Battling diatoms

[Robert59]

I'm trying everything water changes feeding every other day blowing it with turkey baster the bottom of my tank gets brown and grows like hair if I keep the lights off for a couple of days it goes away I check my parameters they they seem to be real good not sure what else to do any advice this tank is been running over a year

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Rodi water?
Have you tested for silicates?
Are you running GFO?
Any Pics?

 

[Hemlawk]

If you are using RODI water, they should go away in a few days.

 

[Robert59]

Yes rodi how do I test for silicates?no gfo

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Yes rodi how do I test for silicates?no gfo

I should have asked if it was a new tank too. if its a chronic long time prob There is a silicate test kit. If its new, the outer parts of the rock will have some silicates that get realeaed and it usually goes away.
if your nurteints are highenoug you can run some GFO in a reactor or a bag over the return pump or a high flow area to remove possible silicates in the water.

rereading the post, can we see a picture?

 

[Fishmantim]

Had the same problems all my parameters were good did a 3 day blackout covered the whole tank with cardboard after 3 days I was amazed no diatoms neve came back

 

[Hazmat312]

I used vibrant for my outbreak. Within 24hours the tank was the clearest it's ever been.

 

[40B Knasty]

Did some research for you. Yes RO/DI water is great, BUT it does not take long and I mean a few uses of the system before silicates and silica acids to start penetrating through the R.O. and D.I. resins filters.
You have to attack and prevent it from 2 ways. What's in your tank and new water.
If things start to look good and then it starts coming back in a day later. Your reactors are now letting the silicates through. Time to change it. Even if it has only been a few days.
If it is on your glass take a sponge and wipe from the bottom up. Rinse the sponge. Do it all the way around your tank.
Fighting conch are great for diatoms.
The 3 day blackout is a great idea, but there is a downside to it. You just killed all the algae and now just made a butt load of diatoms/nutrients. So after the 3 day blackout. Keep rinsing any particle collecting medias or you are basically turning those into a nutrients reactor. Which is very counterintuitive to what you are trying to achieve. I am about to try a product called Continuum Aquatics Bacter Clean-M. It takes care of all algaes by malnourishing algae and dissolving diatoms. The key factor is not letting those decaying nutrients feed more algae, because it will 100% feed that algae problem and probably just as good as you were feeding the old algae.

 

[Robert59]

s
Hope these pics help, going to order silicate tester. And gfo I'll have to do research find one that is in my budget. I clean my glass with a scraper and then I do a water change

 

[Robert59]

It's all those dark spots on the bottom of my tank

 

[Robert59]

Really appreciate your help!!!!

 

[40B Knasty]

My bad. I kept putting diatoms. I meant detritus.
Long day yesterday..

 

[imustbenuts]

You need to turn the blue lights down to like 20% and the whites to 70% and try taking the pictures again. Can't see what you have at all.