Hello everyone, recently I started to see hair-like film algae appear on my rocks, at first I thought it was diatoms because of the hairiness, I thought that dinos were more snot-like. I went to my LFS and picked up 5 Astrea snails to eat the supposed diatoms (Pic of the film):
I don't know if these are dinos or not, but here is the why it is or isn't:
Why it isn't dinos:
⦁ It is a brown hairy substance, not a snotty bubbly slime like I would see in other images.
⦁ When I put the Astrea snails in, they would make a trail of clean rock.
⦁ It does not go away at night
⦁ I think it is a diatom outbreak because recently I put new refugium sand (not mud) in my fuge, and it may have produced some silicates that fueled a diatom outbreak
Why it is dinos:
⦁ The Astrea snails did not do a lot until a few days ago
⦁ There are a few bubbles on the rock
⦁ My nitrates bottomed out (0-1 ppm)
⦁ When I looked under a microscope I saw this:
This picture was taken at 100x zoom
If anyone could have any input on what is going on then please comment.
Some tank info:
My 75-gallon tank has been up for a little over a year now. I started with dry rock (uncured) and went through the normal ugly stage (first diatoms then GHA) but It all cleared up eventually.
My livestock (in order of purchase first to last):
-2x Ocelaris clownfish
-2x Red firefish
-1x Cherub Angelfish
-1x 6-line wrasse
-1x Banggai cardinalfish (I will get another one)
My nutrients have been pretty low (nitrates 0-1 and phosphates are undetectable because of my stupid test kit)
If anyone could ID the dinos/have opinions on this please reply,
Thanks so much.
I don't know if these are dinos or not, but here is the why it is or isn't:
Why it isn't dinos:
⦁ It is a brown hairy substance, not a snotty bubbly slime like I would see in other images.
⦁ When I put the Astrea snails in, they would make a trail of clean rock.
⦁ It does not go away at night
⦁ I think it is a diatom outbreak because recently I put new refugium sand (not mud) in my fuge, and it may have produced some silicates that fueled a diatom outbreak
Why it is dinos:
⦁ The Astrea snails did not do a lot until a few days ago
⦁ There are a few bubbles on the rock
⦁ My nitrates bottomed out (0-1 ppm)
⦁ When I looked under a microscope I saw this:
This picture was taken at 100x zoom
If anyone could have any input on what is going on then please comment.
Some tank info:
My 75-gallon tank has been up for a little over a year now. I started with dry rock (uncured) and went through the normal ugly stage (first diatoms then GHA) but It all cleared up eventually.
My livestock (in order of purchase first to last):
-2x Ocelaris clownfish
-2x Red firefish
-1x Cherub Angelfish
-1x 6-line wrasse
-1x Banggai cardinalfish (I will get another one)
My nutrients have been pretty low (nitrates 0-1 and phosphates are undetectable because of my stupid test kit)
If anyone could ID the dinos/have opinions on this please reply,
Thanks so much.