STUPID cyano

[Stolireef]

Things are going well out here Gary. Gotta love mid seventies in January. There's a great group of reef keepers out here and I'm involved with them.

Hope all is well with you and URS.

I've become a big fan of carbon dosing at low levels. As with everything in this hobby, it takes patience and some fiddling, but when you get it dialed in, it really helps keep nuisances under control.

[reefbud]

Similar fights with cyano...chemi-clean became my friend. Not often...once or twice a year. My outbreaks confined to refug.

[kissman]

Chemi-Clean will kill the cyano but will not fix the problem, it will come back unless the nutrient issue is resolved

[Joe0813]

Thanks everyone for the responses.... does anyone have good threads on how to vodka dose and a good carbon thread? I think I have a idea on how I got cyano... I never washed my sand before I put it in my tank... rookie mistake :/.... would that cause it or is that not my cause

[kissman]

The cause is high nutrients NO3 and/or PO4

[Stolireef]

Originally Posted by Joe0813

Thanks everyone for the responses.... does anyone have good threads on how to vodka dose and a good carbon thread? I think I have a idea on how I got cyano... I never washed my sand before I put it in my tank... rookie mistake :/.... would that cause it or is that not my cause

Yes. If you search RC, there is an article (I believe its in the RC magazine) that lays out precisely how you start. It's very conservative on the dosing schedule but, if you are patient, it's a good approach. The one problem with it is that it relies on testing for Nitrates and if your cyano is taking them up before they register on a test, you need to use the observation method. As you see the cyano starting to recede, you know your dosing level is working. Go slow and it should work out.

On a side note, I started splitting the dosing between vodka and vinegar since they supposedly feed different varities of bacteria. I haven't done sufficient research to validate this though so I would just use vodka until you are confident in what you are doing.

[ppark]

I've had to take a tank down in the past because of cyano... but the last time I had it, it was 2x's per week 20% water changes for a while that got rid of it.

[fyrfytr]

Prodon the noob question (and possibly thread hijack) but what is wet skimming?

[proteinskimmer]

with lots of biopellet reactors on the market now, I'm surprised these cyno threads pop up so much

[Gary Majchrzak]

Originally Posted by proteinskimmer

with lots of biopellet reactors on the market now, I'm surprised these cyno threads pop up so much

I'm not. Bio pellet reactors and carbon dosing are advanced techniques and we're in the noob forum.
Many of those here don't even have a decent protein skimmer- something they will need to purchase before moving onto advanced techniques such as carbon dosing and Lanthanum chloride treatments.

[Joe0813]

someone said that not washing your sand will make you have a ton of silicates which can lead to high phos / nitrates which then will lead to cyano. do you guys think thats what happen? i need to go search for that dosing link too

[kissman]

Washing your sand has nothing to do with silicates. If you buy play sand its made of silicates and is a bad idea. Silicates don't cause PO4 and NO3 bad feeding habits, bad water, etc...cause silicates, PO4 and NO3 which will lead to various algea. HC GFO will remove PO4 and Silicates from the tank, a RO/DI unit removes them from tap-water. increase water changes, a good skimmer, well maintained skimmer, will remove NO3.

[Joe0813]

stupid question but what is HC Gfo

[kissman]

the only stupid question is the one not asked

HC GFO is "High Capacity Granular Ferric Oxide"

[coralsnaked]

3" SANDBED is No Man's Land

I'll bet that sandbed is 1 -3 years old, and is starting to release all the junk it once was absorbing from the water column and rock. Not an uncomman problem w/ a sandbed of this depth . +1 on what Gary has said abpout best means to export nutrients thru aggressive skimming and other means of export. I would go heavy on the GFO and carbon thru whatever means and even utilize some Purigen as well for insurance.

Short term solution: Manually clean out all you can and then hit it w/ some Chemiclean and continue w/ the nutrient export as well as introducing competing bacteria such as StartSmart for saltwater. It will give you a leg up on the problem and help w/ the astetics.

Long term siolution: Bite the bullet and pull that snadbed out and replace w/ an aragonite or crushed coral substrate of less than 1" for easy maintance. I utilize about a 1/2 inch in all my tanks except the sandsifting tank which as a very old 8" bed and still requires more maintance than i like, and my bare bottom SPS tank.

Merry Skerry

[Joe0813]

Originally Posted by kissman

the only stupid question is the one not asked

HC GFO is "High Capacity Granular Ferric Oxide"

Thanks im going to go to my LFS in a hour and get some... if they have it if not ill order it

Originally Posted by coralsnaked

3" SANDBED is No Man's Land

I'll bet that sandbed is 1 -3 years old, and is starting to release all the junk it once was absorbing from the water column and rock. Not an uncomman problem w/ a sandbed of this depth . +1 on what Gary has said abpout best means to export nutrients thru aggressive skimming and other means of export. I would go heavy on the GFO and carbon thru whatever means and even utilize some Purigen as well for insurance.

Short term solution: Manually clean out all you can and then hit it w/ some Chemiclean and continue w/ the nutrient export as well as introducing competing bacteria such as StartSmart for saltwater. It will give you a leg up on the problem and help w/ the astetics.

Long term siolution: Bite the bullet and pull that snadbed out and replace w/ an aragonite or crushed coral substrate of less than 1" for easy maintance. I utilize about a 1/2 inch in all my tanks except the sandsifting tank which as a very old 8" bed and still requires more maintance than i like, and my bare bottom SPS tank.

Merry Skerry

The sand bed is less then a year old. and it is aragonite My tank has only been running since last February.. But i will remove some sand every week with water changes until im at about a inch. If i leave the sand out to dry and wash it real good could i use it in my other soon to be tank? or would i be better off just trashing it. im also going to pick up some chemiclean too.

[Sk8r]

Managing Algae

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So you had this pristine white tank with beautiful rock shapes...
and then the green stuff took over.
Yep. That's the way it is.
So let's understand what it is, what causes it, and what you do about it that actually works.
1. What is it?
a) pest microalgaes, green film, hair, bubble.
b) floating and rooted macroalgaes, among them cheatomorpha, halimeda, caulerpa
c) things that only look like algae: cyanobacteria, diatoms

a) and b) depend on phosphate. Eliminate phosphate, and you eliminate these algaes. Should you test for phosphate? Surprisingly, no. Not ordinarily. The test costs money and only tells you what you can see when you look at your tank: you have phosphate if you have a) and b) algaes. If they're growing like crazy, you have a LOT of phosphate.

Where does phosphate get into your tank? 1) sand and rock: it binds with sand and rock, and dissolves into saltwater, so there you are. 2) tapwater: if you're not using ro/di, the stuff is likely not only coming into your tank, it's building up and up, because it doesn't evaporate. 3) fishfood that has algae in it.
To get rid of phosphate: 1) use ro/di exclusively; 2) patience---after it leaches out of your rocks, water changes and especially a fuge will rid you of it. 3) a fuge or GFO (granulated ferric oxide) reactor. You set this up, toss the waste or overgrowth, and you've exported the spare phosphate. Ironically, you can even sell it to another reefer, as algae. BUT: use cheato as your fuge algae, never caulerpa!!!!!!

OK: now to fuges and rooted and non-rooted macroalgaes. Avoid caulerpa like the plague. It's illegal in California, it's killing life in the Med, and it reproduces by 1. runner 2 fragment 3 spores, so it CAN get through your fuge pump; it's poisonous and nasty and most things won't eat it. One fish will: the onespot rabbit, but that fish is large (up to 10 inches) and venomous itself, and rowdy. I really, really advise against caulerpa, no matter how cheap and local. Halimeda is a stony rooted macroalgae: I've never found it to be a problem, except it's persistent and nothing I know eats it. Cheatomorpha is a floating macro that is ideal for a fuge: it reproduces much more slowly than caulerpa, and DOES NOT ROOT in your rock. It also aerates very, very efficiently. I keep my fuge lit 24/7.

Now to NON-ALGAES that look like algaes. The red blush on your sand (brown in some lighting) is cyanobacteria, one of the oldest lifeforms on earth. Look it up. It's a read. To get rid of it, first have a really good skimmer; then turn the lights out on your tank 3 days a month (finish with 1 day of actinic only, if you have MH or high-end LED lighting, total of 4 days.) It won't hurt your reef. But it will kill this stuff, which has only 3 life requirements: water, carbon [which is in all living things], and sunlight. Sunlight is all you can rob it of safely. Since it is also the origin of chloroplasts in all living green plants, forget trying to avoid it getting into your tank---just deal with it as it shows up. And avoid having slanted sunlight hitting your tank: this stuff had its heyday in the era of the Permian Extinction, when weird-spectrum sunlight was getting through the clouds. It loves that situation. Keep sunlight from your tank in all seasons, or expect to have a little of this show up. Do NOT use Red Slime remedy as a beginner: that rides beginner's luck to the max, and you can can crash your tank with it if you make a mistake or if your skimmer isn't what it ought to be. A cyano outbreak is soooo minor, and does no real harm, bad as it looks: don't panic. Take the long route, and you'll beat it within a few months.

And diatoms: animacules, as cyano is sorta plant/sorta animal, this stuff is little microscopic animals. A baby-poop-brown fluff or sheet or stain on the sand. Treat it much the same as cyano, but this stuff DOES like phosphate particularly well, so a fuge will help.

[kissman]

[QUOTE=Joe0813;21114510]Thanks im going to go to my LFS in a hour and get some... if they have it if not ill order it




the HC GFO, reactor and a pump for reactor will probably be cheaper online

[thebkramer]

the only place I was able to find plain ol' GFO is www.bulkreefsupply.com

[Joe0813]

thanks sk8r... i have tried the lights out and it does not git rid of it all so then it grows back again. i will try it again after i suck most of it up and get my reactor all hooked up.. and today i went to the lfs and go PhosBan by two little fishies until my bulk reef supply order gets here