Diatoms from Silica

[CoralReefer13]

I recently got my ICP results and Silica shows 0.198. I have confirmed with A Purple Reef the company I got my live rock and Oolite sand from that there is no chance they have Silica in them. The sand is pure Aragonite. I am assuming my Silica source is my RODI. I added a 5th stage on the unit. I have sediment and carbon filters, the RO membrane, and 2 DI Resin canisters. First is Anion which is supposed to clear Silica. Second canister is Mixed Bed resin which has Anion and Cation. I have done a 5 gallon water change in my 20 gal tank and I believe I see improvement. How long would you expect it to take for me to see a big difference in diatom reduction changing 5 gal a week? Thanks for any assistance.

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

You could also run some SeaChem SeaGel or Phosguard, just don't run the Phosguard with GFO because both will strip your tank of all phosphate. I personally have had good results with the SeaGel and found the Phosguard to be too strong for my Nano.

 

[CoralReefer13]

You could also run some SeaChem SeaGel or Phosguard, just don't run the Phosguard with GFO because both will strip your tank of all phosphate. I personally have had good results with the SeaGel and found the Phosguard to be too strong for my Nano.

Thanks for the reply. I had used Phosguard in the past, but it was just a temporary fix since I am pretty sure my RODI had the silicates. Now that I have added the extra stage to remove silicates maybe I will use Phosguard again to rid the tank of diatoms and hopefully they will not re-appear. I was mostly wondering how long Diatoms would stick around without a silica source. My Phosphates and Nitrates are both fairly low. Nitrates at 2 and Phosphate at 0.02