cyanobacteria outbreak again (help please)

[dpsa98]

Hello Everyone,

My tank is about 3 months old and I went through the normal algae outbreaks and they went away just fine soo far. A few weeks ago I had a cyanobacteria outbreak. Over 2 weeks I did 3 - 15% water changes and scrubbed the glass almost daily. The cyano stayed. Under hesitation I used chemi clean (followed directions to the T). Cyano went away but now I have tons of bubbles comming from my protein skimmer after I turned it back on. Today besides the bubbles I noticed a red tint and red looiing dust on my glass and powerheads again. I think the cyanobacteria is back, only 4 days after It dissapeared with the chemi clean. I guess my question is these are my water parameters (are they ok) and if not what should I do or add to repair them? Also what are the bubbles from after the chemi clean treatment and should I use the chemi clean again?

Salinity 1.023
PH 8.0
Amonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 20 (I know it's high, I did a 20 % water change after chemi clean but nitrates remain high)
CA 360 (low I think)
KH 13.8
Alk 4.91

I just got the KH/Alk test so if I read the chart correctly thoes are my correct readings. Im not sure what they really should be.

My tank is 25 gal deep with 175W MH lighting , 28W x 2 blue actintic bulbs and moon light. MH on for about 10-12 hrs a day. Actitics on with MH all day + 2 hrs after. Moon lights on all night.

In my tank I have a few hard corals , plate coral, a few zoanthid frags and frag of fragspawn. I do not have any fish as of yet I want to make sure I can keep the corals and proper water parameters prior to fish ( although my wife would have prefered me to do only fish , she said "how can you enjoy stairing at a bunch of rocks") It's comments like that that can cause a divorce

Almost forgot im not sure if this helps but I use phytoplankton for the zooanthids and corals. I have a cleaner shrimp and 2 turbo snails, 1 blue legged hermit crab I feed bryne shrimp. I also have a reef solution formula . I use very very small amounts of these products about 1/4 cap of phytoplankton and hardly any bryne shrimp and about 1/4 cap of reef solution formula about every 3 days.
I also have kent marine liquid calcium and kent marine superbuffer.



Anyway I would like to thank you for your help in advance.

Dave

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I'm not a fan of products that do no reveal what is in them, like chemi clean.

The best ways to reduce cyano, IMO, are reduced nutrients, reduced organics, and increased water flow.

These articles may be useful:


Phosphorus: Algae’s Best Friend
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/sept2002/chem.htm

Nitrate in the Reef Aquarium
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/august2003/chem.htm

Organic Compounds in the Reef Aquarium
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-10/rhf/index.htm


Iron Oxide Hydroxide (GFO) Phosphate Binders
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-11/rhf/index.htm

 

[baussie]

I would like to give credit to whomever posted about turning the tank lights off for a couple of days, but I don't know who that person is.... Turn your tank lights off for a couple of days and reduce foodstuffs added to tank. Your red slime will go away....this method (turning lights off) works like a charm. Don't worry about your fish & corals; they will survive ok with lights off for a couple of days. dr

 

[daytonians]

I agree with baussie. I have tried everything. I reduced feeding to the point of starving my fish. I had cyano really bad in my main tank and in my refugium. I turned the refugiums lights off for 4 days, and it was almost completely gone. I have not done this in my main tank, because I don't want to stress a fish that already looks unhealthy. I will soon though.

 

[dpsa98]

I have heard both yes and no about turning off the lights. If you turn off the lights it stops the cyano from growing and it will dissapear but turning off the lights wont solve the problem of why the cyanobacteria is there in the first place.

 

[Mike 1911A1]

There is NO magic bullet to eleminate Cyno. You need to reduce phosphorus and nitrates. I had high nitrates (>20) for months and continued 12% weekly water changes. It takes a while but I now I have had nitrates below 2.5ppm for 2 months. Also, if your feeding flake, switch to frozen. Once my nitrates were in control, the cyno is no more.

Mike

 

[dpsa98]

That's what I think I will do I will wait till next week and then I will attempt another 10-15% water change and keep checking my parameters. I will keep this up for as long as it takes I understand that my tank is fairly new and these things happen.

 

[daytonians]

I agree, that if you have high nitrates, or phosphates you need to take care of that. I have 0 nitrates, and inorganic phosphates test out at .01. Any lower is actually bad for corals. Still, I have cyano. It can be a total bear to get rid of.

 

[jmack]

I had cyano too..then I got a HUGE cleanup crew of red tip hermits (I'm talking about 100 for a 120gal). Haven't seen it since

 

[daytonians]

"I had cyano too..then I got a HUGE cleanup crew of red tip hermits (I'm talking about 100 for a 120gal). Haven't seen it since "

That is funny. I thought Cyano would kill almost anything that ate it.

 

[MDboyz]

Red tip hermits aka Mexican hermit crabs did help in my cyano sistuation too. That was when I first bought them. Now they are so addicted to my frozen. They don't even care to touch cyano anymore ...

 

[antonsemrad]

lime water drips can be helpfull. I think cyno hates high ph. It also hates high water flow. When you do your water changes try to suck out the cyno for export. One other thing, Patience.