Diatoms

[esparza41577]

Since I have started my aquarium about a year ago, every month, I have delt with Diatoms and/or cyano algae. I have checked my Ro/Di and it is 0.02, water temp ranges from 77.5°-79°. All perams are good, all 0 except for Nitrates are at 20. I have Ocean Revives T247s that run Blues from 1200-2200 and Full Spectrum 1500-1900. I am running a jebao cp40, a jebao dc9000 (return), a coralife turbo twist 18w, a brs dual reactor (carbon/gfo), a crappy skimmer. Can someone give me some idea of what could be going on.

 

[TinyChocobo]

I'm fairly new to this but isn't 20 for nitrates a bit high?

 

[MonsterReef]

Since I have started my aquarium about a year ago, every month, I have delt with Diatoms and/or cyano algae. I have checked my Ro/Di and it is 0.02, water temp ranges from 77.5°-79°. All perams are good, all 0 except for Nitrates are at 20. I have Ocean Revives T247s that run Blues from 1200-2200 and Full Spectrum 1500-1900. I am running a jebao cp40, a jebao dc9000 (return), a coralife turbo twist 18w, a brs dual reactor (carbon/gfo), a crappy skimmer. Can someone give me some idea of what could be going on.

I run my ocean reviven blues 9 am too 12 then full spectrum till 6 pm and blues till 9pm

 

[esparza41577]

I run my ocean reviven blues 9 am too 12 then full spectrum till 6 pm and blues till 9pm

So no lights from 12-6?

 

[bobman]

How long has the tank been up? It is common for diatoms and cayno in new tanks. Are you adding anything like bacteria in a bottle? What kind of live stock to you have so far and have to lost anything?. 20 nitrates is getting high but I highly doubt it is the cause of the diatoms and cayno.

 

[bobman]

So no lights from 12-6?

No he is no light from 9 to 9. Meaning he has blues from 9am to 9pm and full spectrum from noon to 6.

 

[esparza41577]

How long has the tank been up? It is common for diatoms and cayno in new tanks. Are you adding anything like bacteria in a bottle? What kind of live stock to you have so far and have to lost anything?. 20 nitrates is getting high but I highly doubt it is the cause of the diatoms and cayno.

I have a yellow tang, pacific blue tang. 4 clowns, green chromis. The only thing that has died is my naso, but we pulled him out. I am adding seachem fuel.....

 

[bobman]

Any corals?

 

[MonsterReef]

So no lights from 12-6?

No blues from 9 to12, blues and whites 12 to 6 and blues till 9pm Blues in the morning blues and white in the evening and blues at night just like dusk and midday then dawn

 

[esparza41577]

Yes, Miami Hurricane chalice, 3-4 frogspawns, a bunch of zoas, RBTA, a torch, 2 hammers, a green chalice

 

[esparza41577]

No blues from 9 to12, blues and whites 12 to 6 and blues till 9pm Blues in the morning blues and white in the evening and blues at night just like dusk and midday then dawn

Gotcha, what is your intensity, I just lowered mine to blues at 50% and whites at 1%

 

[MonsterReef]

Gotcha, what is your intensity, I just lowered mine to blues at 50% and whites at 1%

I started at blues 25 whites 10 and increased it every week each 5%

 

[MonsterReef]

You want to go slow when you hit 50% blues slow it down to every two week increase 5%

 

[bobman]

Not sure how big or how long the tank has been running. But I would assume you are adding silicates nitrates and phosphates into the water. Most likely from feeding. I would cut back on feeding some and if you got a crappy skimmer then I would look pretty hard at that or maybe a turf algae scrubber. Key is to export what you import.

 

[esparza41577]

I was told the skimmer would have nothing to do with diatoms. Is that not so? The ank has been going for just about a year now

 

[esparza41577]

The tank is 135 gal

 

[esparza41577]

 

[bobman]

I wouldnt say that but it really depends on what it is feeding on. Diatom in my experance really like silicates that can be added with foods also they are a photoplankton and come in foods. Both diatoms and silicates can be removed my the skimmer if they are in the water column i.e. skimming. However there are many other ways to remove them. How often do you change your GFO they should help in silicate removal along with keeping phosphates in check. I do not believe in running carbon 24/7 but dont see anything wrong with it. Reason is they actually get spent very quickly and if not changed out frequently is really adding no benefit to the tank. I only recomend it to polish the water from time to time or to specifically filter out something in the water. You light also appears to be pretty intense but looks can be deceiving with photos of led lighting so I will leave that one out of the equation as I dont know your light fixture. Hoenstly though I would look more into the cayno than the diatoms as the diatom will always be in the tank as long as you have water in the tank to some extent. Plus a good clean up crew can sometime do the trick there. Also are you positive it is diatoms and not just new cayno starting? The Cayno is consuming most likely phosphates and nitrates so again changing out the reactor media very often will help. Consider use of a algae scrubber or maybe carbon dosing. I dont like to recommend carbon dosing as a means to get rid of cayno though as even though it works telling someone to create a breeding ground for bacteria to kill bacteria just dont sit well with me. Either way use of say chemiclean will probably knock out all your issues but if the cause of them is still there they can return.

 

[esparza41577]

I change my gfo, maybe once a month, i have red & blue legged hermits, a cleaner shrip, and had a few peppermint shrimp, but they seem to dissappear

 

[esparza41577]

And when I scrub it off the glass, it comes off like dust, I kkow I have red cyano, and new cyano....