Algae?

[BrewDaddyDave]

Hey all, please see the pics of a growth that has been accumulating on my sand bed and now on my rocks.

What is it? I tried searching the forum and couldn’t find much. Maybe I need to search better.

I started my 55 gallon, fish only tank on 6/22 cycled with Fritz turbo start and added two clowns on 6/28 when my ammonia was down to .25 and nitrates were 10. I’ve been told that there may be some false positives with the API SW master test kit so I recently ordered Salifert test kits for nitrate and phosphate.

Note that I’m using tap water conditioned with Prime. I hear that tap water is likely the culprit for unwanted algae and plan on switching to RODI water in the near future. My city water report is below:

Total Hardness: 10-12 mg/l
Nitrate: .064 mg/l
Flouride: .68 mg/l
Copper: .03 ppm
Lead: .005 ppm
Haloacetic Acids Five: .00099 ppm
Chlorine: 2.6 ppm
Total Trihalomethanes: .0003
Sulfate: They do not test
Calcium: They only test for calcium hardness
Magnesium: They do not test

I did a 20% water change on 7/8 and added a 3.5 sergeant major that I’m feeding frozen squid (not sure if this matters, but it is something different that I’m doing) along with New Life Spectrum Marine Fish. I make sure to remove uneaten food.

I’ve noticed small brown spots on the sand but now it looks like it’s accelerating. My parameters measured this morning are:

pH: 7.8
Ammonia: .5
NO2: 2
NO3: 10
Tank temperature: 77.4 F
Salinity: 30 PPT

The last picture is some dark substance that I’ve seen in my sand before. I’m using CaribSea Super Naturals substrate.

I appreciate any help and guidance.

 

[SPR1968]

It looks a little like diatoms and if it’s a new tank it’s a normal part of the process

 

[keatonmjenkins]

PH is a little low and NO3 is elevated. What are your phosphates at?

 

[BrewDaddyDave]

My salifert phosphate tear kit arrives on Monday. I’ll be able to measure it then.

 

[BrewDaddyDave]

PH is a little low and NO3 is elevated. What are your phosphates at?

Phosphates on 7/13 were .5 and on 7/14 were 1 (after sitting for 10 minutes the level read .25). I used the Salifert test kit to measure.

What’s interesting is the discrepancy Between API and Salifert when measuring NO3. The measurements are for 7/13 and then 7/14

API: 10ppm, then 40ppm the next day
Sal: 75ppm, 100ppm

Which one is accurate?!

I did a 20% water change on 7/8 and plan on doing another one in a couple days; 20% again.

Also, assuming thank my new tank has diatoms growing, would it be detrimental to clean my fluval filter? I can see some substrate collected in the filter housing as well as salt deposits all over the top of the filter. Can I clean it without disturbing the bio media?

 

[BrewDaddyDave]

I’d also like to add that the pH may be operator error as it looked to be 8 today and has been 8 in the past. I’m not color blind but man is it hard to see the difference between the color values of 7.8 and 8 using API’s SW Master kit.