Diatoms and lighting

Pennywise the Clown · Aug 22, 2018

My tank has been running for nearly 5 weeks. I cycled using Colony and dosing ammonia. The lights have been off during this process.
I have added a pair of clowns once my ammonia and nitrate readings stayed steady at 0 for 3 days and in the last week switched my hydra 26's on and added a couple of coral frags.
I now have the expected diatom bloom. My understanding of diatoms is that they consume silicates from the sand and rocks until this fuel is exhausted and them simply disappear.
My lights are on for 12 hours, though much of this schedule is ramp up/down and blues. I could reduce the lighting period but will this just prolong the diatom stage. If I keep the seduce as it is now, will this encourage the diatoms to burn out quicker?

Diesel · Aug 22, 2018

Just let it be.
You still cycling as you added a bioload to the tank and your bacteria level is building.

Ron Reefman · Aug 22, 2018

IMHO the diatoms need to use up most/all of the fuel. I had a situation where I had to set up a new tank (120g) and literally fill it full with corals and fish from a broken tank (180g). I had a pretty bad diatom bloom after about 2 months. I tried the lights out method and the diatoms were gone... only to come back a few days later! I think I made the total bloom last longer, but it also made it less intense. And since I had a tank full of sps coral, keeping the diatom level lower was better for me. If your tank can tolerate letting the bloom go full on, that's what I would suggest. Let it go and get it over with.

Good luck.

Pennywise the Clown · Aug 22, 2018

Ron Reefman said:
IMHO the diatoms need to use up most/all of the fuel. I had a situation where I had to set up a new tank (120g) and literally fill it full with corals and fish from a broken tank (180g). I had a pretty bad diatom bloom after about 2 months. I tried the lights out method and the diatoms were gone... only to come back a few days later! I think I made the total bloom last longer, but it also made it less intense. And since I had a tank full of sps coral, keeping the diatom level lower was better for me. If your tank can tolerate letting the bloom go full on, that's what I would suggest. Let it go and get it over with.

Good luck.

Thanks. Letting it go full on, no matter how bad it is going to look, was exactly what I was thinking. I like a lot of blues in my lighting so it doesn't actually look that bad.
I turned off everything and just had whites on at 100% to just see and the tank looked like a Mars landscape.

Jesterrace · Aug 22, 2018

Steve Thompson said:
My tank has been running for nearly 5 weeks. I cycled using Colony and dosing ammonia. The lights have been off during this process.
I have added a pair of clowns once my ammonia and nitrate readings stayed steady at 0 for 3 days and in the last week switched my hydra 26's on and added a couple of coral frags.
I now have the expected diatom bloom. My understanding of diatoms is that they consume silicates from the sand and rocks until this fuel is exhausted and them simply disappear.
My lights are on for 12 hours, though much of this schedule is ramp up/down and blues. I could reduce the lighting period but will this just prolong the diatom stage. If I keep the seduce as it is now, will this encourage the diatoms to burn out quicker?

Reduce the lighting down to about 8 hours total and add a clean up crew and it will help get rid of it pretty quickly.

Pennywise the Clown · Aug 23, 2018

Well Martian landscape yesterday, completely clear today. My diatoms lasted all of about 5 days.

saltyfilmfolks · Aug 23, 2018

It’s wise in new tank to try and avoid the the sometimes debilitating condition know to reefers as H.I.T.S. (Hands in tank syndrome).

Recurring symptoms may or will continue your entire career in Reefing.

Happy Reefing.

Diesel · Aug 23, 2018

Steve Thompson said:
Well Martian landscape yesterday, completely clear today. My diatoms lasted all of about 5 days.

Ever heard of the “diatom fairy”........... now you did!

Pennywise the Clown · Aug 23, 2018

Diesel said:
Ever heard of the “diatom fairy”........... now you did!

I hope the cyano and hair algea fairies are equally kind

lapin · Aug 23, 2018

saltyfilmfolks said:
It’s wise in new tank to try and avoid the the sometimes debilitating condition know to reefers as H.I.T.S. (Hands in tank syndrome).

Recurring symptoms may or will continue your entire career in Reefing.

Happy Reefing.

Very good advice.
Be wary of adding chemicals to fix problems that have a biological solution. Many times they cause other problems you dont want.