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View Full Version : Valonia vs Bleach - Round 1 - Ding! Ding!


Myka
08-17-2008, 07:01 PM
[[[[For my own reference: http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-02/hcj/feature/index.php]]]]

I will kill you, you $#%^&@% Valonia %$#$* one way or another!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! >:-(

:lol:

It's been over a year's battle with Valonia. I removed all my rocks and "cooked" them in a Rubbermaid for like 12 weeks in the dark about a year ago. Although the phosphate was completely undetectible with a D-D MERC phosphate kit, and the Valonia was nowhere to be seen when I put it back in the tank...IT CAME BACK!!! With a vengeance. I was doing weekly waterchanges manually removing it for 6 MONTHS, still didn't work.

After all that, I had a breeder trap in the tank with 30 baby Bangaii in it contributing to MASSIVE over-stocking...which only made matters worse. Then I had hair algae too! So, once a week I would patiently take scissors, and trim back my HA forest so I could see my (surprisingly) happy corals again, and remove as much Valonia as I could find. This made for 60% waterchanges...haha. Anyway, the baby Bangers aren't in there anymore, so the HA has 95% disappeared, but the #$&#@$&@#$@#($%!&#$% Valonia...dear God what did I do?????????? *pulls hair out*

Ya, so I'm going to remove all my rocks and bleach em. I know there's other ways...like a blow torch. Although a blow torch sounds like WAAAAAAAAAAAY too much fun, and absolutely satisfying(!!!!), I don't have a torch and I'm too lazy to go buy one for $6 because holy hell it's hot out there and my car doesn't have ac. BUT, I have BLEACH!!! :D

So...any comments on the ratio of bleach:RO/DI water and the length of dip time would be grandly appreciated!! I'm hoping to find the fine line where I can kill ALL surface life, but keep the anaerobic bacteria inside the rock intact. Hmmm...

Oh, and I have lots of Prime on hand to neutralize this devastating natural disaster that is about to happen!!! Bleach is natural after all - errr maybe not. ;)

http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k43/Myka82/IMG_0277.jpg

http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k43/Myka82/IMG_0276.jpg

http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k43/Myka82/IMG_0278.jpg

saltaddict
08-17-2008, 07:43 PM
To bad you didn't have a bigger tank, my Naso tang loves to eat valonia. I actually have picked it off the rock in my small tank and thrown it in the big tank for him to eat. The foxface that I had would eat it too.

Edit: Oops, I posted this under Steve's user name. I didn't realize I (fishoholoic) wasn't the one logged in :redface:

Myka
08-17-2008, 09:29 PM
Ya, that would be waaay easier than bleaching the dang rocks!!! :D

marie
08-17-2008, 09:39 PM
If you think that is a bad outbreak of valonia I'm glad I have no pics of my old tank :redface:
Hopefully something you've thought of... if you bleach the rocks your could have a massive die off of critters inside the rock which will release nutrients into the tank and make a whole bunch more valonia grow.
Wouldn't it be easier (seeing as how your taking the rock out of the tank anyway) to just manually remove it all? You might have to do that every couple of months for a while but eventually it would be all gone

Myka
08-17-2008, 09:53 PM
If you think that is a bad outbreak of valonia I'm glad I have no pics of my old tank :redface:
Hopefully something you've thought of... if you bleach the rocks your could have a massive die off of critters inside the rock which will release nutrients into the tank and make a whole bunch more valonia grow.
Wouldn't it be easier (seeing as how your taking the rock out of the tank anyway) to just manually remove it all? You might have to do that every couple of months for a while but eventually it would be all gone

Haha! Got pics of your old tank? :D

I manually removed the Valonia during weekly waterchanges RELIGIOUSLY for 6 months, but there are nooks and crannies my leetle fingers just couldn't get into. I suppose if I removed the rocks on every waterchange and manually removed it may have worked...but seriously?? :lol:

Oh yes, after I bleach the rocks they are going through a dark cook in Rubbermaids again. When I removed the rocks and just did a dark cook a year ago I manually removed all traces of ALL nuisance algaes before the cook, then cooked for 12 weeks, and lo and behold the Valonia came back.

So, I did the manual removal. I did the manual removal and dark cook. Now, I'm going to do a manual removal, bleach, dark cook!!! :D It better work...

WhoPoopWrasse
08-18-2008, 12:22 AM
Wouldn't that make your rock dead live rock??? Lots of $$$ down the drain!:sad:
Wouldn't it be easier to add a tang or foxface and treat is as if it's a QT, then when you are sure it's gone for good you could bring the fish back to lfs for exchange or something. I know you're not supposed to put tangs or rabbitfish in small tanks but don't we all do that when they are in quarantine for a couple of months? :wink:

Bryan
08-18-2008, 01:23 AM
Now, I'm going to do a manual removal, bleach, dark cook!!! :D It better work...

It won't.... you could boil, cook, microwave the rock till it is as devoid as life as a lunar rock, but once you start to introduce live stock it will come back. All you need is a coral that carries a spore of Valonia an you are back to square one. Just a matter of time.

sphelps
08-18-2008, 02:48 AM
An urchin and a few emerald crabs should handle that problem. I had a waay worse case in my lower tank and small two tuxedos and about 5 crabs now keeps it under control, looking right now the only bubble algae I see is on one of the urchins.

You can kill it all now and but you'll probably get it again with a new coral. :twised:

Also bleach?? I think fresh water will kill it.

sharuq1
08-18-2008, 03:17 AM
I had some type of valonia or relative to in my first tank. (looked like sausages but was quite hard to get off the rocks and any bit left turned into more.) Horrible invasive stuff, along with caulerpa, bryopsis.

I have to say +1 on the blowtorch! I got sooo sick of this infested rock I torched every outside area and fried every bit of it off. Then I left the rock in a circulating tub in the dark for months and did several WC's (lots of die off). Later there was still some life to the rocks, just nothing that had been on the outside of it. (as in I found some pods in there, dusters etc.) The coralline died of course but I think the "inner" rock lived as it did not get hot, just the surface did. I understand the whole problem of "1 spore" getting in, however if your problem is this bad and you're already considering it.... You've been in sw long enough to know the bio-ramifications of doing extreme things with LR (cooking, etc) as well as adding critters, so I won't bother even talking about that. Granted this doesn't guarantee the rock will be free of it forever. All I can say is that on that particular bunch of rocks, it killed it, it has not come back and I got to burn something.:twised:

(Oh and +10000 on personal satisfaction of burning. Die algae die!!!)

OCDP
08-18-2008, 04:56 PM
Something about Bleach also doesn't sound right to me... it seems risky.

Zoaelite
08-18-2008, 05:14 PM
Something about Bleach also doesn't sound right to me... it seems risky.

Agreed, bleach is powerfull stuff! No point in nuking the rock when you can go with a much more natural way like sphelps has suggested.

Myka
08-18-2008, 05:53 PM
No point in nuking the rock when you can go with a much more natural way like sphelps has suggested.

We're talking about 25-30lbs of rock here, so it's not much pocket damage risk. Buying critters to eat Valonia is VERY hit or miss. My tank is as stocked as I ever want it to be. There isn't room for any more critters.

I did think of adding an Emerald crab recently, so I made up a poll on CanReef, and it seems like the chances of an Emerald crab eating Valonia is rather slim!

Anyone have a Valonia eating Emerald crab they want to lend me??? :D

untamed
08-18-2008, 05:57 PM
I wish I knew WHY I've never had problems with Valonia...my tanks have always had some but it has never multiplied to any problem level.

If you don't already have one, try adding a refugium. Grow some good algae there (maybe even valonia). That may use up nutrients and the valonia won't be able to get out of control in the main tank. You'll likely still have to weed it manually out of the display until you get growth in the 'fuge, though.

Myka
08-18-2008, 06:00 PM
I wish I knew WHY I've never had problems with Valonia...my tanks have always had some but it has never multiplied to any problem level.

If you don't already have one, try adding a refugium. Grow some good algae there (maybe even valonia). That may use up nutrients and the valonia won't be able to get out of control in the main tank. You'll likely still have to weed it manually out of the display until you get growth in the 'fuge, though.

This is the first tank I've ever had that had any issues with Valonia...and I've had a lot of tanks over the last 15 years. ;)

I don't have a fuge on this tank, but I'm in the process of moving it over to a 40g breeder, and I'm trying to figure out a way to NOT move the Valonia with it! The 40g will have a fuge built into the sump, do you think I should just bite the bullet, move it over, and hope the fuge takes care of it all?

mark
08-18-2008, 06:36 PM
I would stay away from bleach even with Prime. Likely you'll kill off everything else beneficial and some spores of the bubble would survive.

Marlin65
08-19-2008, 04:04 AM
I had some of that as well but it just died off and went away. I run some other Macros in a fuge though. My PO4 is at 0.04 and my NO3 is always zero.
I don't run a phosphate remover and feed heavy every day. I think a large fuge is the way to go. That is why mine is almost the same size as my tank.
Anyway I think you might be able to get rid of it with your fuge as well.
Some of that smaller grape stuff is hard to come by and does not grow that quick. I would try to keep some of that.:biggrin:

slakker
08-19-2008, 04:38 AM
Something tells me if your gonna bleach, you might as well start over with dry base rock or something... could be cheaper and for sure you won't have anything livign on it! :mrgreen:

I had a few, but lucky I caught it by hand picking them off...

Myka
08-19-2008, 04:46 AM
Some of that smaller grape stuff is hard to come by and does not grow that quick. I would try to keep some of that.:biggrin:

Do you mean the smaller Valonia? I have at least two different species of Valonia. One is tiny, and elongated. The other is the usual big round globes.

Well, I haven't bleached it yet...I'll see what I can do with a waterchange and manual removal tomorrow. Maybe I will wait it out awhile longer since the tank is finally coming back round now that the Banger babies aren't in there anymore.

marie
08-19-2008, 05:20 AM
Do you mean the smaller Valonia? I have at least two different species of Valonia. One is tiny, and elongated. The other is the usual big round globes.

Well, I haven't bleached it yet...I'll see what I can do with a waterchange and manual removal tomorrow. Maybe I will wait it out awhile longer since the tank is finally coming back round now that the Banger babies aren't in there anymore.

I think if you decide to try emerald crabs you'll find they are good at erradicating the tiny elongated stuff. In my experience that is the ones they go for first. I think the large ones are tough skinned and less edible.
My foxface and tang play football with the large valonia when they break free of their moorings and it seems to stand up well to all the abuse :mrgreen:

Myka
08-19-2008, 05:23 AM
I think if you decide to try emerald crabs you'll find they are good at erradicating the tiny elongated stuff. In my experience that is the ones they go for first. I think the large ones are tough skinned and less edible.
My foxface and tang play football with the large valonia when they break free of their moorings and it seems to stand up well to all the abuse :mrgreen:

Hmm...ya I don't know about crabs. I have a long standing dislike for crabs of any kind. Especially in a tank with small fish. I just might give in though... *grumble*

Snaz
08-19-2008, 07:15 PM
Algae blooms in my experience whether it is FW/SW or the local pond can be traced back to excess phosphates. I don't see in this thread what your water source is, if it is DI or RO then it might be worth testing for phosphates, maybe a dirty or broken membrane?

bv_reefer
08-19-2008, 09:27 PM
i used to have about a dozen of these back when my phosphates and nitrites were thru the roof, before i got a skimmer and started zeo. for me phosphates were the main culprit, but as with all nuisance algae it really doesn't take much to get it rolling unfortunately:sad:

Myka
08-23-2008, 05:54 PM
My source water is RO/DI. I test every jug before I use it, and it's running at 0 tds. I have a TLF PhosBan Reactor which has 2 cups of HC GFO that I change every 8 weeks. There are no detectable phosphates or nitrates in the water column. Not that that means anything... :lol: