effects of high silicate

CeeGee

CeeGee

New member
I have never tested for silicates. I have a very strange algae that I can't seem to get rid of. I tried carbon dosing and it didn't really help and I finally gave up and cooked my rock. Guess what ? It's back. Not too bad yet but it is there.

I am thinking that there is either some phosphate still bound up in the rock (which I find hard to believe as it was clean as clean can be after cooking) or I have something like silicates in my source water.

What are the effects one sees with high silicates? I don't know if I have them or not as I have never tested (never seemed like I needed to because I run a RO/DI and I stay on top of cartridge replacement) but I am grasping at straws as to what is causing this algae (it might not even be algae as far as I know). I am pulling my hair out and need to figure this out. I have lost enough coral to this junk.
 
A picture of your pest may help. :)

Silicates will cause diatom blooms which are easy to control. Diatoms appear like a brown film on your rock, sand and glass & can be easily removed.

Microalgae, dinoflagellates, cyanobacteria and bacteria are very tough to kill as they can develop a protective covering which will protect them from a lot of things. So this process of rock cooking is perhaps not the best way to eradicate them.

[APD] RE: Algae spores
http://fins.actwin.com/aquatic-plants/month.200412/msg00318.html

"It is a gross over-simplification to talk about algae spreading by spores in the air as if algae were all one biologically similar
life-form. They are not! Filament algae, the algae we need to concern ourselves with, live EXCLUSIVELY in the aquatic environment. Many kinds of aquatic algae can survive extended periods of desiccation (drying) by slowing down biological processes and encysting (so-called resting spores)."
 
I use a Kold Ster-il system so I do have 14 mg/L of silica in my water. When starting the aquarium, I did have yellow-brown diatom blooms that were noticeable on the glass surfaces. By getting other nutrients under control, the diatom blooms have not recurred.

I have not had a problem with algae until my skimmer broke a few months ago. I will need to address the algae problem after my skimmer is repaired but I do not think that silica is the issue.
 
The algae I have is ghost like in appearance. Looks like transparent hair algae. It is very difficult to remove as it is "gummy" and impossible to see when the rock is out of the water. In really thick areas it turns more of dingy yellow and is very think and dang near impossible to remove. Luckily it hasn't gotten that bad yet in the new tank.

I am going to try and get some pics tonight.
 
I read your article Randy and I am not sure I understand it all but a couple of things stick out. This stuff is definitely snotty and slimy. However it doesn't get air bubbles unless some air bubbles get into from another source (pumps etc.). It doesn't appear to make it's own.

My snail population is much lower than it used to be but that is normal as they die over time and I have never added any since my first purchase nearly 4 years ago. That being said snails and hermits don't seem to really touch this stuff like they consumed the green hair algae that I had when I first started my tank.

My pH has always ran low from day 1. It has ranged from 7.8 - 8.1 usually hovering in the 7.9 range. I add two part it goes up for about 30 minutes and then back to normal. Never tried kalk as I don't understand how it is used.

Don't have my pH probe going at the moment I was going to hook it up last night but didn't have time. I will do it tonight.

The stuff I have doesn't really look anything like the two photos in the article. It is much "finer" and ghostly in appearance.

Thinking back this stuff seems to have reared it's head after adding some "base rock" from reeferrocks which I believe to be out of business now. I am wondering if this "rock" was really from the ocean or what it was that I put in my tank. I don't ever remember seeing this stuff before adding the rock to my tank.

I would think that my nutrients would be low. I cooked the crap out of this rock. I started the tank will new ro/di water none from the old tank. I only have one fish in the tank and I feed it sparingly. My filter socks do get a little dirty though every couple of days but my skimmer isn't pulling anything dark. No Nitrates according to my new LaMotte kit. Not sure about phosphate. I have run a good amount of GFO from day one though.

On my last tank I was doing a ULN system which improved things but not quite the way I thought it would hence the reason I cooked the rock. Do you think it would hurt anything to start that back up and keep running GFO for the time being as well? They say not to run GFO while running a ULN system but I don't think it would hurt anything to try and knock out all the phosphate that I can and then let the ULN handle it from then on out.

What do you think?
 
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With that ULN system, were you dosing a carbon source?

White or clear slimes are often bacterial globs driven to grow by the bacteria.
 
Yes I was dosing a carbon source and a bacteria culture.

The only clear slimes I saw would clump together with detritus on the bottom and I would vacuum them out. The "algae" that I speak of was there prior to starting the ULN system.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14536363#post14536363 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Randy Holmes-Farley
I think we need a picture to really tell what it is. :)
Click to expand...

ask and you shall receive. These pics make it show up much better than it actually does in the tank. On the live rock you have to look "just right" to see it until it attacks a coral that is.

1.
ghost_algae_1.jpg


2.
ghost_algae_2.jpg
 
this looks familiar, I could never get a picture to post.
sounds like what I have, it followed me from my old tank to my new tank somehow, must have been on the couple of rocks I transfered.
Does it have an odor when you clean the glass? If I pull the wet side of the magnet out on my magnavor, the smell resembles when you take pulsing xenia out of the water.
 
never smelled xenia but the bucket of water (where I scrubbed my rock the other night) has a very sour milk kinda smell. It is hard to explain.
 
No chlorophyll, bacteria or fungus. Bacteria usually will clean off reasonably easy. Fungus has hold fasts, which would make it harder to clean off, which this appears to have.


This picture is a fungus growing on a petri dish and it is not growing in water:

Fungus_petri_dish.jpg
 
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HighlandReefer,

I don't understand your post. Are you saying that what I posted is not chlorophyll, bacteria or fungus?

Does anyone have any idea what it is and how to eradicate it?
 
I see no color (lack of chlorophyll) in what you have, which would indicate either a bacteria or a fungus. Bacteria have no root like structures (hold-fasts) like fungi have. Bacteria will wipe off of whatever it is on fairly easily. Fungi will not wipe off as easily due to the hold-fasts. IMHO, I believe it may be a fungus. :)

In areas where this organism grows for a while, do you see any slightly darker areas (fruiting bodies), which would contain the spores?

After I re-read my first post, I have to admit that it did not make sense. Sorry, I'm brain-dead at times. :D
 
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<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14551105#post14551105 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by HighlandReefer
I areas where this organism grows for a while, do you see any dark areas (fruiting bodies), which contain the spores?
Click to expand...

Let me get some more pics tonight and you tell me ;)
 
sorry,

pics the other night didn't happen. I am a little under the weather so I have been dragging.

The darker "spots" seem to be some sort of Holdfast/fruiting body to me. Correct me if I am wrong.

If this is indeed a fungus how do you get rid of it and not kill your corals?


fungus1.jpg


fungus2.jpg


fungus3.jpg


Here are a couple of pics of what this stuff looks like once it really gets a hold on the tank. These are from my last tank that I was hoping to eradicate this mess with the current one. Notice how in the high flow areas it turns a slight yellow?

Where did Randy go? :)

tunze_1.jpg


tunze_2.jpg
 
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Man sorry for the hijack but I am going through the exact same thing and just ordered a silica test kit as a last resort.Maybe I can get some help here. Current reading Nitrate 8ppm and Phosphate 0.06. Dosing 2 ml of vodka running Rowaphos and carbon in a reactor and this is what I am dealing with. Again sorry for the hijack but your struggles are exactly like mine and your photo of the powerhead looks exactly like mine.
algae001.jpg
 
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