The Ugly Phase Breaking The Cycle Part 2 Nano Reef Tank Build Fluval Flex 15g Saltwater Aquarium

Part 2 of a 2 part video.

In this video I am going to talk about how to Break The Cycle of the Ugly Phase portion of establishing a reef tank. This is a continuation of the series on my Fluval Flex 15 gallon Nano Reef Aquarium Build / Setup.

During the Ugly Phase of cycling a reef tank, your tank will have an algae bloom. I had a huge algae bloom that included:
- Brown Algae
- Green Algae
- Hair Algae
- Red Cyano Algae
This algae coated my rock scape and sand bed.

The 2 steps taken to Break The Cycle of the Ugly Phase are:
1 - Clean Up Crew (cuc) addition. This was the focus of Part 1.
2 - Adjust Filtration Contents. This will be the focus of Part 2.

The first thing to note before going into the Filtration Contents of each chamber is that I added the remainder of the Microbe-Lift Special Blend to the filtration to continue boosting the beneficial bacteria within the filtration to support the development and sustainability of bio load.

The Fluval Flex has a 3 chamber filtration system in the back. The contents of the filtration by chamber are below:

Chamber 1 - Inlet Chamber
- Ceramic Media
- Chemi-Pure Elite
- Carbon

Chamber 2 - Filter Pad Chamber
- Filter Pad, cut in half
- Purigen
- ROWA phos

Chamber 3 - Return Pump Chamber
- Ceramic Media
- Heater
- Return Pump

Proper filtration is an essential part of water chemistry, algae control, and general reef tank health. The filtration will aid in cleaning the water, removing organic waste, removing phosphate, and holding the needed bio load that will help your tank thrive. Having a healthy tank is the best proactive measure you can take to ensure success. Allowing detritus, organic waste, and phosphates to remain unchecked will lead to algae issues.

I will show results at day 5 and day 9:
Day 5 - most all algae was gone except for the cyano.
Day 9 - all algae was gone.

Special note: I assisted the process by manually removing the cyano myself daily for a week. As for the other algae, the clean up crew removed all the other forms of algae from the tank without assistance and the filtration updates aided in it not returning.