Low Nutrients Cyano Problem out of control!!

[lousybreed]

I need help. I have read everything posted in the last year on Cyano and tried almost everything. Black out? Yes. Reduced feedings and lots of water changes? Yes. More GFO and carbon? Yes. More circulation? 20x tank volume. Didn't help at all. I carbon dose. I switched over to vinegar because that was supposed help which didn't change anything. Lowered lighting intensity and it didn't help. Wet skimming didn't help. Hell this Cyano is getting worse. 1ppm nitrates and 0.02ppm Phosphate. I am about to use chemiclean because I am going to go crazy and broke. I have been doing so many water changes its crazy. Any suggestions? The weird thing is all my corals are doing good.

 

[Bent]

How positive are you that this is actually cyano?

Pics?

 

[lousybreed]

I will tomorrow. It's slimy, reddish, makes bubbles during the photo period (pearling for any fw planted tank guys) and comes off with a puff of a turkey baster. Covers everything. Grows super quick.

 

[slief]

Increase your flow in the effected areas. Vacuum your sand bed and blast the rocks off with a power head. Cyano collects where the waste settles. if you have waste settling, cyano will collect there. It pretty much only collects in areas where the flow is minimal and generally in the dead spots. If you eliminate those dead spots, waste won't collect nor will cyano.

 

[oseymour]

I was having cyano issues with my new tank with low nutrients. I tried the steps you did with no sucess.

Two different treatments with Red Slime remover over 2 weeks did it for me. It never came back. I still had some brown algae on the bed after the treatments but two sea cucumbers take care of the sand keeping it white.

 

[Redrosetuscan]

I had the same scenario, with regard to flow I've got a 66x30x28 with a tunze 110 return and two gyres which for quite a while are both on the same time and were both at about 90%. Flow is chaotic I'll say.......

I ended up using a cyano remover and then have massively upped my feeding, like you my nutrients were low, I believe I simply had an imbalance. It's been about 6-8weeks and tank is still clean apart from one tiny tiny patch.

 

[lousybreed]

Ok I have a total of 1500gpm circulation on my 29 gallon. I should add more flow? Worried I will blast my corals to the moon! Some of the best growth is in high flow areas

 

[lousybreed]

Pics

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[lousybreed]

Next one

 

[lousybreed]

Increase your flow in the effected areas. Vacuum your sand bed and blast the rocks off with a power head. Cyano collects where the waste settles. if you have waste settling, cyano will collect there. It pretty much only collects in areas where the flow is minimal and generally in the dead spots. If you eliminate those dead spots, waste won't collect nor will cyano.

Unfortunately what you have suggested is what I have been doing for the last three weeks. I have very few dead spots. With the increased circulation I am actually having issues finding areas with low enough flow for my LPS. I mean I could add another power head. For a total of 2000gpm flow. In a 29gallon tank

 

[d2mini]

I get this same stuff in my nano. Very annoying.
It's also light dependent, i've killed it all off a few times by going dark for 2-3 days.
Blow the rocks off with a turkey baster on a regular basis and try decreasing your lighting intensity if possible.

 

[DrPheel]

with the amount of algae in the tank I can tell you your system is far from low nutrient. From what I can see you have no use for carbon dosing or vinegar dosing as you don't seem to have a big bio load.... once you deplete your water of "nutrients" to feed the bacteria you create from carbon dosing you get massive die off and if your skimmer cant pull everything out you will end up with the issues you are having ... algae , cyano , slimey film on water , ect

stop the dosing and do proper maintenance as stated above. Water changes - siphon your sand - scrub your rock or blow it with a baster and make sure you catch everything with your siphon. I learned it the hard way when I started my new build , carbon dosing is good when you have issue controlling high nitrates from a big bio-load or heavy feeding. Other then that you are just causing the cyano and other issues. The phosphate part it consumes is very minimal so run GFO instead and you will have better results !

Hope this helps , Happy Reefing :beachbum:

 

[oseymour]

Here is how it looked in my tank.
The entire sandbed and rocks was like that.

Nitrate at 5 (Salifert), phosphate was at .08 (Hanna ULR checker)

I had a heavy fish load and running pellets. Blackout and more flow didn't help. I had mp40s running high kicking up sand. Then I had Tunze 6095 which I could position better still kicking up sand and still not better. The Red Slime Remover is what worked for me and the green slime never came back.

I had some brown algae on the sand left but the sea cucumbers and some hermits cleaned it up.

 

[marinelife]

What is your lighting schedule?

 

[Yogre]

I get this same stuff in my nano. Very annoying.
It's also light dependent, i've killed it all off a few times by going dark for 2-3 days.
Blow the rocks off with a turkey baster on a regular basis and try decreasing your lighting intensity if possible.

Cyano is the bane of my existence. I just finished up a 3 day lights out, it was all over my sand and rocks. I may try reducing my photoperiod.

Dennis, when you were running your 200, how many hours/day were you running the halides?

 

[sirreal63]

Two or three days of lights out isn't enough, it may take five or six days to effect a kill. You will know when it dies, your skimmer will start pulling it out and the color of the skim will change.

 

[d2mini]

Cyano is the bane of my existence. I just finished up a 3 day lights out, it was all over my sand and rocks. I may try reducing my photoperiod.

Dennis, when you were running your 200, how many hours/day were you running the halides?

I was running them from around 6.5 hours if I remember correctly. And then the T5's for a couple hours before and after.

Two or three days of lights out isn't enough, it may take five or six days to effect a kill. You will know when it dies, your skimmer will start pulling it out and the color of the skim will change.

Jack, are you saying that even though it visually disappears it still needs more time to completely die off?

 

[sirreal63]

Yes Sir. If your skimmer isn't skimming the remnants of it out, it isn't dead and will come back in short order. Even if you do kill it, you can always get it again but IMO a healthy tank does a good job of fighting it off. Having high biodiversity helps keep the tank clean and this is the first step to keeping pests like Cyano away. I fought this stuff hard in my tank, the long lights out period killed it.

 

[lousybreed]

Thanks guys! I have a 10 hr photo period. Thanks for the advice on the carbon dosing. I just realized I never backed off dosing once my nitrates went to zero!!!! So a 5 day black out? Do you have to reaccimate the corals after lights out?

 

[sirreal63]

I did for a day or two but I don't think it is an absolute necessity, but I would still ramp up lighting slowly. Don't just go by time, if your skimmer is decent you wil know when it is dieting off.