invincible cyano

[petlandguy]

anyone that can help me would be wonderful i recently ran into a problem in a 29 gal mini reef the tank was running wonderfully for about 4 months no new additions when all of a sudden i got a major bloom of some kind of cyano i believe. it is brown in color and very stringy i have tested all of my levels and everything is checking out for quality i have consulted a few other local people one of which has had it as well it seems to attach to sps corals mainly but is covering just about everything in the tank. i have tried just about everything i can and dont know what to do. i have done large water changes using only ro water, i have tried two cyano removers (red slime remover, and chemi-clean) and tried killing the lights for 48 hours. nothing is even slowing it down. if anyone has any info please let me know i cant find anything about this stuff. thank you in advance

[Kdocimo90]

what I do is.
1. When doing water changes try to get as much out as you can.
2. I turn off my lights for 2 or 3 days once ever month or two (this kills the cyano algae)

Many people go against using chemicals to remove it and there are others that are for it. I myself have been fighting cyano for months but I dont let it get out of hand just by doing these two things.

Good luck!

[Aquarist007]

Originally posted by petlandguy
anyone that can help me would be wonderful i recently ran into a problem in a 29 gal mini reef the tank was running wonderfully for about 4 months no new additions when all of a sudden i got a major bloom of some kind of cyano i believe. it is brown in color and very stringy i have tested all of my levels and everything is checking out for quality i have consulted a few other local people one of which has had it as well it seems to attach to sps corals mainly but is covering just about everything in the tank. i have tried just about everything i can and dont know what to do. i have done large water changes using only ro water, i have tried two cyano removers (red slime remover, and chemi-clean) and tried killing the lights for 48 hours. nothing is even slowing it down. if anyone has any info please let me know i cant find anything about this stuff. thank you in advance

can you post a picture--it may not be cyano especially if red slime remover hasn't touched it. Usually that works but only for a period of time if you haven't found out where or how you are importing nitrates and phosphates

this sounds more like diatoms which are fueled by silicates in the tank and are not affected by cyano removers.
I would try and get hold of a test kit and measure your tank for silicates.

you can buy a diatom filter and run it :

http://www.diatomfilters.com/

[o0jmadr0x0o]

cyno was about to get me out of the hobby until a water pipe exploded in my home that cause me to kill the tanks lights for 5 days, cyno has not been back since.
dunno if it was the lights or just a change in my tank chemistry, but i will give credit to the no lights, i had to vacate the house for 5 days so there was no light at all on the tank ( i had tried lights out for the tank before without any luck, but there was lights in the room with the tank)

[smalls383]

Try and find the source of the algae boom.....low flow, nutrients, slacking on the water changes. But, I would also agree that the lights out trick does work. You may want to scale back your lighting to less hours especially when you start to notice a boom coming along....

Try to attack the cyano or diatoms (whatever it is) before it gets out of hand....makes it easier in the long run

[Michael]

i doubt its cyano, unlikely if its brown and stringy, probably diatoms or even dinos, need a picture for an id tbh.