Caulerpa Smokin'

[jsolomito]

Can anyone explain what just happened? I have a 135 gal tank with a fairly heavy load of Caulerpa Algae (keeps my yellow tang quite happy). Everything seems to be healthy. Tank is approx 2 mo. old. pH 8.3, sp.gr 1.026, Temp. 78, Ammonia 0, Nitrite 0, Nitrate 30 ppm. This afternoon, with only the actinics on a large patch of the Caulerpa appeared silver colored. I pulled a few leaves out and they looked pretty normal out of the water in room light. As soon as the MH's came on it looked like they started smoking!

Within a few minutes the whole tank got cloudy. The fish (2 baby clowns, a small pygmy angel and the tang) seem to be ignoring it but It has never happened before. Any idea what this might have been? Should I remove the lighter colored Caulerpa?
Thanks,
Joe

[Aquarist007]

The caulerpa has gone sexual on you
You need to do an immediate 50 per cent water change or you will lose that tank over night

[Aquarist007]

Here is some more information---I just hope you get to the water change before reading it all

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/20...nftt/index.php

it is rapid release of caulerpa spores--each one capable of forming a caulerpa plant
Each one consumes the oxygen in your tank--with millions of spores being release it won't take long to crash your tank

Water change asap and if you can quarantine those fish it would be a good idea too

[rjsilvers]

Wow. That's not good at all...

[snorvich]

Yes, capn is right. As quickly as you can do the water change. And stop using caulerpa.

[jsolomito]

Thanks, heading down to do it now!
Joe

[Mariner]

Basically your caulerpa has dumped a lot of nutrients back into your water column. The degree to which this could effect your tank ranges from minimal to catastrophic; depends on how much caulerpa went sexual, how big your tank is, and what you've got in it. If it's mainly fish and caulerpa (as your sig indicates) you should be ok. Take out any caulerpa that's gone bad or looks like it might. Do a water change and crank up your skimmer.
HTH,
Mariner

[jsolomito]

Tank is 135 gal. with 20 gal. sump. Only a few fish so far, LR, LS, a few sponges and hard corals, 2 anemones. I had enough SW on hand to do about a 30% change (additional 40 gal aging & warming right now). I put a micron filter in the sump. Skimmer & ozone injector on (redox 345). I also have a UV sterilizer but not sure how much good it will do with spores. At this point the water seems to be clearing up nicely. I'll rinse out the filter pad a couple of times tonight. I do have a QT tank, but was not anticipating using it right now, it is cycling, ammonmia at 0.5 ppm. It may be more stressful on the fish to net them & put them in there than to leave them.
Anything else I should be doing at this point? It doesn't look like anything much has settled on the LR etc. Should I try blowing it off so it can be filtered out?
I really appreciate the quick replies. It may have saved me a major crash.
Joe

[Mariner]

Sounds like you'll be fine. I had a mass of caulerpa go sexual in a 10g nano several years ago with minimal effect, but I didn't have any SPS in the tank, just softies...they didn't seem to mind. I've had small episodes in tanks since then. IMO, if you've got caulerpa you need to keep it harvested, leaving only minimal amounts in your tank, so that if there is an incident the impact will be manageable.
FWIW,
Mariner

[Tswifty]

man that stinks... that was my biggest fear, well outside of being attacked by shark in the bathtub...

Anyway, looks like a case of RC to the rescue again... It's great how fast people jump to your aid when you need it

I recently pulled all the caulerpa out of my fuge and replaced it with cheato... now I just have to figure out what to do about that darn shark

Good luck, keep us posted.

[jsolomito]

The reason I've been keeping it at all is that from what I've read here the tang likes to graze continuously and would not be happy with just 1 or 2 feedings per day. Pretty much every time I see him he is nibbling and he certainly appears to be fat and active. I also thought it would help with water quality and does add a nice look to the tank. Watching that stuff get released however was a chilling experience! I'm going to remove most of it and just leave enough so that any herbivores (present & future) can have fresh veggies whenever they want. Is there anything that can signal an impending release? Yesterday, as far as I can remember, everything looked normal. Is it mostly the older plants? Any steps that can be taken to prevent it?
Also, it seemed as soon as the bright lights came on is when all h**l broke loose. Do you think this was just coincidence? Perhaps I should have removed the "silver" ones immediately while just the actinics were on. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.
Joe

[tmz]

No way I know to prevent it. Some caulerpa is toxic. I would remove it all and use a nori clip once per day for the tangs.
Caulerpa is a single celled algae. Yes with all that stucture it's hard to believe but it is. When it sporulates it a ll goes at once,dumping spores and nutrients. It can be invasive a well and take over a tank if your tangs don'e eat it fast enough. It does absorb nutrients and improve water quality but then it dumps it all back all at the same time.If you decide to keep it in your tank harvest it frequently and keep it in small amounts.

In addition to water changes I would run copious amounts of carbon for a week or so.

[CaptainCoral]

I like to keep a fair "window" of growth between enough algae growing to do it's job, but not so much that it cannot sustain its own growth. Occasionally I'll slip up and keep a little too much growing and its appearance/health starts to suffer. At that point, I'll harvest more than usual to give what remains good health.

Good water parameters and stability help as well.

Randy Holmes Farley did a poll with caulerpa users on its going sexual and iron dosing. Those who dosed iron reported less incident.

I've run my caulerpa refugiums lighting 24hrs and 12 hrs both (currently all of them 12hrs reverse daylight for ph stability)
I feel that 12hr light cycles are fine when tank stability is achieved and there isn't too much growing to sustain itself.

[CaptainCoral]

As to my preference for caulerpa, I like it because it grows faster than any other algae I've tried (I have quite a few species in three different fuges), and it scrubs my remote dsb's. I don't have to worry about ditritus accumulation on or in the sand bed. I actually try to get as much in there as I can, and the sand is clean. The caulerpas roots have the ability to feed on waste in the sand.

[wiscsaltwater]

Tank is approx 2 mo. old.

Tank is 135 gal. with 20 gal. sump. Only a few fish so far, LR, LS, a few sponges and hard corals, 2 anemones.

the 1st thing you need to do is SLOW DOWN, 2 months and you have sponges, corals and anemones? some tanks take 2 months just to complete a cycle. Calurpa went sexual and is now going to be an issue for some time to come, read up on what you put in your tank, tangs will be happy with a clip once or twice a day.

[jsolomito]

All the LR came from TBS so there really wasn't much of a cycle. Richard threw the sponges and anemones in as "extras". Otherwise I probably wouldn't have tried anything like that for about six months or so. So far everything is doing fine but I don't anticipate any more additions for a while. I do keep pretty close check on water though and do about 5% change per week and maintain Ca and Alk. with 2 part system. My only loss so far has been in the QT tank and I think that was my fault because ammonia spiked too high. I've been reading everything I can find here about QT tanks but I still can't get a good handle on controling the N cycle in such a small system that is only used intermittantly.
Everything made it through the night fine. Water this morning is crystal clear so far. I'm going to get rid of most of the Caulerpa today.
Appreciate all the feedback.
Joe

[Aquarist007]

Originally posted by jsolomito
All the LR came from TBS so there really wasn't much of a cycle. Richard threw the sponges and anemones in as "extras". Otherwise I probably wouldn't have tried anything like that for about six months or so. So far everything is doing fine but I don't anticipate any more additions for a while. I do keep pretty close check on water though and do about 5% change per week and maintain Ca and Alk. with 2 part system. My only loss so far has been in the QT tank and I think that was my fault because ammonia spiked too high. I've been reading everything I can find here about QT tanks but I still can't get a good handle on controling the N cycle in such a small system that is only used intermittantly.
Everything made it through the night fine. Water this morning is crystal clear so far. I'm going to get rid of most of the Caulerpa today.
Appreciate all the feedback.
Joe

Glad to hear you took immediate action and had a positive outcome.

[Aquarist007]

Originally posted by jsolomito
The reason I've been keeping it at all is that from what I've read here the tang likes to graze continuously and would not be happy with just 1 or 2 feedings per day. Pretty much every time I see him he is nibbling and he certainly appears to be fat and active. I also thought it would help with water quality and does add a nice look to the tank. Watching that stuff get released however was a chilling experience! I'm going to remove most of it and just leave enough so that any herbivores (present & future) can have fresh veggies whenever they want. Is there anything that can signal an impending release? Yesterday, as far as I can remember, everything looked normal. Is it mostly the older plants? Any steps that can be taken to prevent it?
Also, it seemed as soon as the bright lights came on is when all h**l broke loose. Do you think this was just coincidence? Perhaps I should have removed the "silver" ones immediately while just the actinics were on. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.
Joe

try Sera stick on spirulina algae tablets. Everyone in the tank loves them, they last longer then a nori clip with no mess or possible clogging of the power heads

[Aquarist007]

Originally posted by CaptainCoral
As to my preference for caulerpa, I like it because it grows faster than any other algae I've tried (I have quite a few species in three different fuges), and it scrubs my remote dsb's. I don't have to worry about ditritus accumulation on or in the sand bed. I actually try to get as much in there as I can, and the sand is clean. The caulerpas roots have the ability to feed on waste in the sand.

I think the big difference here is that you are running the caulerpa in your fuge, the OP was growing it in the DT.

One point with using iron ---you have to be careful dosing iron with inverts

[Aquarist007]

I would like to thank personally all the guys that answered this thread quickly when I made them aware of it.
Great team work on RC

[talon4x4]

Originally posted by capn_hylinur
try Sera stick on spirulina algae tablets. Everyone in the tank loves them, they last longer then a nori clip with no mess or possible clogging of the power heads

Don't want to hijack the thread but where did you get those tablets?!? I've never seen them before.

[Aquarist007]

Originally posted by talon4x4
Don't want to hijack the thread but where did you get those tablets?!? I've never seen them before.

http://www.sera-usa.com/pages.php?pageid=95

they are sera spirulina algae tablets

I get them at www.mops.ca
there is a US outlet in the left corner of the web page==its is mail order but really quick

[jsolomito]

Thanks for the info on the tabs. Also a big ditto on the thanks to all who responded so quickly. To think that a wipeout can happen so fast is really scary.
Joe

[Aquarist007]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by jsolomito
Thanks for the info on the tabs. Also a big ditto on the thanks to all who responded so quickly. To think that a wipeout can happen so fast is really scary.
Joe [/QUOTE

Your welcome--but your direct and quick action saved your tank

This is defintely a hobby where you can be complacent and have to be constantly keeping up your knowledge base.
Reef Central is certainly the place to do it