Purple growth overtaking the tank

[hessfish125]

I am not sure which forum to post this. If this is not appropriate please let me know where to post.

About 3 weeks ago I did my normal scheduled water change. I had read from some posts on the site that I should remove my charcoal and phosguard from my sump since I have coral that was losing color. The water change was great. Here are my current stats:
salinity 1.0245 pH 8.2 ammonia 0 Nitrate 0 Nitrite 0 Calcium 490 Magnesium 1,280 Alkalinity 3.8

The problem: purple algae like growth is overtaking the tank. There are air bubbles attached to the growth. I have 3 pics included. I have suctioned out as much as a gallon of the growth a night and it is replacing itself even faster each night.

The fish are seemingly ok. They swim, eat, and interact as always. I put the charcoal back but not the phosguard. I don't know what to do.

I have owned the system since May 2013. The system is about 5 1/2 years old.

 

[alb_56]

Cyano bacteria

 

[alb_56]

Removing the phosgard and the charcoal opened the door for a bloom. If you can handle it, its best to just let it cycle itself out. Eventually it will all die off. Usually you get this kind of bloom during the ugly phase of the initial cycle in your tank.

 

[hessfish125]

should I replace the phosguard?

is it ok to leave in the charcoal?

I can let it cycle. should I continue to remove manually or leave it undisturbed?

 

[alb_56]

I would keep removing it, eventually you will get it to the point where it wont come back, just takes some patience and time. Millions of articles and threads out there, where people have tried fighting it and people have just left it alone, it is kind of tank and owner dependent thing, on how you want to deal with it. I use phosgard and carbon and still have some in my tank every once in awhile. If you think your corals werent liking it then I would do what my corals wanted, but honestly unless you were using a crap load of it, I really dont see it bleaching corals out. Maybe try and locate and resolve any other issues that there might be before you add or remove any physical filtering media.

Oh PS: I used to let my cyano grow a little when it was on the sand bed and if I caught it at the right time I could pull it all off in one mat.

 

[alb_56]

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2279039