Dinos? Diatoms? Cyano?

jfoahs04 · Oct 16, 2021

I don’t have a microscope, so I’m hoping someone can visually ID:

Tank is 3.5 months old and I had a small diatom outbreak 2 weeks in. Using natural sea water collected locally. The “algae” tends to diminish a little overnight and return midday (making me want to rule diatoms out). It’s been like this for about 2 weeks and sticks to the substrate only. Nothing on the rocks.

Tank is a EVO 13.5 running an AI Prime 16HD (Saxby settings). Mixed reef (softies, LPS, and few montis), 4 Astrea Snails, 3 blue leg hermits, 1 nassarius, 1 skunk cleaner, a tailspot blenny, and a small DaVinci clown.

Params:
Ca-420
Mg-1285
Alk-7
No3 <1
Po4 .02 ppm or less
salinity 1.02
Temp 78

trying to figure out the best course of action. Thoughts on whether we’re looking at Dino’s, diatoms, cyano, something else? Thanks!

maleks.reef · Oct 16, 2021

Following. I dont think its diatoms either because ive had a diatom outbreak in my tank and it did not look like this. This looks a bit hairy. Maybe someone with more experience can chime in. Id say your best bet is to do a water change to siphon out whatever it is until you figure out if its dinos, cyano or something else.

jfoahs04 · Oct 16, 2021

Agreed. I should have added that I’ve been seeing this for about 3 weeks now. I’m doing biweekly water changes of 30% and siphoning each time. I’m also manually removing it a few times per week. It pulls up relatively easily with my tongs. Sort of staying the course until I can figure it out.

Also, running filter floss, Chemipure Blue (2x nano packets) and bio media in chamber 1.

I’ve had 3 reefs and I don’t recall having this before. I’ve had plenty of diatoms, hair, bubble, and other algae before, but this one is different.

also, mistake in the first post. Salinity is 1.025.

jfoahs04 · Oct 17, 2021

I guess there actually is more of it than I thought before the lights come on. In the morning, just the ambient light from the room:

jfoahs04 · Oct 21, 2021

So a quick update on this. I’m completely confused. Here’s what it looks like under 100% whites and nothing else:

Is it possible that this is just GHA but is mostly restricted to the sand bed? It’s not slimy at all, it’s very green under white light, and it doesn’t break up and reform when shaken and strained (3rd image, it never separated from rock).

My Nitrates and Phosphates are nearly non-existent which is why I’m not 100% sold on the GHA. It’s generally unusual to get GHA solely on the sand bed, but the sand bed is the only “new” part of my 3 month old tank (rocks are from old, established systems and covered in coralline and other algae). I should note that my CUC has been eating this for about 2 weeks with no problems or changes in behavior.

Regardless, I have a microscope on the way and I’m over feeding to bump phosphates and nitrates because that needs to change no matter what. I also pulled my Chemi Pure Blue and replaced it with activated carbon in case it is Dinos and releasing toxins.

Thoughts? Anyone have anything similar happen?

maleks.reef · Oct 21, 2021

It definitely looks like GHA. The 0 po3 and no3 might be due to the fact that the GHA is sucking it up too quickly. You also mentioned that the sand is new so it would make sense that you're getting algae growth on it, especially if its not covered with bacteria yet. While i agree that usually gha doesn't grow on sand, your sand looks very coarse and big, almost like a small rock. As far as i know, dinos are toxic to inverts (esp snails) so i don't think it is dinos, plus it looks nothing like dinos. I think the best thing to do is to get more of whatever CUC is eating this alga in ur tank and to manually remove it. I'm experiencing an algae outbreak myself as well.

jfoahs04 · Oct 21, 2021

maleks.reef said:
It definitely looks like GHA. The 0 po3 and no3 might be due to the fact that the GHA is sucking it up too quickly. You also mentioned that the sand is new so it would make sense that you're getting algae growth on it, especially if its not covered with bacteria yet. While i agree that usually gha doesn't grow on sand, your sand looks very coarse and big, almost like a small rock. As far as i know, dinos are toxic to inverts (esp snails) so i don't think it is dinos, plus it looks nothing like dinos. I think the best thing to do is to get more of whatever CUC is eating this alga in ur tank and to manually remove it. I'm experiencing an algae outbreak myself as well.

Thanks!

I know people with big GHA outbreaks don't dead po3 and no3 in many cases. Honestly, I'd much rather it be GHA than Dinos. The sand is pretty course, so that makes sense.

What are you doing for your outbreak? I'm going to manually remove until I get the microscope and can confirm what it is for sure. But it definitely looks/acts a lot like GHA.

maleks.reef · Oct 23, 2021

jfoahs04 said:
Thanks!

I know people with big GHA outbreaks don't dead po3 and no3 in many cases. Honestly, I'd much rather it be GHA than Dinos. The sand is pretty course, so that makes sense.

What are you doing for your outbreak? I'm going to manually remove until I get the microscope and can confirm what it is for sure. But it definitely looks/acts a lot like GHA.

No problem!

Im not really doing much. I turned my fuge up to 11 hours a day and i manually remove it when i can. Hopefully it goes away eventually, its not TOO bad rn its okay. Im just worried ill get dinos because my nutrients are always 0. Also, there is a little trick i found out when it comes to GHA (or any algae on a rock), i use my turkey baster to suck up some sand and i put a small mountain of sand over the area with GHA (or even sea lettuce in my case). That sand mountain will block any light to the algae and kill it, and surprisingly it does work. Sounds weird and too good but the science adds up so give it a shot. I also cut back on feeding alot.