Son threw in 1oz lump of Play -Doh, and bread crumbs

[Reefmonster]

I new to NR but I've had reef tanks since 1991. My tank is a 21 day old BC14 with 1" of Carib sea Crushed coral and 2pieces of base dry rock seeded with Biozyme and Micro-lift. I place a Media Basket in chamber 2, and have filter floss on top with nothing in the other spaces. I replaced the stock pump with a Hydor Pico 1200 and have cycled the aquarium using the ammonia drip method and have had great success with it until now. I also added a Koralia Nano with a simple wavemaker. I had the algal bloom on day 7 and left it for one week to fully mature. On day 15 I added my CUC which is 7 blue-legged hermits and (1) Mexican turbo snail. They ate everything in 6 days, which prompted me to do the following...

 

Yes...I fed a tiny 1/4" leaf of spinach to my CUC because they did such a great job of cleaning every morsel of algae off everything...Anyhow, now my water is cloudy as heck. Chemistry is as follows;

 

Ammonia - Undetected

Nitrite - Undetected

Nitrate - 10 PPM

Phosphate - Very Low on the test scale

Calcium 450ppm

pH 8.2

 

I just did a 5gal water change and the SG according to the refractometer is 1.023.

 

Bacterial bloom? Algae bloom? Got me stumped.

 

Any ideas whats going on in my tank?

[Reefmonster]

Not one reply? Holy Cow, Batman!

[ajkochev]

I don't know what caused the cloudiness, but IMO try and limit any food put in the tank to things made or mostly made out of stuff that grew in the ocean to begin with. See what happens when you feed some Nori(seaweed) instead. Spinach is high in iron so maybe that had something to do with it.

[Reefmonster]

I don't know what caused the cloudiness, but IMO try and limit any food put in the tank to things made or mostly made out of stuff that grew in the ocean to begin with. See what happens when you feed some Nori(seaweed) instead. Spinach is high in iron so maybe that had something to do with it.

I just found out that my 3 yo son put some bread crust in the tank and a small quarter sized piece of blue play-doh... According to the Play-Doh website it is made from non-toxic ingredients of Flour, water, salt, Starch, and food coloring, so hopefully it'll be okay.

 

I made a 5gal water change this morning and will mix and make another 5gal WC tomorrow. The hermits are still running around and the snails seem to be doing fine, so at least I'm not so frantic now. Nitrates went up a bit to 20ppm before the WC. I also added some Activated Carbon to chamber 2. I also noticed a light film of algae on the glass where there was none before...

 

I suppose the water now has Amylose in it which will likely feed whatever alga might be in the water column...I'm hoping that my bacteria can compensate, but maybe I'll need more drastic measures to overcome this.

 

Any other ideas on what I can do beside water changes and carbon?

[Oceanus]

Run Chemi-Pure Elite and maybe Purigen. Lot's of wc's.

[jbb]

trade the kid in for store credit at your lfs... he isnt REEF SAFE ... that might help slove future issues

 

 

 

 

 

carbon and w/c should do it, i think you will be fine

[RedMan25xl]

so your saying he just threw in the snack foods you give him?

[dsoz]

It is a bacterial bloom from the sugar/starch/flour. If you have a skimmer, turn it up. If you have an air pump, put it in to oxygenate the water or the bacteria will use up all the oxygen and the stuff in your tank will die.

 

This is similar to when people start dosing sugar/vodka/vinegar and they get a bacterial bloom. The only things you can do is to let it run its course, or do major water changes. 50 to 75% or more will not hurt as long as the temperature, salinity, calcium, and carbonate (alkalinity) are the same. Several smaller changes spread out over a long period of time would be better for the animals in your tank but one large change would reduce the amount of bacteria food in the water the most. You need to balance between the two (some small changes and let it run its course).

 

dsoz

[Reefmonster]

This is similar to when people start dosing sugar/vodka/vinegar and they get a bacterial bloom. The only things you can do is to let it run its course, or do major water changes. 50 to 75% or more will not hurt as long as the temperature, salinity, calcium, and carbonate (alkalinity) are the same. Several smaller changes spread out over a long period of time would be better for the animals in your tank but one large change would reduce the amount of bacteria food in the water the most. You need to balance between the two (some small changes and let it run its course).

dsoz

 

 

I think I just discovered a new way to cycle a tank! A ball of Play-doh and bread crusts! My tank appears magically cycled on day 24 and all seems to be in good order. I dumped in a nylon baggie of carbon and did a 4 gal WC, and it all looks good now. Tests are WAY better than before the Play-Doh'sing, and the water is sparkling clear. no hints of Nitrate either...Interesting...Very intesresting!

 

I wonder if I could Patent the Play-Doh method...

 

Thanks for all the help!