Red flaky algae

[mrudman]

What is this stuff? My first instinct was that I have a bad case of cyano.. it's maroon in color, peels off in sheets...

But this stuff is growing in the highest possible circulation areas only. It's growing right along rim of my overflow box, and on the spouts of all the powerheads... I see maybe a few small areas on the rocks, but nothing on sand, and nothing where the circulation is at its lowest.

Thanks!

P.S. Finally getting some awesome corraline growth! Got bright red, neon green, and deep purple starting, :)

[commandertekki]

it's cyano. if you want you can siphon it out or use erythromycin to add to your tank to kill it since it is a bacteria.

You want to get it out of your tank because it can suffocate your sand bed if it is a dsb

[jdallred]

Are you sure it’s flaky and are you’re sure it’s not coralline?

[commandertekki]

when you touch it does it break up immediately?

if it does its probably cyano.

[mrudman]

Ok, here's the scoop on it.... I tried to brush some off of the powerheads, and it was pretty difficult to brush off... when it did come off, it was like a powder kind of... it just scattered...

Then i pulled a small sheet of it off the return pipe.. and it did not crumble at all... I brought it out of the water to throw it away and it looks black out of the water. But inside the tank, the rest of it is very very dark maroon.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

[commandertekki]

it's probably coralline algae. just do a search on coralline algae and you can see the difference between it and cyanobateria.

click on this link to see what cyano looks like

http://sparklingfloorservice.com/melevsreef/id/cyano.jpg


this is what coralline algae looks like

http://sparklingfloorservice.com/melevsreef/rc/coralline.jpg

[mrudman]

Thanks!

If i had to take a guess, I'd say corraline also... doesn't look anything like that cyano pic. But it's not a color I expected to see, lol.. oh well!
It did show up about the same time that my other colors starting appearing, so probably just another color of it.

Thanks!