Wahts growing on my substrate

[jdog6973]

In the past two weeks a brown film has started to grow in the substrate of my tank! I have preformed 2 water changes in those two weeks. Also I have changed the carbon in my phosban reactor, and have tested my RO/DI water and it is at 0 TDS, my water parameters are as follows. Salinity= 1.025, PH= 8.4, KH= 5.76, ALK= 2.05, Mg= 1470ppm, Strontium= 3 Calcium= 422mg/l, Ammonia= <.25 I am including some pictures because these always seam to help! I am just looking for some feedback as to what this is and how I can control it.


Reef Central Rules
Thanks
Jason


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[nanO352]

Looks like diatoms to me next water change siphon it out. And if it spreads to the rocks scrub it with a soft bristle tooth brush.

[thecichlidpleco]

The stuff on your coral is cyano, increase flow or lower phosphates.

[Kannin]

Cyano bacteria... It feeds on phospahates which usually comes from excess nutrients.

[chris31]

deff cayno

[jdog6973]

so what is the best way to rid my tank of this nasty cyano bacteria?

[ccoons43]

you can siphon it out with water changes. But you need to increase your flow to these areas and keep up on regular water changes.

How long has your tank been running?
What do you have for flow now?
Skimmer?

[jdog6973]

The tank has been running for about 1 1/2 years now I am running 3 maxijet 600 and a Rio 1400 return pump from my sump.
The power heads make it move but it forms a mat and holds fast. I have siphoned some off but it grows back the next day.
Will it slow down if I leave my lights off for a day or two?

[ccoons43]

If its growing in those areas there is probably detritus and other stuff settling there. Maybe you can either add more flow or rearange a powerhead to keep everything in the water colum so it will not settle.

I'm not sure about lights but someone else may be able to chime in.

I beat mine by just doing regular water changes (10% every 2 weeks) and adding more flow to keep anything from settling. I Have not seen it for over a year now.

[ninjamini]

How about the bubble algae.

[roxy]

I had a similar event years ago even though the tank had plenty of flow and the water quality was great. I ended up changing my bulbs and it went away.

How old are your lights?

[Kannin]

Less nutrients... (I was inadvertantly putting them in my water by thawing frozen food and pooring the whole bit in the tank). Now, I drain off the melt which lessens the amount of nutrients I put in the tank that don't get consumed. Others get it from feeding too much. A friend of mine got it because, over time... his clean up crew died, but he kept feeding the same amount. It took weeks of me trying to help him before I realized that he had no crabs eating the extra food in his tank.

More flow... Cyano grows in dead spots... (probably because unused nutrients settle in dead spots).

Less light... If you'll notice (the cyano is much worse near the end of the light cycle). Just cut back by an hour or so until you cure the problem.

Phosban reactor. I use Phosgard... which is the little white beads media instead of the coffee ground type. (less messy) I run it in a reactor which will cost about 70 bucks to set up including the pump but, with an aquapod... maybe you could just put it in a media bag in your overflow or something.

Remember this. Once you beat... If you get lax... it'll come back.