Diatoms! Diatoms everywhere!

Kiboshed · Jul 8, 2022

So tank has been up and running for two weeks now.

Biocube 32. Nutriwater, wet live rock, live sand, bottle of Tims one and only.

There is a thin film of algae coating everything the light touches now. It grows very quickly. Weirdly the algae on the live rocks is starting to turn a crazy orange color that I will be honest looks kinda cool.

I bought 5 Astra Snails to combat the "problem".

A Cerith Snail and a Blue legged Hermit Crab were also hitchhikers on the live rock along with a legion of bristleworms and small black pods of some kind. Shockingly I found the smallest bristleworms actually eating the Algea off of the glass.

I recently I found that the algae on my live rock is making bubbles. Not bubbles of algae, but actual bubbles coming off of the algae and floating to the top.

What is this? Is this all normal and healthy?

Lools like a thriving little ecosystem in there, but this is my first saltwater aquarium.

HankstankXXL750 · Jul 8, 2022

Diatoms and other Algea need light. If you don’t have any corals yet it can work to shut off your lights while you cycle your tank. You can add a fish or two when you are ready as they don’t have to have light.

Kiboshed · Jul 8, 2022

HankstankXXXL750 said:
Diatoms and other Algea need light. If you don’t have any corals yet it can work to shut off your lights while you cycle your tank. You can add a fish or two when you are ready as they don’t have to have light.

Interesting. I posted some pics.

Will it hurt anything to just let the algae grow?

What's up with the bubbles?

Kiboshed · Jul 8, 2022

This one tiny patch of clean glass was actually eaten by a small bristleworm. Saw it last night and blew my mind. Didn't think they ate algae.

HankstankXXL750 · Jul 8, 2022

Kiboshed said:
Interesting. I posted some pics.

Will it hurt anything to just let the algae grow?

What's up with the bubbles?

Is it possible you have Cyanobacteria as well? I have fought that. For Cyanobacteria you need to try to siphon it off with a hose, or in small tank like airline. Dose with beneficial bacteria to put compete it. I believe it isn’t affected with a black out.
As far as letting it go? I have and have later regretted it as it becomes harder to eliminate, but I think you can over react also. I thing diatoms are one that can go away with good water quality and just ride them out, part of the ugly stage. But in my opinion cyano will spread and cover looking extremely gross. Chemi-clean works great at killing cyano and is reef and fish safe. It is an antibiotic and I have used it. Another thing that helps with cyano is better flow. Read an article on here earlier that discussed cyano growing in dead or low flow areas. I probably don’t have enough flow in the sand bed as I like sand and don’t like it blowing around.

Kiboshed · Jul 8, 2022

HankstankXXXL750 said:
Is it possible you have Cyanobacteria as well? I have fought that. For Cyanobacteria you need to try to siphon it off with a hose, or in small tank like airline. Dose with beneficial bacteria to put compete it. I believe it isn’t affected with a black out.
As far as letting it go? I have and have later regretted it as it becomes harder to eliminate, but I think you can over react also. I thing diatoms are one that can go away with good water quality and just ride them out, part of the ugly stage. But in my opinion cyano will spread and cover looking extremely gross. Chemi-clean works great at killing cyano and is reef and fish safe. It is an antibiotic and I have used it. Another thing that helps with cyano is better flow. Read an article on here earlier that discussed cyano growing in dead or low flow areas. I probably don’t have enough flow in the sand bed as I like sand and don’t like it blowing around.

Could be. I will need to do more research on cynobacteria. Won't anti bacterials also kill my good bacteria?

I don't have hardly any flow on my sand bed as I have that God aweful sugar sand and any flow toward the bottom just turns my tank into a snowstorm.

HankstankXXL750 · Jul 8, 2022

Kiboshed said:
This one tiny patch of clean glass was actually eaten by a small bristleworm. Saw it last night and blew my mind. Didn't think they ate algae.

I would say that the Algea on your glass isn’t that big of an issue. Just get a cleaner. I like and use the flipper. Get the right one for your glass thickness though as the larger ones are nearly impossible to move on any thing less than 1/2”. I run the medium on my 525 which is 1/2
And on my 350 which is thinner. Run the largest on my XXL750 and my S1000. I just let it grow on the back and it doesn’t bother anything. Unless it turns out to be hair Algea vs the little thin stuff that I normally see.

HankstankXXL750 · Jul 8, 2022

Kiboshed said:
Could be. I will need to do more research on cynobacteria. Won't anti bacterials also kill my good bacteria?

I don't have hardly any flow on my sand bed as I have that God aweful sugar sand and any flow toward the bottom just turns my tank into a

Kiboshed said:

Could be. I will need to do more research on cynobacteria. Won't anti bacterials also kill my good bacteria?

I don't have hardly any flow on my sand bed as I have that God aweful sugar sand and any flow toward the bottom just turns my tank into a snowstorm.

Click to expand...

yes that is a problem with the finer sand. I put it in my S1000 as I missed it from my early days of buying live sand straight out of the Florida ocean. Try smaller wave makers set lower speed and maybe angled to bounce off the front glass. Start high and move down until it disrupts too much then move back up slightly. Have a extra power head that you can plug in and use like a Turkey blaster to clean the sand from your rock and eventually you will get it to settle nicely and still have some flow there. As far as bacteria. Look up chemical-clean. If it warms of that supplement with (I use aquavitro seed) beneficial bacteria. When I treated two tanks (struggle with it in my predator tanks as I feed and feed. I don’t like hungry fish . I didn’t have any problem. But my tanks were 2-3 months in when I treated it I remember right.