clumping sand.

[Engloid]

I have a red coris wrasse that's always tipping frags over, so any in the sand bed, I have to glue to larger pieces of rubble and bury them. Every day, I have to go in and upright something.

I have found some clumps of sand lately. It looks about like how cat pee does in a litter box with clumping litter. It's soft when I pick it up, and if I work it in my fingers a bit, it slowly comes apart, leaving nothing but sand. I hate to use the word slime, because that might lead somebody to think bobbit worm. I've had one of them on another system, and it's not like snot. This system is pretty clean and I'm careful what's in it. I inspect several times a day for any changes, things moved, or damage. I have gotten a few astria stars, but have no bristle worms or aiptasia.

You actually can't see what it is that's holding the sand together, but the clump is somewhat pliable, so I don't think it's anything having to do with precipitation. There's no color, so I don't suspect anything with algae.

I have a sand star, two fighting conchs, a goby and shrimp (they hide all the time), and a couple nasarious snails. My phosphates are still a bit high, so sand is not the cleanest. I'm dosing nopox to get that lowered.

any ideas what this clumping stuff is?

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

What are you doing for alk and cal?

 

[Engloid]

I've been dosing a small amount of kalk for about three weeks. I don't think that would be it since I'm only putting about 1tsp in a gallon and only put in about a half gallon so far. Not only that, but if it was precipitating, it would probably be hard clumps, not soft and squishy.

 

[Engloid]

If I'm crazy, or just wrong, please explain why. I'm not arguing, just trying to figure out what's going on.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Oh no worries.

I honestly am not sure. It could be a lot of stuff like some kinda micro fauna or sponge etc.

Maybe is wrasse slime??

Dunno.
Let's #reefsquad.

 

[chefjpaul]

 

[Engloid]

The clumps aren't hard at all though. They're soft, yet can be picked up. They're about like jello.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

That would say maybe bacterial. I've not heard of that but I've not seen everything.

 

[malacoda]

I can't speak from personal experience as I don't use kalk (I'm a 2-part kind of guy), but I suspect it could be mild precipitation even though the clumps are 'soft' -- kind of like when salt or sugar clump together ... depending on how much moisture there is the salt clumps can be soft and crumble when you touch them, or hard as a rock. I imagine the hardness of the sand clumps would depend on the amount of precipitation and the length of time it has been happening.

In either case, if starting to add kalk is the only major change you've made recently and you didn't have clumps before, odds are the change (e.g. kalk dosing) is in some way the culprit.

 

[Maritimer]

Given the texture / consistency you're seeing, I'm thinking something biological - worms or bacterial colonies, perhaps, or leftover mucus from a sandsleeping fish, as SaltyFilmFolks suggested.

~Bruce

 

[bubbaque]

I made a post about the same thing. I believe it's your conchs. Does yours look like this? https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/conch-eggs.314155/

 

[Skimmerdon’tstink]

I made a post about the same thing. I believe it's your conchs. Does yours look like this? https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/conch-eggs.314155/

Conch makes clumps of Sand, I have 5 conchs and I see them making it all the time. It’s harmless .