Possible problems

[SeaSaltyDog]

Randy,

Last time I posted I had accidently poured the results of my alk test kit back into my aquarium. I immediatly did a 25 gallon water change in my 58g tank with a 20g sump and 20g refuge. My best guess is that I have about 75-80 gallons of water in this system. I used oceanic salt to do this water change and was the first time I had used this salt mix. I had previously been using kent and had been doing a 5 gallon change once per week. Since doing the water change with the Oceanic salt mix the tank has had a serious bloom of diatom algea and cyno, the likes I have not seen in this tank since I cycled it. Also 75 percent of my soft corals are closed up and the xenia looks terrible. I would also like to add that I recently put my calcium reactor back on line about 2-3 days before this happened. This tank has been up since Nov of 2002. The problems started last week after the water change.

My water parameters are as follows

Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate less than 5
Calc 375
alk 7
ph in the morning 7.79
ph in the evening 7.98

I do not know what is going on. Please help.

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Did you purify the water used to make the Oceanic salt water?

[SeaSaltyDog]

Water is ro/di TDS 0-1. I have only used RO/DI in this tank.

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I don't know what it might be. It may be purely coincidence that the Oceanic started at the same time, or there might be a problem with it. I'd switch to a different salt mix for a while and see if that helps.

[SeaSaltyDog]

Randy,

While doing a 17g water change this Saturday using IO salt I noticed my skimmer(MR-1) had produced very little skimmate for the past 2-3 weeks. I pulled the injeter apart and found it to be about 95% blocked with chitons and snails. I cleaned this out and the skimmer went nuts producing tons of skimmate. I adjusted this so it is skimming very wet. Sunday morning the tank looked almost as good as it did before the problems started. Could my problems been caused by high CO2 and low oxygen levels in the tank along with a higher than normal level of nutrients, because of the skimmer not working properly?

Robbie

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Certainly many of the problems (like the cyano) could be related to elevated organics and other nutrients. Hopefully things will begin to look up.

You might meaure phosphate and see if it is elevated.

[SeaSaltyDog]

I mesured phosphate last night. It was less than .05.

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

OK, then hopefully with the skimmer working better things will start to look up soon. :)