Help me please.....Diatoms

tiababygirl2

tiababygirl2

New member
hello..
my tank has been cycle for 3+years but out of no where... Diatoms... and it will not go away .I've done 20% water changes weekly .,the coral and fish are happy {if not even happier during this out break} has been 3 almost 4 weeks now . it starts on the sand bed then the glass and then the rock .I clean everything weekly .
I added a few piece of rock but that came after/during{outbreak} first water change..and the rock that was cycled .
the only thing different is I'm been using Aiptasia -x..could this cuase this problem? I'm just so upset .I've been doing salt water for over 10 yrs and rarely had a problem when setting up a new tank.
please help me figure this out.
thanks Ruth
Ps one more thing I did open a new bag of salt .Part of a 150g bucket..
 
Diatoms feed off silicate, IIRC, so maybe something added it to the system? No new sand, right? I would check the new variables to see if they could be adding silicate, but that's a pretty long time to be battling it on an established system. Gluck!
 
I have try running GFo right when it started..I'm currently runnig tank with Chemi Pure Elite. tank is beautiful{clear} corals are fully extended..
now tonight air bubbles on everything .rock, back of glass. think I'm going to turn off power heads.
I think its my salt mix .going to order new salt this weekend.
gheez its just driving me crazy .
There is one more thing i forgot to mention I had a whole colony of xenia die right when this all started.{thought maybe it died from the aiptias X
 
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If hair like strands start coming from the bubbles watch out. Mine turned into cyano. If you see red or purple it's cyano.
 
yes , i check my ro/di filter still reading zero..
so what if it turns to cyano? whats cause it? what fix it ?
I'm looking for Help..
I ordered new salt .should be here fri or sat. I turn off 1 power head..
 
Don't turn off any flow off.. I think your NO3 and phosphate might be high.. You might want to have these checked with a good testing kit and not API IMO..

I never heard of Salt causing diatoms, but I can be wrong. Can you post a picture of the diatoms you are talking about?

What kind of skimmer are u running and how many powerheads do you have?
 
From my experience in the past anything new added to the system will casue a Diatoms outbreak. Even if there was one present adding new rock is adding fuel to the fire. How long have you had your RO/DI unit running? When was the last time you change your RO membrane? Sometimes salt can casue these issues especially if your batch goes bad after awhile. But as Dre mention I woulod be checking out you Nitrates and Phophates a little closer just to make sure.
 
didn't work Dre..but i did find another person going thur this here on Rc forum : reef chemistry ..alias jimmaki.. I think it just might be the salt .and i have new box coming sat. but i sure would love to read from the thread you have. Thanks Ruth
 
Ruth don't cut back on flow use as much as possible. That stuff will suck up the oxygen during it's run. Run some charcoal after the chemi-pure. Use micron bags on your drains and blow out your rocks until there's no more silt in them. Doing a water change right after blasting the rock and upper portion of your sandbed will remove the fuel the diatoms are feeding on and they will go away. Coral usually love it when they get silt treatment too. GL!
 
Thanks everyone..
I added a aquapower 70 filter {temp.] filled with extra charcoal ,brush off my rock ,and stirup the sandbed ,and this morning its looking better,without doing the water change,the last 3 weeks ,this was my process with water change.. I've read I might be fueling it ,with to many water changes.. but either way I'm waiting for new salt to come .might even be here today..
Ruth
 
Good luck with your tome problem ... I had exactly the same situation. What I think happened in my case is a dose of chemiclean lowered the oxygen level in the water column and phosphorous started recycling back out of the sand bed and live rock. It was a well established tank so I'm sure both the sand bed and rocks had sinked a good deal of nutrients over the years.

I ended up removing the sand bed a little at a time. That helped a lot but was still getting tomes on the rocks and walls. Finally disassembled the aquascape (what a pain) and washed all the rock in salt water outside the tank. Kept changing the water, and saw improvement after each water change. After about the fifth 50% water change, the problem has finally been brought under control. I put in a new SSB a week ago and all is still crystal clear and clean. I get a slight brown dusting on the new sand after a week, but I have not put in any sand sifters or other CUC critters yet.

I did some research on nutrient recycling and low oxygen levels defintely will cause nutrients to recycle back into the water column, mainly phosphorous.
 
I use Instant Ocean, Reef Crystals and Red Sea Pro ... didn't seem to make any difference.
 
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Thanks jimmaki.. your input does help .it was your thread I was following..I also tried the chemiclean ,but not till after a week when it all started..It started when I..well I think ...when I started killing aiptasias with the aiptasia-x ..I must have got it on my xenia colony ,and which in turn killed it .but unlike your situation .I haven't removed my sand bed .so actually my corals and fish are very happy..where I read your took a turn for the bad {probably anmonia spike?}..but like I stated I also open a new bag of salt .still not sure where it started. who knows..I could have been over feeding ,I just give up trying to figure it out . all I want to do is clear it up..I'm still not 100% cleared yet .and yes I did change my salt .it seems a little better..time will tell.
Thanks Ruth
Ps thanks for the input of water changes .I'm going to increase from 20% to maybe 35%..
 
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