Aquarium blackout

[Reef inebriated]

Does anyone know about leaving lights out for three days to rid algae? Will coral and fish suffer? does it work? I replaced lights with proper light temp in fuge and plan to run fuge on reg light schedule

[TimeConsumer]

It won't hurt anything. I've done up to 7 day blackouts before without losing any fish or coral.

[sirreal63]

It isn't a solution to the problem and has no effect long term. You have algae because you have the nutrients to allow it to grow. Get the nutrients under control and the algae will not be there. Lights out is only short term, if you do not address the problem you will not be rid of it.

[Reef inebriated]

I just added sump to fix this and wanna speed things along and give the chaeto a head start. I don't really have a source for phos other than feedings and water changes

[Reef inebriated]

Should I turn on lights to feed fish. And will fish just stay asleep?

[TimothyJ]

Fish from my experience don't really care if the light is on or off for feeding or even swimming around to do their thing. Corals on the other hand care if it is long term (depending on the type of coral).

[Jeromi]

Turning your lights off could also drop your ph to undesirable levels. I would recommend lighting the fuge alternate your display.

[Reef inebriated]

Damn I didn't think about that thanks jeromi

[bif24701]

I kept my light on the fuge 24/7 during the three days lights out. This gave my cheato a head start. I also increased my vinegar dose while the lights where put giving it a head start. Then maintaining that dose for coverall weeks afterwards. It's important to have your skimmer running at max efficiency to remove as much stuff as possible. The carbon dosing helped remove excess nutrients that where releases into the water as the nuisance algae, dinos and cyano died back. Actually carbon dosing binds up the nutrients in the bacteria that it grows. Then the skimmer removes the bacteria live and dead. It works. You will notice your skimmer pulling out much more, darker, and stinker skim mate. Best thing I've done to help keep my tank well. It also allows me to feed heavily. Tuning on the lights durning feeding isn't nessasary however I don't think it will hurt much either.





120 gallon mixed reef, 55, 36, and 10g Planted, 29g African rift lake chiclids..

[shovelrider]

You can also spot treat rocks that can come out briefly with peroxide. Then rinse with RO or tank water and put it back in. Do a search and you will see it works like magic = 3 days and GHA is gone in the treated spot.

[Reef inebriated]

I'd rather not take apart the aquascape how long does it take to notice gha disappearing and will it affect corraline

[kissman]

i used black poster board and taped it to the tank, the back is painted so i didn't need to do that. but, it left the top open so I made sure I plenty of surface aggitation and I had no problems, I also didn't feed for 3 days

[acabgd]

I did the lights off for 3 days and everything was fine, including pH.

[Vanquishxxxx]

Besides a small ph swing , i have had great succes with a three day blackout. Have done it with spa,clams,lps. All actually thrived and had growth spurts in the weeks after. Just watch the ph. It will make ur tank look brand new . But as already noted its just a bandaid not a fix.

[Reef inebriated]

It's day three and iv only seen diatoms dissapear off sand and there's three or four spots with gha still. Should I go longer?

[sirreal63]

You have to manually remove it, otherwise where do you think the nutrients locked up in that algae will go when it dies? Hint, Scotty is not standing by to beam them out of your tank. Doing a blackout will not solve anything, it will only release those nutrients back into the tank. Turn the lights back on, remove as much algae as you can and run GFO until you get a handle on the PO4. Start doing more frequent water changes and get the nutrients under control.

Algae needs light and nutrients to grow, you may slow it down by removing the light but as soon as you turn the lights back on it will return, and it will until you remove what it needs to grow, you probably don't want to have the tank dark all of the time, so do what is logical, remove the nutrients it needs to grow. You can beat it but only by controlling what it needs to grow.

[kissman]

did you cover the tank so no light could get in or just cut the lights off? In order for the algae to completly die you need 0 light to get in tank. The light from the room can be enough for it to stay alive. You do need to figure out where the nutrients are coming from and fix that to or the algae will come back.

[Zacktosterone]

I'm going to bring this forum to life again. Theoretically woulfntbit helpntondo a blackout? As the phosphates are released back into the water wouldn't one be able to do a large water change on the last day to get a lot of the phosphates out?