrible idea and would never do it again being i didn't really accomplish anything, it's still in the system. 

 

Just before this last snow storm hit i drained my fuge and pulled this infected rock that was now about 3'' thick and tossed it along with a small ball of cheato that would not grow and was covered in cyano.

 

Gill&Fin being the awesome person she is hooked me up with a couple huge chunks of cheato to get me started again. Thanks again! Also thanks bamburgb for offering some up!

 

I wish a had a ATS set up because even without testing i can already see a difference in the color of some of my corals. PO4 may have risen with removing that rock and the cheato not being able to keep up, not sure, i just know that rock was sucking up tons of nutrients ready for export, but with it being bryopsis i fear it spreading everywhere if harvested so it was only a temp situation for me but it sure made me want a ATS more!  :laugh: I still have so much to learn about nutrient export even the basics.

 

 

Here is a paragraph i found that sparked my interest to learn more about it.

I'm not suggesting you do this, just sharing 

 

"To combat filamentous algae "difficult", both Bryopsis as Derbésia, I have used and recommended is the FLUCONAZOL at a dose of 9 mg / liter SINGLE DOSE and directly on the display. It is reef safe.

Fluconazole has the mechanism of action blocking the synthesis of ergosterol, a structural fat present in the cell membranes of some algae, among which the aforementioned, which gives them flexibility and endurance. When it blocks the synthesis of this fat also present in fungi, the cell wall and membranes algae weaken, and they are exposed to the aggression of the medium and even herbivorous; cleaning staff and duty algueiros start to eat them. This fat, ergosterol is not present in the cell membranes of animals and higher plants nor the zooxanthellae of corals, so it does not affect them.
The drug is purchased at any pharmacy, but excercises (click the link) usually has the best price. It is an antimycotic, not an antibiotic, so do not need prescription. Usually come into capsules of 150 mg, powder filled, which must be opened and the powder (only powder) dissolved in a little deionised water, then pouring the thus obtained solution in the tank of the display or in the sump, preferably at night ."

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Very interesting read Chris.  Thanks for the link.  I'm sorry to hear your battle has been so drastic.  I fear my situation is on the brink of turning in to that so I'm spending my day ripping my sump out and sterilizing everything.  I think I'm going to have to take my overflows apart to get at it in there as well.  This stuff is awful but there are definitely success stories out there.  Let me know if you decide to try the fluconazol route.  I'd be interested to see how it treats your algae.  

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Update: I tore everything out including taking the overflows and circulation pumps apart to sanitize them. We have a big basin sink that I filled with hot water and vinegar. A submersible pump was dropped in to stir it up.

 

Then I did the dumbest thing I've done in a while. I was thinking about what else I could do and remembered someone mentioned using bleach. So why not dump a half gallon in there? Right? Something smelled off so I quickly googled what was happening. Yep. I chlorine bombed our kitchen. Luckily I was the only one in that part of the house because it was smelling like a swimming pool pretty quick.

 

Anyways, after some major ventilation I finished cleaning everything. I'm no chemist and have my moments of pure genius, obviously. I'm still going to put the sump area in the dark for the next two weeks and then I'm going to add a giant mass of macro back to the fuge.

Edited by youcallmenny
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Yeah, looks like vinegar and bleach can create some nice gas. Definitely don't wanna be breathing that in. I'm not sure off hand, but for future reference, I think you only need a couple tablespoons per gallon of water for it to disinfect.

 

I remember working in a kitchen and the procedure was only one cap full of bleach for a bucket of water.

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Thanks Daniel I'll give that a try in addition to the Vibrant. Everything that could be removed was taken out and soaked in vinegar and scrubbed down with a vengeance but I'm not taking any chances.

 

Is H2O2 dangerous at that dosage to other reef life though? I'd rather not nuke anything with a treatment.

Edited by youcallmenny
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Thanks Daniel I'll give that a try in addition to the Vibrant. Everything that could be removed was taken out and soaked in vinegar and scrubbed down with a vengeance but I'm not taking any chances.

 

Is H2O2 dangerous at that dosage to other reef life though? I'd rather not nuke anything with a treatment.

 

H2O2 at 1ml/10gal is very mild.  I've gone up to 2.5ml/10gal still ok.  I've washed coral frags at 100% H2O2 and they were ok (contact time probably less than 5 sec), and polyps comes out after a couple hours.  I dipped all my new fish at 1ml/pint for 30min (65-70ppm of H2O2).

 

If you're able to remove rocks with lots of bryopsis in a bucket, soak that rock in 1:10 H2O2 to tank water.  Enough H2O2 to get the bryopsis to bubble for 5min, bryopsis will turn clear and die next day or two.  At such high H2O2, it'll kill off worms, feather dusters, etc.  Corals will be ok but not happy.

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H2O2 at 1ml/10gal is very mild.  I've gone up to 2.5ml/10gal still ok.  I've washed coral frags at 100% H2O2 and they were ok (contact time probably less than 5 sec), and polyps comes out after a couple hours.  I dipped all my new fish at 1ml/pint for 30min (65-70ppm of H2O2).

 

If you're able to remove rocks with lots of bryopsis in a bucket, soak that rock in 1:10 H2O2 to tank water.  Enough H2O2 to get the bryopsis to bubble for 5min, bryopsis will turn clear and die next day or two.  At such high H2O2, it'll kill off worms, feather dusters, etc.  Corals will be ok but not happy.

 

I only had bryopsis in the sump.  I'll dose H2O2 for the next two weeks while I black out the sump area.  It's already all been soaked and scrubbed but like I said, I'm waging war.  

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I was just watching week 48 of 52 weeks of reef keeping by brs and they touched on bryoposis a few times. Not sure if it would be any help but maybe worth a listen

 

I will give it a watch.  I love their weekly bits.  One of the most instructional things I have found where this hobby is concerned.  Knowledge is power and this stuff is putting up a heck of a fight.  One of the things that I keep seeing is people blaming it on nutrient levels.  Of course any macro will thrive as it is in my fuge but I think the bigger issue was contamination in the first place.  I'll be soaking any future macro in fresh water before adding it to sterilize.  

Edited by youcallmenny
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  • 2 weeks later...

Nice find.  I just torn down my tank rocks because of it.  It's a uphill battle and probably can't win it.

 

If anyone is brave to fluconazole treatment, I'd want to see document thread and long term affects.  These stupid corals take weeks for months to show decaying sign affects from any kind of treatments or changes.

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I clamped down my P and N, but tank looks boring and fish started picking each other.  So adding few new fishes, feed a bit more so fish fat belly happy then here back to square one bryopsis fighting :-).  I just hand pick them in my frag tank and here and there in dt tank when they are clumpsy ball :-)

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  • 2 months later...

I don't know if this is still a problem,

 

but this sounds like something that can be temporarily solved with a turf scrubber. If you can use it to outcompete the bryopsis, you might have a chance to remove the bryopsis for good. If you had insane growth in your scrubber, that would be a sign that some nutrients are out of control.

 

Have you checked your iron levels? Those being high could also cause algae booms.

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