red slime! can't get rid of it.

I am going through a major outbreak of red slime that is sticking to and covering everything. Corals and fish look fine, but some snails and limpets have been covered by it. It is cinnamon-red, and has a slimy-stringy texture, and traps air bubbles. Some chhunks come loose and float to the top. Nobody in the tank seems to like eating it.

My tank is 2 1/2 months old. I went through small unproblematic oubreaks of diatoms, and hair algae, but now this is quite noticeable. I am hoping it is just part of the maturing process and it goes away. I am guessing these are dinoflagellates. Is that so? Any tips on how to control it, how log will it last, and how harmful can it be?

Some more info about tank:

Tank: 12 gallon Eclipse

Filtration: Eclipse filter plus Rio 90 PH

pH: 8.5

ammonia, nitrites: 0

nitrate: 10-20 ppm

calcium: 520 ppm

SG: 1.024-1.025

water source: distilled from supermarket

salt: Coralife

water changes: 2 gal/week

There are many factors that favour cyanobacteria. They include the level of dissolved organics in the water, light, and flow.

I had a recent outbreak covering all my sand and many of the rocks. I hadn't done anything unusual, my lights were not the cause, my water parameters were perfect and changing the flow had no effect.

I got rid of it with two 25% WC's 4 days apart and more consistent 10% WC's EVERY week thereafter. I ran my skimmer 24/7 to pull out some of the organics and siphoned off the sand and rocks very carefully. I also changed out my carbon stage on my RO unit. Lo and behold it has now gone and shows no sign of returning. OK ... it was a PITA to do all that stuff but the systematic approach worked for me. You can always do it the easy way of course and use one of the many reef safe red slime removers out there. Make sure you aerate the water very well if you decide to go that route.

Thank you. For some reason I thought of dinoflagellates, but now that you mention cyanobacteria it does look like it. I did a search and found some useful threads. I am increasing my PH flow (had the valve semi-closed).

There is something that may have contributed to this outbreak. I used a different brand of distilled water for my water change.

if you have a test kit for them, check your phosphate and kH levels too. i noticed a spike in kH resulted in stunting the growth of nuisance algae. not sure this would solve the problem but might slow it down.

Def having a problem with disolved organics, if you have a skimmer use it... If not, pick up some GAC at your LFS. This should help. The question is how it got in there in the first place. I would be suspicious of the new water as well as ANY other change in the tank in the last 2 weeks.

Go light on the feeding, and do frequent water changes.

You could also try adding some queen or fighting conchs. These are the only guys I know that love to munch on cyano.

Increase dissolved oxygen in the water, cyano perfers less oxygen. Easy enough, just aim a power head across the surface of your tank. Buy if you changed types of water or salts in the last couple of weeks, that would be my first suspect.

Good Luck

The closed down PH would have been a factor I think. In my case, a blocked PH allowed my cyano to get a foothold. I understand that once it gets going it tends to alter the tank equilibrium in its favour so you have to keep a close eye on it.

I'm very surprised that you have cyano in such a young tank though ......... Are you sure its not diatoms?

No-Cya-NO. by Fish Vet.

get some.

reef safe,

biodegradeable,

no polutants.

it is a little known "Pro" solution.

the kind of slime u have is a nasty strain.

it will choke everything slowly by O2 Suffication.

try this.

you will thank me, and your tank will recover.

Also Coralife salt is NOTORIOUS for fueling cyano bacteria as is Crystal sea. I was in a pinch and needed some salt.... BAD IDEA.

I shoulda used kosher salt fron the grocery store. tanks ver FUBAR with the stuff in less than a week. NEVER AGAIN !

Upon completion of treatment, run your skimmer after and do some waterchanges. Lookin to phosphates as a culprit as well as possible accidental contamination from Grocery store water. Increase lighting if possible for a few days.

IKTWH

Dave ...... could you explain your rationale behind the increased lighting?

Thanks

low light = lowered ph and O2 content.

test the ph of a tank at night, and one at full strength halide at noon..... they are different guaronteed. same with a tank under floros and then adding a halide. I have seen ph jump .02 in less than 2 hours.

A higher amount of light will speed up the growth of the cyano so that it burns itself out faster, OR will be shocked by the increased light to the point of it nearly bleaching itself out of existance. Its a form of PAR irradication. this can be dangerous too if you exceed the thresh hold of the corals in a tank for too long. Usualy I do it for 24 hours solid.

To get real technical, if you could introduce a .2 % influx of ozone in the tank through a reactor, it will eleminate the bacteria

but it is not something that will likely be a viable (or inexpensive)form of irradication.

Phototonic radiation from the INCREASED lighting will also help the algaes and corals sustain themselves while the cyano consumes the nutrients the corals and other inverts are also competing for. It isnt a necessary process, but it is something that has worked in the past on a few tanks that when experiencing major outbreaks of cyano AND/OR the choking dieoff of caluerpia species and other macros, has saved my proverbial Wrasse on a few occasions.

Hope this makes some sense... ???