Ok seriously WTH?!? Red Cyano all over

[Clown79]

Distilled having phos is odd. It's pure water and safely used by many. 

 

 

Lfs water that's labeled rodi often isn't rodi water. Often ro water or rodi that is less than perfect as they cheap out on changing filters when they should be changed.

 

There are many factors at play. Even the container water is stored in can be an issue.

[Clown79]

3 minutes ago, seabass said:

I would consider phosphate a contributing factor, but maybe not "the" cause.  I've had small patches of cyano in tanks even in tanks where I couldn't detect phosphate with a Hanna ULR Phosphorus Checker (before, during, and after the bloom).  IMO, organics may play an even bigger role in cyano.  I encourage you to work on that too.

So true.

 

People jump to the phos cause but it can be anything from over feeding, food types, over stocking, bacteria issues, lack of flow, husbandry issues, additives,  etc. Etc.

[Reidallaboutit]

Update 3 - Haven't resorted to chemiclean yet. Added another pump to remove dead spots in the tank and the skimmer has been running strong for a couple days.

 

It's looking better in there and..... holy crap a lot of garbage has been pulled out from the skimmer (pictured).  Like Seabass mentioned, dissolved organics could be playing a big role.

[Reidallaboutit]

On 6/28/2018 at 11:52 AM, Clown79 said:

So true.

 

People jump to the phos cause but it can be anything from over feeding, food types, over stocking, bacteria issues, lack of flow, husbandry issues, additives,  etc. Etc.

I'm ticking off the list here. Phos was initial thought...getting that lower through routine water changes with better source water.

 

Flow - there were a couple dead spots so I picked up a hydor nano 240gph to get some more movement.

 

Overstocking, additives, husbandry, etc I don't think are an issue right now. I'm stocked with a cleanup crew, two clowns, two cleaner shrimp and a lawnmower blenny. I do 10% weekly water changes, rake gravel and Turkey baste rocks clean. No additives.

 

Overfeeding probably isn't an issue either. I spot feed the fish/shrimp with a baster using a frozen mysis, krill, phyto mix at the moment. They're frozen into little cubes and I use like 1/4 of a cube each day.

 

I am thinking about getting some reef-roids to spot feed corals but haven't done so yet.

 

Is there a way to detect bacteria issues?

[1891Bro]

On 6/27/2018 at 6:27 PM, Reidallaboutit said:

Update #2

 

Slowly losing the battle against cyano. Finally got the Seachem Phosphate test kit. Looks my tank water is around 0.08 and guess what....that's the same level the grocery store distilled water I've been using for top offs tested at. My LFS is almost 40 min away so I was trying to save drive time. Clearly laziness didn't pay off. 

 

Now that I've found the source of phosphates I ordered some chemi-clean to knock out the cyano and a reef octopus HOB protein skimmer to clear the organics that will be floating around after the treatment.

 

For now on it's LFS water only until I can figure out where I'm going to install an RODI system (one more thing to buy and hear my wife give me crap about LMAO).

 

Feeling hopeful...

 

Tank parameters

 

Temp 78

Salinity 1.026

pH between 7.8 and 8 

NO4 above 0 and below 5  (color using API kit was somewhere between the two)

kH 10 

Ca 400

PO4 0.08

You mean the pre jugged on the shelf distilled or the cheap RO you bottle yourself at the machine?

[1891Bro]

On 6/28/2018 at 8:50 AM, Clown79 said:

Distilled having phos is odd. It's pure water and safely used by many. 

 

 

Lfs water that's labeled rodi often isn't rodi water. Often ro water or rodi that is less than perfect as they cheap out on changing filters when they should be changed.

 

There are many factors at play. Even the container water is stored in can be an issue.

Didn’t read far enough to see this. I’m thinking op is not getting distilled. Probably getting water from the RO machine. I could be wrong but, I doubt it. 

[Reidallaboutit]

Just now, 1891Bro said:

Didn’t read far enough to see this. I’m thinking op is not getting distilled. Probably getting water from the RO machine. I could be wrong but, I doubt it. 

I'm getting Meijer distilled water (already bottled). Not from their machine.

 

Tommorow I'll test the reference water the seachem kit came with to make sure I'm not getting a false positive.

[Clown79]

Feeding frozen food daily,  especially with phyto in it would certainly add to your phos issues. Could be the main contributing factor.

 

Raking the sandbed helps but vacuuming it is far better, it actually removes the detritus from the sandbed where as raking it releases it into the water column, allowing a majority to drop back into the sand bed.

 

 

I wouldn't use reef roids during this time, it will only add to the nutrient issues.

 

Reef roids is a suitable food for sps and filter feeders.

 

[Reidallaboutit]

1 hour ago, Clown79 said:

Feeding frozen food daily,  especially with phyto in it would certainly add to your phos issues. Could be the main contributing factor.

 

Raking the sandbed helps but vacuuming it is far better, it actually removes the detritus from the sandbed where as raking it releases it into the water column, allowing a majority to drop back into the sand bed.

 

 

I wouldn't use reef roids during this time, it will only add to the nutrient issues.

 

Reef roids is a suitable food for sps and filter feeders.

 

Would you recommend alternating between a dry food and the frozen food or should I cut back to an every other day feeding cycle?

 

As far as vacuuming, I've been doing that at every water change since you recommended doing so earlier. I started raking every other day to keep the sand bed looking a bit whiter.

 

I was given a yellow birdnest frag and a purple gorgonian so I thought they may benefit from spot feeding some roids.

 

Tank looked a little better this morning since adding the new power head. Wondering if I should give it a few more days before tweaking any other variables so I can actually figure out what is and isn't working.

[Floundering_Around]

Do you have any corals other than the birdsnest and the gorgonian? If you're light is strong enough, your birdsnest shouldn't need any feeding (it'll certainly enjoy it but it's not necessary). Your gorgonian relies mostly on flow to get food; you can probably decrease your feeding to two or three times a week while you get your tank under control

[Reidallaboutit]

10 minutes ago, Floundering_Around said:

Do you have any corals other than the birdsnest and the gorgonian? If you're light is strong enough, your birdsnest shouldn't need any feeding (it'll certainly enjoy it but it's not necessary). Your gorgonian relies mostly on flow to get food; you can probably decrease your feeding to two or three times a week while you get your tank under control

Lights aren't the greatest...It's the orbit marine IC led system. The birdsnest and gorgonian seem to be doing well.

 

I have a few other corals in there. Small frag of bam bams, super saiyans, a red setosa, and fire and ice colony.

 

The clownfish are ok to eat just a few times weekly?

[Floundering_Around]

Are you feeding frozen or pellets for your clownfish? If you're doing frozen, the little particles and liquid it's frozen in should be enough for your gorgonian. If you're feeding pellets to your clowns, you'll have to do broadcast feedings for your corals. My earlier comment was referring more to the gorgonian. You can cut back on your broadcast/spot feeding to a few times a week to help with smaller particles that will just end up in your filter and skimmer if not eaten.

[Reidallaboutit]

7 minutes ago, Floundering_Around said:

Are you feeding frozen or pellets for your clownfish? If you're doing frozen, the little particles and liquid it's frozen in should be enough for your gorgonian. If you're feeding pellets to your clowns, you'll have to do broadcast feedings for your corals. My earlier comment was referring more to the gorgonian. You can cut back on your broadcast/spot feeding to a few times a week to help with smaller particles that will just end up in your filter and skimmer if not eaten.

Ok that makes sense. I've just been feeding my clowns the frozen food. I've yet to directly feed the corals but was entertaining the idea. If they're likely getting enough from the frozen bits I'll hold off for now.

[Floundering_Around]

23 hours ago, Reidallaboutit said:

Ok that makes sense. I've just been feeding my clowns the frozen food. I've yet to directly feed the corals but was entertaining the idea. If they're likely getting enough from the frozen bits I'll hold off for now.

I had a huge cyano outbreak last year as well, and am currently battling brown slime algae, hair algae, etc. (I use tap water. boo me, I have reasons but I'm trying to change). My clowns are still in QT so I don't have any fish in the tank which is why I'm broadcast feeding. Once I add the clowns, I'll cut back quite a bit since the clowns will be adding nutrients to the water with their waste; plus, when I feed frozen, I don't rinse. I only have a few LPS but the rest of my corals are softies, SPS, and NPS that will filter feed (none of mine seem to have a feeding reaction when I drop food on them).

Only other thing is to increase water changes. Do smaller ones more frequently and the cyano should take care of its self

[Aurortpa]

Well, I did NOT cut my daylights, altho I stopped running my actinics 24/7 (I was under the impression blue lighting didn’t grow algae—doh [note this only slowed the cyano, not stop it anyway]). I had read a dark period is just a temporary stop gap measure.

 

I’ve just gotten my cyano under control, like 90% erradicated. I suspected adding live rock a few months ago, a nutrient rich sandbed, and dirty back chambers contributed to the problem, so I sand rinsed 90% of my substrate and lightly scrubbed + siphoned the back chambers.

 

The other two most significant things I did was add a skimmer and increased my supplemental flow by twofold—my tank now turnsover 44 times at peak flow. 

 

I typically run my alk higher, so I didn’t want to cut feedings as it would impact my corals. What is note worthy is that I actually increased feeding frozen from once to twice a week, and pellets everyday except water change day. 

 

Not that time itself might have been a variable, however I saw significant change once I rinsed the sandbed and cleaned the back chambers were nurtrients were lurking, started skimming, and increased flow (anything feeding the cyano in theory had a better chance getting skimmed out). Anything else I had tried for weeks and weeks like water changes, even up to 50% and cutting feedings slowed the cyano but that’s all. 

 

 

[Reidallaboutit]

Happy to update there is ZERO cyano in the tank now and I did it without resorting to chemi-clean.

 

The battle was fierce, my phosphates are still slightly elevated (although I'm not 100% sure on that because the seachem test I bought is meh). 

 

The number 1 factor that helped me win against the cyano was flow. I started with one 660gph powerhead and had a hang on back filter running without any media just to add water movement. I now have 2 660s (running at 60% each and a smaller 240).

 

It took a little playing around with positioning the heads but eventually I was able to remove all dead spots and viola! Bye bye cyano.

 

Thanks for all the input everyone. I started placing some more corals in there and everything is looking pretty happy so far. Here are a few shots from last night. They are sucking up the calcium like crazy though.

 

On to the next challenge... 🙂

[EvilFish]

Chemiclean works really good for cyano.