CLOUDY WATER OVERNIGHT

Chris444 · May 8, 2019

clm65 said:
You don't happen to have any nephews visiting that may be using your sump as a toilet, do you?

Haha, luckily no

Lasse · May 8, 2019

Ca 460 and alk 11 and you dose a concentrated calcium solution prior to this event. It could be the reason for this fog - it could be lime dust.

What do you use in order to meassure this? which brand? Have you test the pH just before your lights will go down?

The green stuf is cyano bacteria. Now it is time for @brandon429 to sit down and do not fall from the chair

- because I think that you should mechanical remove this green mats every evening - as much as you can. Put in new water. Be carefull with the sea apples - they should not be allowed to die in the aquaria - if they do - you will have a catastrophe.

Sincerely Lasse

brandon429 · May 8, 2019

I already posted work in redoing eighty + gallon invaded setups with before and after pics- certainly don't mind other methods offered. Have multi options to choose from~ rank the ones with before n after pics pretty well tho, certainly don't discount if it's more than one example off a given approach

Chris444 · May 8, 2019

Lasse said:
Ca 460 and alk 11 and you dose a concentrated calcium solution prior to this event. It could be the reason for this fog - it could be lime dust.

What do you use in order to meassure this? which brand? Have you test the pH just before your lights will go down?

The green stuf is cyano bacteria. Now it is time for @brandon429 to sit down and do not fall from the chair - because I think that you should mechanical remove this green mats every evening - as much as you can. Put in new water. Be carefull with the sea apples - they should not be allowed to die in the aquaria - if they do - you will have a catastrophe.

Sincerely Lasse

Yeah, I'll stop using it now.
It it tested with Salifert.
I did and it is dropping to about 7.6-7.7.
I really care about as I know what can happen if its now happy.
Any idea how to completly get rid of cyano?

Sarah24! · May 8, 2019

Hemmdog said:
Lol, classic

@Sarah24!

Hello,

Those nephews of mine lol they are so getting embarrassed when they get married or something special when we have to all give a story about them. Although they didn’t make my tank per say cloudy, they definitely polluted it. Now I have to always wear these huge rubber gloves when ever I mess with my sump. Just in case lol.

OnyxPerc · May 8, 2019

@Chris444 I would not go beast mode as suggested by brandon just yet. While there are scenarios in which I would say his method is necessary, I dont think we have enough information to recommend that as a course of action just yet. We dont even know what the cause of the cloudy water is yet. There are also a few things you can try to remedy the situation without having to give your rocks / sand a deep cleaning (tank is only 3 months old after all).

First, the common-sense stuff should be mentioned:

Use RO/DI water for top offs and for mixing new salt water
Do regular water changes - at least every week or two, but be consistent
Make sure you have enough flow - algae's typically don't like a lot of flow
Raise your PH slowly over a few days - algae doesn't do well in high PH - 8.0-8.4 range is ideal. I recommend trying to do this naturally without additives first. Open up a window in the room where your DT is, or run an airline from outside to your skimmer to help raise your PH. Some macro algae is also good to help raise PH and export nutrients. If all else fails, you can use baking soda or some other additive to raise PH slowly.
Clean up crew - you have too much algae right now for a CUC to make any kind of difference, but once you have it under control, crabs/snails/stars (along with the other recommendations) will help keep algae blooms at bay.

You may already be doing some or all of these things, but if not I definitely recommend that you consider these suggestions. Here is what I would do regardless of water parameters - minimum 20% water change (siphon as much algae out as you can, and you can even brush it off the rocks with a toothbrush and then siphon whatever comes off), run carbon, followed by a 72hr black out (no lights on in the tank).

For the cloudy water specifically, I would do a water change and stop dosing Coral Grower for now, then observe. It's possible that it's a bacteria bloom, but your UV sterilizer would presumably rule that out. Additives and micro-bubbles are the other "usual suspects."

brandon429 · May 8, 2019

one thing that's missed in rip cleaning is its not insulting, it doesn't even have to run on an invaded tank, its just simple cleaning. In the thread I demonstrate rip cleaning in my 13 yr nano reef which is not invaded, its taken apart and set in the air for half an hour to show safety/prediction/ability when a system isn't cloudy with feed mud in all the cracks and crevices...safety comes from cleaning. The ability to weather power outages specifically is boosted in cleaning.

large tankers always see it as an insult, any type of access is deemed harmful or ineffective though work threads on the matter show cure results...its not a negative, its a positive impact on the system we show.

We have to do this in the sand rinse thread to prep an uninvaded tank to move homes...to keep them from recycling, since detritus is the cause of the recycle when moving tanks...or we have to prep rinse the system when doing tank upgrades and downgrades. This is standard fare, tank CPR

its safe, not harsh. consider the logged attempts people made before consulting the #1 action they were told to never run, then the tank is posted up fixed after we showed them access is good, not bad, and why an entire branch of this hobby runs uninvaded reef tanks.

again, 80 gallons isn't easy but we already did maybe ten or so in there, before and after pics, happy reefers, vs the months long wait it takes to get lucky. the thread shows the eventual pathway for stored up clouded reef tanks, its worth noting for patterns there.

Lasse · May 8, 2019

Chris444 said:
Yeah, I'll stop using it now.
It it tested with Salifert.
I did and it is dropping to about 7.6-7.7.
I really care about as I know what can happen if its now happy.
Any idea how to completly get rid of cyano?

Many times I rise NO3 or/and PO4 but if your measurements is right - you do not need that. Hence the recommendation to rinse it of every evening and stirr the sand. Lesser biomass in the start next morning. But it is a fight

Sincerely Lasse

Mastiffsrule · May 8, 2019

Hold the fire!

Just wanted to ask feelings on using a flocculating method like seachem clarity. Is it safe, would it work on thinks bacterial related like a bloom? If it was from a precipitation issue would it still work.

Just wondering, not recommending. (Unless it would work them it is my idea

)

vetteguy53081 · May 8, 2019

Something leeched or dissolved but a good grade carbon will dissipate and clear it quickly

Chris444 · May 8, 2019

Mastiffsrule said:
Hold the fire!

Just wanted to ask feelings on using a flocculating method like seachem clarity. Is it safe, would it work on thinks bacterial related like a bloom? If it was from a precipitation issue would it still work.

Just wondering, not recommending. (Unless it would work them it is my idea)

I was thinking about it too

Chris444 · May 8, 2019

Lasse said:
Many times I rise NO3 or/and PO4 but if your measurements is right - you do not need that. Hence the recommendation to rinse it of every evening and stirr the sand. Lesser biomass in the start next morning. But it is a fight

Sincerely Lasse

Yeah I will try this, hopefully it get better over time

Chris444 · May 8, 2019

OnyxPerc said:
@Chris444 I would not go beast mode as suggested by brandon just yet. While there are scenarios in which I would say his method is necessary, I dont think we have enough information to recommend that as a course of action just yet. We dont even know what the cause of the cloudy water is yet. There are also a few things you can try to remedy the situation without having to give your rocks / sand a deep cleaning (tank is only 3 months old after all).

First, the common-sense stuff should be mentioned:

Use RO/DI water for top offs and for mixing new salt water

Do regular water changes - at least every week or two, but be consistent

Make sure you have enough flow - algae's typically don't like a lot of flow

Raise your PH slowly over a few days - algae doesn't do well in high PH - 8.0-8.4 range is ideal. I recommend trying to do this naturally without additives first. Open up a window in the room where your DT is, or run an airline from outside to your skimmer to help raise your PH. Some macro algae is also good to help raise PH and export nutrients. If all else fails, you can use baking soda or some other additive to raise PH slowly.

Clean up crew - you have too much algae right now for a CUC to make any kind of difference, but once you have it under control, crabs/snails/stars (along with the other recommendations) will help keep algae blooms at bay.

You may already be doing some or all of these things, but if not I definitely recommend that you consider these suggestions. Here is what I would do regardless of water parameters - minimum 20% water change (siphon as much algae out as you can, and you can even brush it off the rocks with a toothbrush and then siphon whatever comes off), run carbon, followed by a 72hr black out (no lights on in the tank).

For the cloudy water specifically, I would do a water change and stop dosing Coral Grower for now, then observe. It's possible that it's a bacteria bloom, but your UV sterilizer would presumably rule that out. Additives and micro-bubbles are the other "usual suspects."

To be honest I am already doing most of the things you mentioned. However, I can be more consistent on water changes and I'll try harder to get the ph higher. Thanks for the advice

Chris444 · May 9, 2019

Chris444 said:
To be honest I am already doing most of the things you mentioned. However, I can be more consistent on water changes and I'll try harder to get the ph higher. Thanks for the advice

Just woke up today and the tank is looking much better. There is still some cloudiness but just a little bit. Being honest I didnt do anything yet as I was planning to get it sorted today. However still gonna clean the rocks and do water change trying to get rid off that ugly green thing. I am still very curious what was causing the water to go cloudy to prevent it from happening in the future
Thank you all for help and so much support!!

Lasse · May 9, 2019

If the same thing happens locally when you stirr the sand and/or suck out the cyano - the answer is percipitation!

Sincerely Lasse

OnyxPerc · May 9, 2019

good luck mate, keep us posted!

Chris444 · May 9, 2019

Just an update to anyone who's interested. The water is completly clear now. Also cleaned the rocks and sand a little bit. Now I will start the battle to get rid of the cyano.