Anyone else have the "problem" of not getting any coralline algae growth?

[Canadian]

I re-setup my tank when I moved at the beginning of August. You can see in the pictures below that I have basically no coralline algae growth either on my LR or anywhere else for that matter but I still have pretty decent coral growth. There's a bit on the pumps but that's it. I'd actually prefer to have my LR be purple but the predominant coralline algae color in my tank is pink.

I've flipped back and forth between thinking I might have too much or too little phosphate and nitrate which is effecting my coralline growth. Other than my pH being a little depressed my water parameters are within typical values for an SPS dominated tank:

SG - 1.026 (35ppt)
Temp - 80
pH - 7.9-8.0
Alk - 10 (Elos)
Ca - 490 Salifert - I'd actually like to get this lower but I don't see it harming anything)
Mg - 1400 (Elos)
PO4 - less than 0.03 with an Elos kit (this includes doing a heat PO4 test)
NO3 - 0 (Salifert but was also 0 with Elos before I ran out of reagent)

Anyway, part of my struggle with the too much vs too little PO4 is that while I get negligible readings for NO3 and PO4 I do have some tiny spots of hair algae growth which means there's something feeding it. It looks to me that my frequent basting of the LR actually causes some of the detritus to be caught by the little bits of algae and it's using this detritus as a food source. I've been playing with running and removing my phosban reactor and that doesn't seem to make any difference. The only time I've noticed any appreciable coralline algae growth was when I first set up the tank after moving and I put a SSB in for about 3 weeks.

Any and all comments/suggestions are appreciated.

Here are some pics just in case they might help (they were taken right after doing a water change today so the GSP in the bottom left are closed up). You'll also notice that most of the SPS appear to be pastel and washed out like you'd see with too few nutrients but as I mentioned above I do still have some pest algae growth so I'm timid about dumping in amino acids or adding more fish (plus my crappy point and shoot digital camera doesn't do the best job of actually capturing an accurate image of the tank with the T5 fluorescents on):

[Delphinus]

FWIW, I find that if you have clams and SPS they tend to outcompete the coraline for Ca and Alk and coraline can be sometimes affected.

[Keri]

I found that my corraline grows Much faster in my softy tank Vs my sps/clam/mixed tank, I think Delphinus is right

[KrazyKuch]

Our 180G has the same problem with corraline but then again we have 12 clams so I think tony might be right, your corals are pulling so much or the calcium/Alk that it's not leaving much for anything else....plus coraline is a type of algea so I would asume it needs nitrates and phosphates to feed off of!!!

[tang daddy]

pretty clean tank...

I can see what you mean about no coraline which is odd as you set up the tank 4 months ago.

I was going to say that maybe the Mg was low but your elos test kits shows otherwise.

I was doing some reading on Mg and found out that it plays a huge part with stabilizing alk and Ca, also it is the 3rd most abundant ion in salt water and apparently the coraline algae has high magnesium content.

If you are intrested read this article: http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/oct2003/chem.htm

I use to have nice coraline algae under the rocks with my MH and when I switched to t5 it all turned to algae, at first I thought the new light was to blame but now think otherwise with lots of calcium in my tank aswell I couldn't understand why the coraline was not so plentiful after reading the article on Mg I understand alittle more....

Btw what lights are you running and what salt are you using?

[awa1979]

I set my tank up in August and only recently started getting coraline on the rocks, but its taking a liking to anything plastic, my pumps are becoming covered in it, but the rock is showing it very slowly.

[reeferious]

just love that image of your rockwork reflection off your tank bottom.is it true that aragonite sand releases other trace elements such as strontium useable by inverts and possibly coralline and that different coralline strains prefer different light level? maybe dosing trace elements and putting in assorted coralline scrapings might kickstart process.

[marie]

I have enough coralline algae for my tank, your tank, and everyone elses tank :twised: . It's not because your tank is sps dominant because mine is too maybe its because of the clams but I suspect it has more to do with nutrient levels, it is an algae after all

[GreenSpottedPuffer]

I don't think its nutrient levels either though. Well I mean I don't think your going to get more coraline in a higher nutrient tank. My tank is always at 0 nitrates, 0 phosphates and I don't have a speck of nuisance algae but am getting a lot of coraline on the rocks. The only other algae in my tank is a ball of chaeto that doesn't really grow much.

I never got as much coraline until I started adding Kalk in my top off water (since kalk precipitates phosphates, that would explain 0 reading I always get). I think I agree that the corals/clams will out compete the coraline. I know before Kalk I was only using two part and would test the Ca every few days. I noticed that I would dose in the morning and get a Ca reading of around 400 and by the next day if I did not dose two part again, it would be mid 300's. And this is a tank with only frags. So the corals are using up a ridiculous amount of Ca each day. I think my clams are a big part of it too.

After dosing kalk though, the Ca never drops below 400 even when I forget or choose not to dose two part.

Just my observations...

[i have crabs]

calcium polygluconate which is what is used in most liquid calcium supplements is supposed to be the best way to grow coraline

[Aquattro]

Andrew, I have more coraline than I could ever want, I scrape the side and it's covered again in weeks. I do notice that my SPS don't grow like they should. While they encrust heavily, they don't elongate at all. This may be due to elevated Ca levels (>500ppm) over a few months, but I do notice that as I drop Ca, the corals are starting to grow, and it's possible the coraline is slowing. If you really want coraline, come by and we can scrap soe off to seed your tank with, this has always helped me.
Nutrient wise, I have really no other algae to speak of, other than some small patches of wafer algae. I don't think it's a nutrient issue.
My 150 used to grow coralne like crazy, even though the SPS needed pruning monthly. However, my 75, with equally strong SPS growth, didn't have any coraline whatsoever. So hard to say, from experience, I have yet to determine what causes it to grow, or impedes it.

[christyf5]

My tank had coralline a couple of years ago for a short while. Then suddenly it all died off for some reason and that was the end of that. No coralline on glass/pumps but I still have some on the rock. I'd love to have it grow but I dunno, I guess all my sps are sucking the Ca up too fast.

[new but handy]

Hey I've got quite a few dime sized spots on my glass and pumps.
But I've noticed that on the under side of my home-made rock and my base rock (in the shade) coralline is covering everything. Seems to like the shade.
It is growing on everything but it's much faster in the shady areas.
Just an observation.
I'm running 3 250w mh 15000k and pc actincts

[christyf5]

Hey I've got quite a few dime sized spots on my glass and pumps.
But I've noticed that on the under side of my home-made rock and my base rock (in the shade) coralline is covering everything. Seems to like the shade.
It is growing on everything but it's much faster in the shady areas.
Just an observation.
I'm running 3 250w mh 15000k and pc actincts

Coralline definitely does better in lower lighted areas, I find it used to grow best under my eurobracing and under various powerheads and such. Don't talk to Marie about that though :wink:

[marie]

...
Nutrient wise, I have really no other algae to speak of, other than some small patches of wafer algae. I don't think it's a nutrient issue.
...
It's possible the coralline algae is using the nutrients and thats why you have no other algae.

Something everyone forgets is that everything including sps corals need nutrients of some kind in the water column to grow, if one organism is using it all up before others can grab it then the others growth suffers.
I happen to have a ton of coralline, fantastic coral growth, cyano out my ears and a healthy ball of cheato in my sump. I also have very fat fish who get fed too often :redface:.

Coralline definitely does better in lower lighted areas, I find it used to grow best under my eurobracing and under various powerheads and such. Don't talk to Marie about that though :wink:

I do find different colours of coralline like different levels of light. The pinks and lavenders like higher light and the reds and purples like it better underneath. The branching kind doesn't seem to care and the plating stuff is definitely low light

[Aquattro]

Marie, what I meant is that I dont think the lack of coraline is due to lack of nutrients, but rather I don't think it's presence means high nutrients.

[marie]

And I guess what I'm trying to say is... What are you crazy? why on earth would anyone want coralline algae. It sucks up all your calcium and then you have to buy shares in a vinegar company to get it off all your equipment :razz:

I have it growing inside my skimmer, it clogs up the airline that I use to gravity feed my calcium reactor and I even have it growing inside my wavebox :lol:

[Canadian]

Thanks for the replies.

I'm still leaning toward the lack of coralline in my case being the result of high nutrients that aren't being picked up on testing. As I mentioned earlier, when I blast my rock I stir up the detritus and it gets caught in some of the hair algae on the LR which I think is what feeds it, but there could be some unmeasured nutrients in the tank that are also contributing to it. I also think this is why briefly adding sand lead to a brief explosion of coralline - the sand acted as a nutrient sink while it was in there briefly.

My Ca is quite high as well Brad (often testing at 500+) and I do notice I get more encrusting than vertical growth. I might try to change my dosing on my dosing pumps to see if I can bring it down a bit and see if it has any effect.

[brizzo]

calcium polygluconate which is what is used in most liquid calcium supplements is supposed to be the best way to grow coraline

I'm going to put support to that, personally my tank maintains around 380ppm with consistent water changes. Once I started dosing small amounts of kent liquid calcium once a week, I got coraline out the wazoo.

Maybe you want to try some purple-up? ;)

[Aquattro]

I have it growing inside my skimmer,

I have it in my skimmer too, and the skimmer is in a separate sump room with a 50w bulb in the ceiling!!

[Skimmerking]

Be careful on what you wish for. I know on my 170 gal i had in the wall where the 150 is now. I had huge Coraline growing it was peeling off and I was going thur CAL and ALK like crazy...... SO theis time around im scraping it off because it will suck the life out of CAL and ALK..

[StirCrazy]

Andrew what are you using for lights again and what colors, and how long are they on for?

I had a zero nurtrean tank in my 90, My Mg was the same as yours, I feel your Ca is way high. I found much over 400 and you actualy get a slow down in growth in SPS. I used to try maintain mine at 380 to 400. I also had my alk a little higher than yours, 12 if I recall right.

I had SPS growth and color that poped, with nice deep colors. I was running Pure actinic 12 hours a day and My 10K MH for 8 hours a day, and I had to clean coraline off the glass every other day and it would plug my tunze in about 2 weeks to the point if the power went off they wouldn't restart.

personaly I think it was the extended actinic period that did it, in combanation with a elevated alk and a natural level Ca.

Steve

[Canadian]

Hi Steve,

Right now I'm running 4 x 24W Tek light while I wait for my ATI 6 x 24W Sunpower to come in. Today I actually swapped one of my AquaScience Duo lamps for a UVL Actinic (420nm) just to see if bluer coloration makes a difference. Prior to swapping lamps today I was running 2 X Giesemann Actinic+ (mostly 450nm - a "blue" lamp) and 2 x AquaScience Duo (around 15,000K - a "daylight" and "actinic" combination). This combination was fairly white with a hint of blue and now with the swapped out AquaScience Duo for a UVL Actinic it's much closer to 20,000K looking.

As far as calcium goes I struggle with keeping it down while maintaining my Alk higher despite using Reef Crystals salt which I bought because I heard it had high Alk and and low Ca - but so far it's tested quite high in Ca. I think I will shut my doser down over the next 24 hours to see how much my Ca drops and then re-adjust my Ca dosing to keep my Ca around 425 and Alk around 10dKh. Then I'll just dose to keep Ca around 425 and Alk around 10dKH without worrying about equally dosing the 2-part.

[StirCrazy]

ya, give that a try Andrew, one other thing to note is that the different colors of coraline seam to coraspond with color of light and intensity of light. oh do all you bulbs turn on at the same time? is there a way you can do the old "pure actinic comes on for a couple hours then the rest, and opposit at night? that might encourage more purple growth.

Steve

[banditpowdercoat]

Not much Coraline, BUT, alot of Cyano LOL