Cyano problem

[Tired]

That's a fairly young tank that's already overstocked, if those fish are more than an inch long apiece. You should get that 30gal set up as soon as possible. 

[1st reef]

So nitrates are at zero or very close to it. 

[Toshas79]

On 12/16/2021 at 7:44 PM, 1st reef said:

How do you get those up... If too low? 

Feed more, I add every other day reefroids , also I used UV light it helped A lot . I used to keep my nutrients low phos 0.03 and nitrates 2-3 that's when I got Dinos

now I keep it higher 0.2 Phos and 5-10 nitrates

[1st reef]

I also dosed with aquaforest bio s

[Murphs_Reef]

I'm going back into a cyanobacteria bloom now.. I wouldn't recommend it as it's only been done the once by me. But in the summer I sucked all of my sand out washed it like a rip clean and dumped it back in. Worked well and has lasted 6 months with no Cyano so I'm going repeat it tomorrow morning. 

 

The route cause of mine is most definitely flow or not of enough of it on the sand bed. I have great flow up at the top and mid but as I have so many mushrooms on the sandbed I don't have great flow there.. results in build up of crap, phosphate goes wonky then cyano. 

[mcarroll]

5 hours ago, 1st reef said:

I also dosed with aquaforest bio s

Avoid things like this.  To become stable, your tank needs a diversity of organisms aside from bacteria.  (And it already has bacteria.)

 

1 hour ago, Murphych said:

I'm going back into a cyanobacteria bloom now.. I wouldn't recommend it as it's only been done the once by me. But in the summer I sucked all of my sand out washed it like a rip clean and dumped it back in. Worked well and has lasted 6 months with no Cyano so I'm going repeat it tomorrow morning. 

 

The route cause of mine is most definitely flow or not of enough of it on the sand bed. I have great flow up at the top and mid but as I have so many mushrooms on the sandbed I don't have great flow there.. results in build up of crap, phosphate goes wonky then cyano. 

A rule of thumb I use is to watch the flow right at the sand bed....if it's not strong enough to occasionally tumble small sand grains, then it's not going to lift any major detritus either.  Try rearranging your pumps for better effect....but you might need more flow or even a different style of pump.  (Most of the popular brands you see mentioned have VERY VERY VERY soft flow....as a result the GPH numbers on these pumps feels quite inflated compared with the amount of work they do.  Work isn't measured in volume like GPH, BTW, it's measured in force like feet per second (ie velocity).  Velocity is what your tank actually needs to move detritus.)

 

Detritus gets a bad rap, BTW, because of crappy and/or low-velocity flow.  

 

Detritus is an optimal food source for corals, inverts AND fish when it's not simply allowed to fall to the ground and rot.  👍

 

For reference...

 

In my old sump system, I had an open sump layout and a flow pump down there just to make sure detritus wasn't even able to settle in the sump.  I never had to clean the sump once that pump was installed down there.  

 

BTW, this can't work in a typical sump that is broken up with useless baffles which actually accumulate detritus.  Likewise, check your AIO back chamber to see if it's a trap.  (I also had about 3300 GPH in the 40-50 gallon displays for flow too....equivalent to around 10,000 GPH in Vortex/Nero-style flow.)  

 

Some of my Monti. cap's in those tanks (near the return pump outlet) had bi-facial growth I believe because of this.  (There's a thread somewhere with pics).  

 

In most tanks (and in nature, I think) they grow unifacial plates, with only skeleton on the side facing away from the sun.  

 

Coral tissue is a feeding surface though, so with the amount of detritus I had re-circulating from the sump, it was worth it for those coral plates to grow tissue on the bottom!

Edited December 18, 2021 by mcarroll
bad first edit

[1st reef]

Cyano came about right after I added the pistol shrimp. Mixed up the sanded bigtime. I'll stop Adding bio s and I removed the polypad. I'll check tomorrow to see if I'm getting any nitrate readings cause yesterday there was none. 

[Tired]

It'll likely take a few days for any parameter readings to change. 

[ubpr]

On 12/16/2021 at 10:44 PM, 1st reef said:

How do you get those up... If too low? 

Dosing, to compensate consumption. Start with phosphorus.

 

From bulk chemicals, available not in every country, to Brightwell NeoPhos and NeoNitro, made specifically for ULNS, or freshwater tank fertilizers, Seachem Flourish Phosphorus and Nitrogen. Both worked well for me for a mixed reefs, first for SPS focused and second for mostly zoas with some LPS.

[1st reef]

Will reduce water changes for now and feed more. 

[Tired]

Don't reduce water changes, stop them entirely. Don't do water changes (beyond the tiny bit of water accidentally removed while removing gunk) until something in the water actually needs removing. 

[1st reef]

5 hours ago, Tired said:

Don't reduce water changes, stop them entirely. Don't do water changes (beyond the tiny bit of water accidentally removed while removing gunk) until something in the water actually needs removing. 

It's what I meant. 

[1st reef]

Still zero nitrates... Or nearly zero

[Jakesaw]

33 minutes ago, 1st reef said:

Still zero nitrates... Or nearly zero

Frozen food and more fish bioload increase Nitrates.  I was stuck at zero nitrates in my 10 gallon for 8 months til I got around to adding a 2nd fish.  Had to remove Clownfish re-arrange my rock scape, - and add Clown + new fish at the same time - in order for my Clown to allow a new fish into it's domain.

 

Took a few days to work out territory, but both fish are co-existing and interacting on friendly / peaceful terms.  

 

Nitrates steady around 5-10 range for me now.

[seabass]

I just consider dosing nutrients to be feeding your corals.  It requires some testing, but it's as easy as feeding typical food.

[mcarroll]

On 12/22/2021 at 8:36 AM, seabass said:

I just consider dosing nutrients to be feeding your corals.  It requires some testing, but it's as easy as feeding typical food.

I wish there was a test that would tell us how much food to add for fish!!   😄

 

IMO what you said is one thing (of several) that make corals easier to care for than fish.  👍