Cyno outbreak!!!

[get_armbarred]

yep red and green cyno all over my rocks.
i dont want to use chemicals
any advice?

38 gal reef tk
340 gph power filter
2 occ clowns
1 tiny hippo tang
1 cleaner shrimp
10 turbo snails
4 hermits
250w mh

 

[Original Fin]

I appear t be winning the war against cyano myself, but I don't want to blurt out what's working for me just yet. I attribute mine to stocking too heavy too early.
I advise against heading to the LFS medicine cabinet right off the bat, and instead try to find the root cause first. You may find a simple fix by changing or modifying your husbandry practices, so that's certainly where you want to start before contemplating any drastic measures like dosing
magical potions...:spin1: Glad you don't want to use chemicals.

Let's gather some facts and see if we can find a consensus for a suitable course of action for you.

Please fill in the blanks:

Pics (how sure are you that it's cyano? Ever had cyano in this tank before?)
water parameters-PH, Ammonia, Nitrites, Nitrates, Phosphates, Temp, SG/Salinity, CAL/ALK/MAG,
lighting schedule
feeding practices (types and how often)
Age of tank
Protein skimmer, sump, refugium?
Maintenance, i.e. water changes, source water type, how much how often. What do you run in the filter? Bio media? Carbon? How often do you do maintenance on this filter, and what does it consist of?
Any other water flow devices besides your power filter?

Do you have plans to transfer that Hippo Tang to a larger tank? Please say yes!

Anybody else see any details we're missing?

 

[get_armbarred]

I'm running pad filters with carbon in my powerfilter. I do a 5 gal water change every two weeks. My sump is waiting for a return pump to be complete. No skimmer yet. I have a hydor 700 ph. My system is 5 months young. 250w mh run 8 hrs a day.
Params and pics coming soon

 

[get_armbarred]

pics

 

[sminker]

i seem to ONLY get cyano when its time to change the filters on my RO/DI unit.

its weird. about every 5-6 months i will start to see it on the sandbed in small areas, then within 2-4 days of changing my filters it goes away. the TDS meter will still read 000 or 001 when i start to see this happening.

 

[get_armbarred]

That's good to hear I'm worried about it getting out of control.

 

[rostato]

You need more flow, and a skimmer to remove the bacteria...cyano is a bacteria, not an algae.

Flow being the biggest concern for me.

Alos do your water change every week in sytead of two. And blow it all off your rocks right before the lights go out. Change filter socks, and pray. Cyano is tough to beat.

Lights out for 2-3 days will kill it, but unless you fix the problem it will just come back.

 

[get_armbarred]

Thanks for the advise i cant turn my lights off because of my corals. i should have my sump up by next week so that will help the flow

 

[WI reefer55]

^^^

sure u can I just did a 2 day lights out with a blanket over my tank and all the cyno dyed. my entire tank is clean now no cyno anywhere

BTW I keep sps, LPS, fish all did fine the sps seemed a little ****ed but nothing major

I would not do more than 48 hours with sps

 

[get_armbarred]

wow i didnt know they could take that good to know. makes since though i guess people do ship corals halfway around the world every day

 

[cpl40475]

one of the biggest reasons for Cyano is low flow and over feeding. Can you add more flow with another PH. Remove as much by hand increase water changes to weekly and keep a good check on water parem.
http://www.suite101.com/content/how-to-battle-cyanobacteria-a44385

Kind of a good article on battling it.

 

[get_armbarred]

Good article thanks