Another brown slime post

[RealtyBoss]

Ok so I've read several posts here and I know this is redundant and there doesn't seem to be a clear answer. I have the brown algae bacteria. Originally I was under the impression it only goes after Zoas and palys. It took out my prized brains and torches- rapidly. Right now, all my DT fish are in the hospital tank. My DT is full of endless coral. Inverts- Mother Sherman, CUC and more beautiful large show pieces. We did the blanket treatment for 72 hours and the tank looked amazing ( once the corals perked back up) never seen my tank to clean. We'd removed the few pieces that had the bacteria. Now on to tank #5... New. Had transferred a mushroom branch into it before we had found the bacteria in DT. It's now rapidly growing, even onto one of the BTAs stalk. Interestingly enough while googling, I found this same bacteria plagues cannabis growers and they found a solution. Consisting of bleach and some antibiotic. Now obviously these aren't suitable for a tank with inverts. I have chemi-clean and will use that but I don't believe it will clear it of this bacteria. Has anyone been successful in killing this ? Even if breaking apart the tank? It will be a 200 gal, 50, 30 and 20 gallon tank as I suspect I'll find out sonner than later that I've somehow cross contaminated. I'm willing to be a Guinea pig if someone thinks they might have a plan, will just need specific plans for the nems, Rock nems , leathers , acans, acanophillia, hammers, frog spawns, mushrooms, weslo, bubble ( you get my drift) ex: throwing them in a storage tub while nuking the tank. I don't have any intention of adding anything more to the tanks in the future so if I crash it trying / I may be ok with it if I can start over new. Sorry for the novel , just hoping to better understand. I'm curious about this antibiotic I read about. It's a 4 day process but again, was for hydroponic canabis. Thanks for any help.

 

[ahammer]

Are you referring to brown jelly? If so I tend to believe that it is from excessive nitrate/phosphates.

 

[Astle2015]

Use no pox by red Sea or start vodka dosing. Wont fully cure nitrate and phosphate problems nothing will. but it works a treat

 

[Diesel]

What you have is common known as Cyano but that's a maybe it also can be spirulina.
Not so easy to treat.
But there are in tank treatments.

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/positive-identification-of-cyanobacteria.253287/

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/cyanobacteria-questions-answers-and-solution.253823/

Take a portion of that red mat you see in your tank and place it into a cup with about 2 cups of tank water.
Now add 1ml of 3% hydrogen peroxide
Over the course of several hours you may start to see a change in the water and the color of your sample.
If in fact it is the common cyanobacteria and not spirulina the water will start to turn a pink color and the sample with start to turn a green color.
Now if it is spirulina there will be no change as h2o2 has little effect on the individual cells.

 

[cromag27 Verified Sponsor]

Can you post photos? Brown slime could describe a few different algae. if it's killing things I'm wondering if it's dinos.

 

[BoneXriffic]

What you have is common known as Cyano but that's a maybe it also can be spirulina.
Not so easy to treat.
But there are in tank treatments.

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/positive-identification-of-cyanobacteria.253287/

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/cyanobacteria-questions-answers-and-solution.253823/

Take a portion of that red mat you see in your tank and place it into a cup with about 2 cups of tank water.
Now add 1ml of 3% hydrogen peroxide
Over the course of several hours you may start to see a change in the water and the color of your sample.
If in fact it is the common cyanobacteria and not spirulina the water will start to turn a pink color and the sample with start to turn a green color.
Now if it is spirulina there will be no change as h2o2 has little effect on the individual cells.

This!! And if it ends up being common cyano, h202 treatment os safe and effective

 

[RealtyBoss]

We have cyno and another. I'll take a pic. The red sheets we've been able to take care of ( it returns but we treat again) - the brown will cover an emty hospital tank. We've moved frags and dying coral to it and they're gone within the day and then the tank turns brown with jelly along the bottom glass.

 

[Astle2015]

What are your nitrate and phosphate readings?

 

[twilliard]

We have cyno and another. I'll take a pic. The red sheets we've been able to take care of ( it returns but we treat again) - the brown will cover an emty hospital tank. We've moved frags and dying coral to it and they're gone within the day and then the tank turns brown with jelly along the bottom glass.

If it returns using something like chemiclean it is not spirulina.
Diesel covered the rest

 

[RealtyBoss]

What are your nitrate and phosphate readings?

Nitrates are undetectable
Phosphates are undetectable
( I've read they can absorb these though ?)

 

[Griff]

Following along.

 

[BoneXriffic]

I had experience with dinos stripping my tank of po4...not sure in the nitrate...i imagine these others could have similar affects

 

[RealtyBoss]

What you have is common known as Cyano but that's a maybe it also can be spirulina.
Not so easy to treat.
But there are in tank treatments.

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/positive-identification-of-cyanobacteria.253287/

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/cyanobacteria-questions-answers-and-solution.253823/

Take a portion of that red mat you see in your tank and place it into a cup with about 2 cups of tank water.
Now add 1ml of 3% hydrogen peroxide
Over the course of several hours you may start to see a change in the water and the color of your sample.
If in fact it is the common cyanobacteria and not spirulina the water will start to turn a pink color and the sample with start to turn a green color.
Now if it is spirulina there will be no change as h2o2 has little effect on the individual cells.

No change. Any advice for the other you mentioned ?

 

[Nemguy123]

Try getting a silica test these could be dinoflagellates and they have shells that are made up of silica and if you have an abundance of silica in your water it could fuel a Dino-bloom I've had this happen once before I would also recommend daily waterchages I would suck out all that I could and then just replace with new water

 

[Diesel]

No change. Any advice for the other you mentioned ?

You telling me you have Spirulina?
That's a good thing.
Start dosing a concentrated bacteria, I had good luck with Aqua Forrest Bio-S.
Remove as much as possible by sucking it out with a small tubing in a bucket when do a WC.
Keep No3 and Po4 low, do WC twice a week, cut down the photo period for a extra 2 hours and you'll see that it disappear.
It won't hurt to dose some peroxide but do a 50% dose as it will help the skimmer perform better.

 

[RealtyBoss]

Yes sir. On it. Do I need to remove the corals? Weslos and nems?

 

[Diesel]

Yes sir. On it. Do I need to remove the corals? Weslos and nems?

Nope, just leave tank as is just improve the skimmer and water quality.

 

[imustbenuts]

Does it blow off the rocks with a baster easily? It looks like Dinoflagellates to me.

 

[RealtyBoss]

Not particularly. It's a gelatin like substance. Not in sheets or layers in the sub state. It'll Start off as a small slime on the base of a coral and by day's end, it will have disintegrated the whole piece. Leaving behind a globular , sometimes stringy snot floating above. I got S sample yesterday and had to use a spoon to get if off from the rock as the baster wasn't strong enough. Now once it's done cleaning to the bone, it comes off easier. But we've just been throwing out the sick corals. It's like it eats them from the inside out. I don't want to blow the baster and spread it more.

 

[imustbenuts]

Do you have access to a microscope? That is truly the only way to identify your invader.