FlowerMama Posted July 11, 2013 Share Posted July 11, 2013 hopefully someone w/ macro experience can help. I think cutting down the time but not turning off completely though. Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 16, 2013 Author Share Posted July 16, 2013 I made the decision Friday to turn off the lights for the weekend. Came back into the office yesterday and things were really looking better! (Then I made the silly mistake of leaving the lights on all night...woops). Still looking pretty good today and the macros seem to be getting most color back that was lost. Still a little ways to go until a full recovery but things are starting to look up. Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 19, 2013 Author Share Posted July 19, 2013 Update: Everyday I come in, the brown is back. No slime or anything like that. I'm 99.9% sure that it is diatoms. I can take a turkey baster and blow it all away. Problem is, it is everywhere; On the macros, the rocks, the substrate, the walls...everywhere. I ordered a clean up crew which was delivered yesterday in hopes that this may help. Other than that, I don't know what else to do. All parameters are in line (no Nitrates or anything like that). Any other suggestions/advice? Link to comment
Islandoftiki Posted July 19, 2013 Share Posted July 19, 2013 It sounds like diatoms, but could it maybe be cyano? Maybe you have excess silicates in the tank causing a diatom outbreak. Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 19, 2013 Author Share Posted July 19, 2013 Not sure that it is cyano. Isn't that red color that I normally see. Not familiar with extra silicates. Can you expand on that please? Link to comment
BadCrab Posted July 19, 2013 Share Posted July 19, 2013 Probably just need to expand the CUC a bit I'd say wait and see how they do Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 19, 2013 Author Share Posted July 19, 2013 Actually, diatoms really does make sense. One thing I did add recently to the tank was branching coralline and fine coralline. I'm willing to bet that is what caused the outbreak. I would imagine it is very similar to adding live rock. This was all living and I'm guessing caused the outbreak. Link to comment
Islandoftiki Posted July 19, 2013 Share Posted July 19, 2013 Diatoms require silicates to survive. If you can reduce or eliminate any silicates, you'll get rid of the diatoms. There are a couple filter medias that adsorb silicates. Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 19, 2013 Author Share Posted July 19, 2013 Next question: My Rock Nem is not very happy with all of this and has detached himself and is floating around (looks pretty funny honestly, lol). Anyways, I am trying to think of a good way to keep him safe. Any suggestions? I thought about putting him in a cup, but the only cup I have here is plastic and way too small for him to expand fully. Maybe put him back in the fuge for now? Although this will give him no light. Link to comment
Islandoftiki Posted July 19, 2013 Share Posted July 19, 2013 I've seen people put them in plastic sieves that just float on the surface... http://s1176.photobucket.com/user/mattmclemore/media/DSCN1306_zpsaec7d692.jpg.html'> Link to comment
jedimasterben Posted July 19, 2013 Share Posted July 19, 2013 I've never had a rock flower that detached by itself, but when moving them, they always reattached within an hour. Maybe try placing it in a different spot with any powerheads off and let it do its own thing? Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 22, 2013 Author Share Posted July 22, 2013 Decided to let the lights run a normal cycle over the weekend while I was gone. Came back into the office today and everything looked much better first thing this morning. Things stayed clear until the GE bulb came on (which is at noon). After that, everything started to brown back up. I took at look at the skimmer and noticed that it looked like nothing was going down the output hose. Took it apart and washed it out and YUCK! It was clogged! Gave it a good rinse out (no scrubbing tools here at the office today) and put it back in place. Also, I put the nem in a plastic to-go bowl for now so that he quits blowing around. I'm thinking I'm going to let it go another week with the skimmer cleaned out and see what happens. If things still progress and continue to brown up, I think I'm going to change the bulb. Maybe it is too much light for the tank? Link to comment
jedimasterben Posted July 22, 2013 Share Posted July 22, 2013 I've made it a point to clean out my skimmer with every dump of the cup (which unfortunately has been every day for me for the past few weeks!!!), otherwise gunk in the neck just rapes efficiency. :/ Link to comment
Islandoftiki Posted July 22, 2013 Share Posted July 22, 2013 Chris, Your description of everything looking good until the lights came on screams cyano to me. Chemi-Clean will make short work of that. I had to use some in my 25 gallon mantis tank because I have the flow so low in there to accommodate the mushroom corals that cyano grows pretty easily in some parts of the tank. Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 22, 2013 Author Share Posted July 22, 2013 Thanks, will take a look into Chemi-Clean. Did you use an airstone as suggested or did you just mix it and turn up power heads? Link to comment
jedimasterben Posted July 22, 2013 Share Posted July 22, 2013 Chris, Your description of everything looking good until the lights came on screams cyano to me. Chemi-Clean will make short work of that. I had to use some in my 25 gallon mantis tank because I have the flow so low in there to accommodate the mushroom corals that cyano grows pretty easily in some parts of the tank. Why do you have low flow for mushrooms? I've got some that are three inches under a Tunze 6095 at 100%. Unless you're trying to get them to attach. Link to comment
Islandoftiki Posted July 22, 2013 Share Posted July 22, 2013 Thanks, will take a look into Chemi-Clean. Did you use an airstone as suggested or did you just mix it and turn up power heads? I did use an air stone just to be safe. I was surprised at how clean the rocks and sand looked after one treatment. It pissed off the mushrooms the most, but after a week, they looked even better than before. Why do you have low flow for mushrooms? I've got some that are three inches under a Tunze 6095 at 100%. Unless you're trying to get them to attach. Everywhere there's any real flow, the mushrooms have all detached and floated around until they're eventually all in the lowest flow parts of the tank. If I were to crank up the flow any more, they'd all end up in the back corners of the tank. LOL. Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 23, 2013 Author Share Posted July 23, 2013 I did use an air stone just to be safe. I was surprised at how clean the rocks and sand looked after one treatment. It pissed off the mushrooms the most, but after a week, they looked even better than before. Everywhere there's any real flow, the mushrooms have all detached and floated around until they're eventually all in the lowest flow parts of the tank. If I were to crank up the flow any more, they'd all end up in the back corners of the tank. LOL. You think I could just get away with using my air stone from my skimmer? I know the directions state to turn off the skimmer when using that treatment. I was thinking that I could just use the air stone from it, put it in the display portion of the tank and turn it on. It is either that or I have to go out and purchase an air stone specifically for this. Link to comment
jedimasterben Posted July 23, 2013 Share Posted July 23, 2013 I would get as much air into the tank as possible IMHO. Link to comment
Islandoftiki Posted July 23, 2013 Share Posted July 23, 2013 You think I could just get away with using my air stone from my skimmer? I know the directions state to turn off the skimmer when using that treatment. I was thinking that I could just use the air stone from it, put it in the display portion of the tank and turn it on. That's exactly what I did when I treated the 10 gallon tank for the green cyano. I just used the limewood air stone. Worked great. The tank was full of little bubbles while I was treating it, but it didn't seem to bother anything. Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 23, 2013 Author Share Posted July 23, 2013 Thanks Guys! Gotta love amazon Prime. Ordered that Chemi-Clean stuff last night, will be here tomorrow . For now, I'm just keeping on top of hitting the nasty growth with the turkey baster to clean off as much as possible. I'm willing to bet that I had bad water in my previous auto top off container and that may have caused this. Here's hoping this treatment clears it all up. If not, back to the drawing board, lol. Link to comment
Islandoftiki Posted July 23, 2013 Share Posted July 23, 2013 I'm actually thinking about making chemi-clean a regular maintenance procedure every three months, maybe 1/2 the normal dosage. I'm astounded how much it just generally cleans up the tank and makes everything look pristine. Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 24, 2013 Author Share Posted July 24, 2013 Chemi-clean is due to arrive today (usually around lunch). I'll treat and update once I know more. Of course, I come in today and noticed that my light didn't look right when powered on. Two of the bulbs didn't come on. After troubleshooting, it would appear that I had one bulb (that was just purchased in May 2013) go bad already! Errrrr.... Luckily, I had a spare bulb, though it was a different type than the previous. So now I'm running the following for lights: (Back to front) Aquablue Special Purple+ Blue+ GE6500K Link to comment
ccapasso Posted July 24, 2013 Author Share Posted July 24, 2013 Treatment applied, skimmer turned off and air stone moved to display. Now...we wait and hope . Link to comment
Islandoftiki Posted July 25, 2013 Share Posted July 25, 2013 You'll probably begin noticing a major improvement starting tomorrow. It usually takes about 2 days to kick in, then bam! Link to comment
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