Brought some Cyano with me.

MichaelReefer · Jul 31, 2020

Well, as some of you know I moved from my Reefer 250 to my 525XL last weekend. I cleaned the sand extremely well but apparently some Cyano snuck over on my rocks possibly? I am getting some reddish patches on the sand bed and little bubbles on the rocks here and there. I really dont want to hit it with Chemi-Clean when its only been going for a week so I was looking into something like Dr.Tims Waste Away? Does anyone think that would work or have any advice? Its not bad, but you can definitely see a reddish hue in a few spots of the tank on the sand. Its just weird because its a brand new system, I'm running GFO, Carbon and a Refugium. I really want to get a foothold on it before it gets out of hand, especially on a new tank.

MichaelReefer · Jul 31, 2020

Bump. Anyone?

Tl02022020 · Jul 31, 2020

Ant time I’ve gotten cyano I’ve just stuck to the basics, skimming, nutrient reduction etc and it’s gone away. I think it likes to show up in a new system especially since things get stirred up in the move. So I have no real good advice but it may just be part of the process of getting the new setup all settled in.

jcolliii · Jul 31, 2020

cyano is everywhere, all the time. You can't get rid of it. You can, with careful control of nutrients, minimize its growth. But if your nutients/parameters go out of whack, it will be back - there is nothing you can do about that. Cyano cysts can reactivate after being completely dry. Even if you bleach your dry rock, and then handle something that sat on the counter and touch the water, you probably have introduced cyano cysts. They are probably blowing around in the air. Cyano is a highly successful organism - as far as we know, cyanobacterias are the oldest forms of life on the planet - like 4.1 billion years old. It is highly successful.

I think at very low nutrient levels, cyano is better at getting what it needs than some other things are. Is your NO3 very very low? I know that when my PO4 was undetectable and my NO3 was close to zero, that is when I had much more cyano than I do now. I still have little bits - mostly on the underside of a few branches - but I can live with that. My NO3 has been around 10ppm for months and that seems to keep it mostly away in my system.

MichaelReefer · Aug 1, 2020

jcolliii said:
cyano is everywhere, all the time. You can't get rid of it. You can, with careful control of nutrients, minimize its growth. But if your nutients/parameters go out of whack, it will be back - there is nothing you can do about that. Cyano cysts can reactivate after being completely dry. Even if you bleach your dry rock, and then handle something that sat on the counter and touch the water, you probably have introduced cyano cysts. They are probably blowing around in the air. Cyano is a highly successful organism - as far as we know, cyanobacterias are the oldest forms of life on the planet - like 4.1 billion years old. It is highly successful.

I think at very low nutrient levels, cyano is better at getting what it needs than some other things are. Is your NO3 very very low? I know that when my PO4 was undetectable and my NO3 was close to zero, that is when I had much more cyano than I do now. I still have little bits - mostly on the underside of a few branches - but I can live with that. My NO3 has been around 10ppm for months and that seems to keep it mostly away in my system.

Yeah I think I made the mistake of hooking my GFO up too early. The tank is probably TOO clean. I unplugged my gfo and am feeding more to try and get nutrients ba k up.