Salinity, Nitrates - Can’t Keep Macroalgae Alive

[Malikta]

Hi All!

I’ve had my ecosphere shrimp freed for a couple years now along with 10 from Mustafa, snails macroalgae & mossballs.

I’ve made mistakes in “upgrading” to a big tank with a filter, added lava substrate and lost 1/2 my shrimp.

That was over a year ago. I went back to the basics and haven’t lost any since (or my population is growing more than the loss).

I have a 3 gallon tank (top filter I’m not using), macro algae, moss balls, a barnacle shell for my shrimp to hide in (they love it). I think I have at least 10 snails. My shrimp are very happy and I’m up to about 30. 10 adults, 10 juveniles and 10 not babies but small shrimp.

I’ve had 4 berries shrimp just this year, one right now, so I know the tank conditions are good enough. I feed about once a month.

My problem is, I cannot keep the macroalgae alive. It expands and gets lighter and lighter. I remove it before it dies and then just order more.

I’m so happy with my tank but sad I can’t keep this alive. I was using natural, indirect light, I have since picked up a tank light and used that the last month so it’s too soon to tell.

As far as testing, I’ve never done it because I’ve had a steady stream of babies. I tried to test the salinity and the hydrometer didn’t seem to read my level so I’m returning for a better tool.

The nitrates are reading at 0 .... I’m suspecting this is the issue. I do have biofilm, I can see algae growth, not a lot but I do have 40 animals in there between the shrimp and snails. Any advice would be appreciated.

[Varanus]

Not saying there isn't a solution, but Mustafa has noted that even in seemingly identical conditions he has had tanks where in one the macroalgae thrived, while in another it fell apart. So there may not be much you can do other than let the moss balls slowly populate (their growth seems to be more predictable).

Albeit, even those broken up bits of macroalgae are not necessarily dead, they can and do start growing again should conditions become favorable for them (whatever that constitutes).

[skrimpster]

The building blocks for plants are potassium, nitrogen, and phosphorus (K,N,P). Plants get their nitrogen from nitrates and ammonia, so your theory is a good guess as to where the deficiency is. It's also not unusual to see plants "melt" when you move them from one tank to another even if the conditions may seem similar.

I've seen that java moss, christmas mosses and marimo mosses tend to thrive when nitrates are a little bit higher than 0 (I try to keep mine at 5 ppm in my shrimp tanks). Dosing the tank with a nitrates-based fertilizer may have other complications, which may negatively impact your shrimp.

Safest thing to do would be to wait it out and see if the macroalgae returns back to its form.

[Dch48]

Mine is staying bright green and maybe has grown a little, I tested for nitrates yesterday and there was barely any reading at all. There is a mix of brown and green algae on the walls and on the sea fan so between that and the macroalgae, the nitrates are being consumed I guess.

[Vorteil]

Do you have any pics of your tank? If I were to guess I would say that your algae is not getting enough nutrients. The alage feeds off the waste from the opae. If you don't feed like most of us do there's only so much left in the tank for your alage to survive on. I know when there's too much macro algae in my tank & I clear it out all the little strands left at the bottom would grow quickly due to less competition. I know in this tank there's plenty of opae in there to sustain the algae. Still not enough to get the alage a darl green color but enough to survive. It seems to hit a peak and taper off as far as growth is concerned. Just like everyone else my original macro algae was purchased from Mustafa too.