Tank maturation phase??

[Shooter7]

My 120 is just over 5 1/2 months old and has been doing pretty well, all things considered. Over the past week or so I suddenly developed a short, fuzzy algae across the entire back wall of the tank and on the Seio powerheads. I purchased some astrea reinforcements and they are helping with munching on the stuff, and I occasionally see the foxface and scopas nipping some of it as well. Have also noticed the sudden appearance of hundreds of those little white spirobid worms on the back wall too. Anyway, there have been no significant occurrences with the tank recently. Pretty much status quo. I have been transitioning over to IO from Coralife salt over the past two water changes - I do about a 25 - 30 gal water change once a month. Last water change was 6/3. My nitrates have been and remain below 5. My pH has been pretty stable between 8.1 and 8.3 most of the time. Last alk was about 10 dkh as I recall, from about a week ago. I just haven't been able to come up with anything specific happening that would cause any kind of significant shift of things in the tank, so it got me wondering if this was just some sort of maturing phase going on? Anyone have any input?

 

[chadfarmer]

maybe just some phosphates in the system

 

[Shooter7]

Dunno, don't know where they would have come from. And why this stuff isn't growing on the rocks or sand, just the back wall and pumps? And nothing extra growing in the sump either...

 

[trottman]

maby you need to change the filter in your ro di maker??

mabe it is leaching phosphates or is not filtering as well anymore?

 

[Shooter7]

RO/DI filters were changed just a few months ago. TDS is always zero. Every time it starts to show just one TDS, I change out the DI resin. Manufacturer recommends changing filters approx once a year.

 

[Shooter7]

Again, if this were a phosphate problem then I would think it would be system wide, and I would have algae all over everything. I don't, I have some short stuff on the back wall that the snails are eating and it's not coming back where they've eaten it, and it's not showing up on the rock, sand, or in the sump.

 

[Shooter7]

You know what? I think it may have occurred to me what part of it might be. It may be a flow issue. The fronts of the overflows that are exposed to all the flow in the tank are totally barren of this algae, however the sunken areas between them and in the corners are the areas that have this algae growing. hmmmm

It's spooge-fest in there right now. The guys in the rocks are shooting out white blobs into the tank. Always a good time...especially when the foxface eats them. :worried: