What is wrong with my tank and how can I fix it?

[Lasse]

My bad language - I´m not a native english speaker - I mean clean up as much as possible, Maybe brush the rocks. I would try to avoid cleaning with peroxide because what I want to do is to give other organisms the possibility to grow and conquer with the cyanos. If I use peroxide to clean the rocks with - it will kill other organisms too. I could think of using peroxide in the water however - small amounts - someones have advised 1 ml/10 gallon 3 % H2O2 for a prolonged period. Never test that by myself for Lynbia but have used it as a help in defeating red mats.. When i clean my nano - I used a toothbrush and swirl it around catching the cyano threads like spaghetti on a fork. The going down with light intensity is a way of slowing the growth of the fast growing organisms and give the one that like lower intensity a fair chance to establish themselves. But all systems is different and you may need to adapt the fight.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Dav2996]

My bad language - I´m not a native english speaker - I mean clean up as much as possible, Maybe brush the rocks. I would try to avoid cleaning with peroxide because what I want to do is to give other organisms the possibility to grow and conquer with the cyanos. If I use peroxide to clean the rocks with - it will kill other organisms too. I could think of using peroxide in the water however - small amounts - someones have advised 1 ml/10 gallon 3 % H2O2 for a prolonged period. Never test that by myself for Lynbia but have used it as a help in defeating red mats.. When i clean my nano - I used a toothbrush and swirl it around catching the cyano threads like spaghetti on a fork. The going down with light intensity is a way of slowing the growth of the fast growing organisms and give the one that like lower intensity a fair chance to establish themselves. But all systems is different and you may need to adapt the fight.

Sincerely Lasse

I don’t think he has cyano because he talked about adding lots of chemiclean. It would of been gone. I have cured cyano with chemiclean before and following the directions. I think just regular algae.

 

[Aqua Man]

So the RODI water might be my issue?

Do you have a TDS meter? Important tool to have to know EXACTLY if your RODI is Zero TDS( total dissolved solids). Very important since clean water is the foundation for our reef.

Your LFS may or may not keep up on the maintenance of there RODI unit. So it’s possible that the water you buy is causing some issues in your tank. Only by checking the TDS of that water will you know for sure

 

[Aqua Man]

Tools for reefing I used today!

Toothbrush, turkey baster and hose. I pulled this out today! Nasty!

What is your water change regimen??

 

[sixty_reefer]

Sorry late in and maybe will turn everything upside down



Lyngbya is a family of cyanobacteria that are able to fix nitrogen with help of bunch of bacteria even in aerobic environment. They do not need nitrogen in the water column (read nitrate) - they fix it by themself. These type of cyanobacteria will dominate in an environment low in dissolved inorganic nitrogen - together with other filamentous cyanobacteria from the family Oscillatoriaceae.


Indeed

IMO - you need to establish which organism you have - if it is a type of cyanobacteria or a type of normal algae. This of many different reasons. If it is a cyanobacteria - a CUC will not be able to do its job. Many cyanobacteria is toxic and will not be eaten, they can even kill your introduced CUC. But also because the type of things you need to do will differ, If it is cyanobacteria - you need to rise your nitrates at least to around 3 ppm, This will give dissolved nitrogen for other more wanted organisms and reduce possible release of PO4 from rocks and sand.

The things I would do in this situation (and I think that @paintman is on the right direction what I see from the pictures - but I can be wrong) is
1. Rinse everything as good as possible - with brush if it is necessary. Keep most of the water.
2. Rise NO3 levels to around 3 ppm Use 40 g of NaNO3 (Chile salpeter, Sodium nitrate ) from the grocery store spice shelf - or KNO3 (Saltpeter or potassium nitrate) from the same shelf. Dissolve these 40 g in 500 ml of RO water. 1 ml of this stock solution will rise the NO3 level of 100 L water with around 0.5 ppm.
3. Go down in light intensity with around 50 %. If your fixture have an adaptive mode - set it to around 30 days to go from 50 % intensity to 100 %
4. Introduce a CUC but observe if the cyanobacteria come back or not.
5. Keep the NO3 concentrations around 3 ppm
6. If possible some mixed bacteria blends can be effective or sediments from well working aquariums
7. Do not do WC before the situation is under control
8. I would not use NoPox if it is cyanobacteria - it tends (IMO) make the situation worse if it is cyanobacteria

Sincerely Lasse

Best advice I’ve seen for a long time

 

[paintman]

Best advice I’ve seen for a long time

Your are correct! Lasse and Randy Holmes Farley are the only ones I take advice from . Everybody else on R2R would have recommended dumping 100's of $ worth of CUC's only to have them die. Kudos to Lasse!

 

[Roatan Reef]

Do you have a TDS meter? Important tool to have to know EXACTLY if your RODI is Zero TDS( total dissolved solids). Very important since clean water is the foundation for our reef.

Your LFS may or may not keep up on the maintenance of there RODI unit. So it’s possible that the water you buy is causing some issues in your tank. Only by checking the TDS of that water will you know for sure

This is my thoughts ad well!

I have seen some LFS use only RO to make Saltwater. It is highly recommended to get your own RODI System and make your own water.

 

[Aqua Man]

I have seen some LFS use only RO to make Saltwater. It is highly recommended to get your own RODI System and make your own water.

I tested RODI from a LFS and it was 25TDS!!! I watered my lawn with it. Definitely not going to risk my reef!

 

[Lasse]

Your are correct! Lasse and Randy Holmes Farley are the only ones I take advice from . Everybody else on R2R would have recommended dumping 100's of $ worth of CUC's only to have them die. Kudos to Lasse!

We are dealing with biological systems - it means that we may understand why a action works in 95 % of the cases but we are also handling systems with an unknown variety of parametres. That´s the 5 % where our advises make it worse. Believe me - I have been in that trap too. But in this case - knowing what the OP is dealing with is necessary in order to give a good advise. @Chris_Noles - have you any possibility to take a microscopic picture (or a macro picture) of your problem an post it here? The organism on a white paper and as a high magnification as possible can also be useful

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Chris_Noles]

We are dealing with biological systems - it means that we may understand why a action works in 95 % of the cases but we are also handling systems with an unknown variety of parametres. That´s the 5 % where our advises make it worse. Believe me - I have been in that trap too. But in this case - knowing what the OP is dealing with is necessary in order to give a good advise. @Chris_Noles - have you any possibility to take a microscopic picture (or a macro picture) of your problem an post it here? The organism on a white paper and as a high magnification as possible can also be useful

Sincerely Lasse

Hi Lasse thank you for all the great advice for this situation. I will get a picture of algae on a piece of paper ASAP. I had a microscope at one point but I returned it after THINKING I solved my problem.

 

[Chris_Noles]

I tested RODI from a LFS and it was 25TDS!!! I watered my lawn with it. Definitely not going to risk my reef!

Just ordered a TDS meter off amazon and will report back....maybe this is the issue?

 

[Lasse]

25 ppm in TDS does only says that you have some ions in the water - not which you have

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Chris_Noles]

Here is what the TDS meter got for my RODI water

 

[Lasse]

That´s OK

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Chris_Noles]

 

[Chris_Noles]

Here is my tank before the scrub down, I’ve lowered the lights and tried scrubbing it down best I could

 

[Lasse]

This part shows some type of mat building cyano

What this show - I do not really know - its difficult to see/say. When you cleaned - was it loose attached to the rocks?

@taricha - any idea ?

What I have understand - you have test all of the most common tricks in the toolbox. I would test to rise the NO3 to around 2 - 3 ppm (after cleaning and limiting the light). If it not works in a month - easy to make undone with a WC

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Aqua Man]

Here is my tank before the scrub down, I’ve lowered the lights and tried scrubbing it down best I could

TDS look ok. Getting that green cyano off the sand is tough. I have a similar situation in one of my systems right now. It’s almost better to let it form a thicker mat and then slowly peel and lift out by hand. If the cyano is covering coral, lightly turkey baste it off and try to catch the bits with a net.

Looks like some of your rocks can be removed and given a good scrub! Tools I used the other day below.

 

[Aqua Man]

@Lasse
If that’s regular hair alga. Does it spread like other algae? Can the rocks be scrubbed In tank? Or would that just make it worse? Of course a large water change would need to be done afterwards to remove as much as possible. Or is it safer to remove rock and scrub?

@Chris_Noles What’s your water change routine? Smaller more frequent water changes would be good.

 

[Chris_Noles]

This part shows some type of mat building cyano

What this show - I do not really know - its difficult to see/say. When you cleaned - was it loose attached to the rocks?

@taricha - any idea ?

What I have understand - you have test all of the most common tricks in the toolbox. I would test to rise the NO3 to around 2 - 3 ppm (after cleaning and limiting the light). If it not works in a month - easy to make undone with a WC

Sincerely Lasse

The green mat is easy to get off of the rocks. I’ll remove some of the rocks today to scrub down some more and get my nitrates to 2-3