help do I have diatoms?

[zebbiesgarden]

I thought I had cyano at first, but 2 doses of chemiclean didn't help, so I'm thinking I have diatoms. They're brown ish spikes that have bubbles attached to them, growing all over my sand, rocks, and glass. Tiny particles also float on the surface.

Tank was set up 5 months ago, and picture is about 6 hours after water change. This has been going on for around a month now. Snail, hermit crab, GSP, mushroom, zoa, and chaeto are all fine although the GSP closed up today. Any suggestions?

 

[Shirak]

Brownish with bubbles more likely dinos. Do they go away at night all on their own and reappear after lights have been on a little while?

 

[Kingsley_Reef]

Looks like it could be diatoms especially with a newer tank what’s your nitrate/phos?

 

[Uncle99]

What do nutrients run at?

 

[zebbiesgarden]

Brownish with bubbles more likely dinos. Do they go away at night all on their own and reappear after lights have been on a little while?

they're still there at night. looks opaque green in the room light?

 

[zebbiesgarden]

Looks like it could be diatoms especially with a newer tank what’s your nitrate/phos?

last I checked, nitrate around 10 and phos around 0.25ppm using the API reef testing kit

 

[zebbiesgarden]

What do nutrients run at?

salinity 1.025, pH 8.2, ammonia 0.5ppm, nitrite 0ppm, nitrate 10.0ppm, calcium 440ppm, KH 143.2ppm, and phosphate 0.25ppm

^ last time I checked

 

[Uncle99]

salinity 1.025, pH 8.2, ammonia 0.5ppm, nitrite 0ppm, nitrate 10.0ppm, calcium 440ppm, KH 143.2ppm, and phosphate 0.25ppm

^ last time I checked

Those look great.
Still on the edge of uglies.
I’d vacuum it out and let it mature up a bit more.

 

[zebbiesgarden]

Those look great.
Still on the edge of uglies.
I’d vacuum it out and let it mature up a bit more.

ugly phase sucks :(

would it help to bury the diatoms by turning over the sand bed?

also, thoughts on getting more rock? clean up crew? fish?

 

[Kingsley_Reef]

When’s the last time you tested
I wouldn’t disturb the sand bed diatoms are just part of the process once’s they run the course they will be gone naturally I found products like mb7 and microbacter clean and the addition of pods and live phytoplankton help during the ugliest aswell as adding some biodiversity