Can Bacteria Bloom Kill off Corals?

ejk17

ejk17

Member
Hey everyone,

so i suspect that my 5 month old tank is having a bacteria bloom and it has been like this for almost 3 days. I have had bad blooms in the past but none as cloudy or long lasting as this...( white milky water, I cannot see the back of the 2ft tank) Can this kill off my corals? its mainly leathers and some polyps.

Also whats the best action to get rid of this? I did a water change of 20% yesterday and 20% over last weekend. I have been dosing Microbatr7 and running Chemi-pure elite. anything else I can try to help get rid of this?
 
Dear, under my Experience Bacteria blooming means Water quality issue
And water quality issue means .......problem
But you have leathers and polyps ,
Polyps Zoanthus are very hardy and survive in this case for long but lathers will not tolerate it for very long
And face some problems

Dear if possible let me know yourtank
Water parameters
Temperature
And how is you skimmer working

Thanks
Darpan Dhawan
 
ejk17 said:
Hey everyone,

so i suspect that my 5 month old tank is having a bacteria bloom and it has been like this for almost 3 days. I have had bad blooms in the past but none as cloudy or long lasting as this...( white milky water, I cannot see the back of the 2ft tank) Can this kill off my corals? its mainly leathers and some polyps.

Also whats the best action to get rid of this? I did a water change of 20% yesterday and 20% over last weekend. I have been dosing Microbatr7 and running Chemi-pure elite. anything else I can try to help get rid of this?
Click to expand...

Bacteria blooms can kill anything and everything in a tank. Hell it happens in the ocean. Stinks like hell too. The bacteria multiply at such a fast rate they consume all of the oxygen in the water creating an hypoxic environment that for lack of a better term will suffocate your tank inhabitants.

A UV sterilizer will solve this issue pretty quick. In the mean time I would be sure you have sufficent surface agitation by pointing your powerheads to the surface. This will help to keep the water oxygenated.

Good luck.
 
Thanks for the responses.

I haven't had a chance to test my parameters in the past 2 days. I will check tonight. The water is still cloudy and and still pretty bad. Had no losses so far. One of my leathers looks pretty flat and limpy... started looking that way before this bloom started but I wonder if he could have been the cause of this "bloom" or whatever it is?

Can leathers leech toxins into the water that can cause something like this?
 
CuzzA said:
Bacteria blooms can kill anything and everything in a tank. Hell it happens in the ocean. Stinks like hell too. The bacteria multiply at such a fast rate they consume all of the oxygen in the water creating an hypoxic environment that for lack of a better term will suffocate your tank inhabitants.

A UV sterilizer will solve this issue pretty quick. In the mean time I would be sure you have sufficent surface agitation by pointing your powerheads to the surface. This will help to keep the water oxygenated.

Good luck.
Click to expand...

Good to know.

Thanks,

Mike
 
Bump. This issue is still going on... No signs of die off. Corals are not happy but all fish are fine. What's next? I have already done 2 20% water changes and all levels are within parameters.

Any suggestions? More water changes?
 
Let your skimmer roar. Or at least check it to see that it's running properly. The last couple blooms I had made my skimmer go nuts on even the lowest settings.

Oxygenate, reduce feedings, and let your skimmer take care of it.
 
D man I have never heard of that before. But it is bacteria... Should I stop dosing this? And start something new?
 
CuzzA is right. A UV will sort it out for you. I had a bacteria bloom problem on one of my tanks that would not go away for months. I bought a small submersible UV and it cleared up in days. After that I pulled the UV and never had to use it again.
 
Stopped microbactr a couple of days ago. But I was dosing every other day. Half of recommended amount.

Lost 2 of my leathers

Have changed about 95% of the total water in the past 2 weeks and it is slowly clearing up. Also added 100 micron socks instead of 200. Skimmer is constantly running.

It's upsetting that I have lost 2 nice leathers.

Was the microbactr the cause of this possibly? I didn't know it wasn't safe to use long term...
 
I had a bad bloom, ordered a UV next day shipping from Amazon, cleared it up in less than 24 hours.
Aggressive water changes did not help.
Cuzza gave good advice here.
 
Wish I would have used the UV. Heard bad things about them in the past and I have never had problems getting rid of a bloom so I didn't grab one...
 
There's also anecdotal reports of UV sterilizers keeping cyanobacteria at bay. Ultimately I think they're a good idea on a reef tank aside from clearing bacteria and algae blooms. They help to keep certain things in check by avoiding an explosion of one species taking over your tank.
 
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