Is this really Diatoms, if so any suggestions?

[Andrew Schubert]

So I've had my tank up and running for 7 months now and have been battling this 'brown algae' since about month 1 or 2. I've been told it is Diatoms and will go away on its own. However, everything I've read says it should be gone within one or 2 months...well I'm now on month 5+ and still dealing with it. If anything, its thicker then ever.

Reasons I'm questioning if its something other then diatoms...

1) According to Salifert Silicate test kit my silicate is either 0 or .03 (can't really tell as the test colors are so close to each other).
2) Thought maybe silicate was undetectable was b/c it was being taken up by the diatoms too fast. However...I would have no clue what could be leaching the silicate if that was the case.

A. I've used RO/DI water since day #1
B. Although the tank is still fairly 'new', I cycled the dry rock for 2 months before adding to the tank (so the rock is about 9 months old now).
C. I'm using Instant Ocean Reef Cystals for my salt mix (from what I've read no one has had silicate issues with this mix. However, I did just buy the hw-Wiegandt Pro salt mix to try..just to give it a try).
D. I set it up using Carib Sea Arg-Alive Fiji Pink substrate which even states on the package it contains no silica.

3) It seems the 'thickess' is at the very top of my rocks where PAR is around 220-250, and flow is the highest. (From what I've read they don't like a lot of flow or high intensity lighting?).

4) The description I've read about Diatoms don't completely match up with my experience. From reading, it seems that diatoms should be easy to scrap off the rocks. HOWEVER, mine is impossible to get off. The attached picture (above) was scrubbed with a tooth brush for 5 minutes and barely got any off. The brown algae feels more like 'felt', and builds like an impossible turf barrier across the rocks.

To me it almost looks more like Calothrix, but there are no bubbles so I don't think that is the case either.

Here is a good pic of my Tyree Pink Lemonade frag and the thickness of the 'brown algae' and the very top of my tank.

HOWEVER, now on the flip side I've read that pineapple sponges like silicate for growth, and I do have those in my tank as well.

Here is a pic of my Eagle Eye Zoa, and you can also see some of the brown algae growing around it, and some of the sponges there as well.

I'm thinking of doing a 100% water change, and a 3-days lights out, but afraid of how that would stress my current corals.

The good thing is that its presence isn't a detractor to the beauty of the tank; however, I think all the brown algae is preventing some corals from spreading as fast as they could if the rocks were 'clean', and preventing the coraline algae from spreading on the rocks as well.

As far as my water chemistry....

Nitrates : stable at 2ppm (tested with Nyos Nitrate test kit)
Phosphate: stable at 3 (.01ppm) (via Hanna Checker UL checker).
----- In fact for the longest time I was dosing Nitrate and Phosphate b/c both tests were reading 0. As is my Protein Skimmer is only running about 50% of the time.
Alk: 7.5
Calcium: 450
Mag: 1400
PH: 8.1-8.4 (been dosing Kalk along with CO2 Scrubber media).

Also been dosing Poh's Coral Vitalizer and Karallen-Zuch Amino Acid Concertrate LPS. Maybe I should stop dosing those to see if one of those could be effecting something?

As you can see after 5 months of this I'm lost. Thankfully, in my first 7 months in the hobby this is the only issue I've had to deal with.

 

[EmdeReef]

Doesn’t look like diatoms to me.

#reefsquad?

 

[tupes]

That does not look like dinos to me either.

Absolutely do NOT do a 100% WC. Lefts first figure out what is going on.

 

[Andrew Schubert]

Question...will diatoms catch 'bubbles' at all. As I said before I've never noticed the algae with bubbles. HOWEVER, I just turned all the pumps and powerheads off to take some pics of my corals. And without everything off bubbles have started to form on the rocks. Here is a pic of one of my acro frags I just took a pic of, and you can see in the background the bubbles starting to form on the rocks. Seems the longer the pumps are off the more bubbles that are forming.

 

[Andrew Schubert]

and another pic of the 'new' bubbles with pumps off...

 

[tupes]

Yes they do catch bubbles but that is way to fuzzy

I'm thinking Red Turf Algea.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Yea. A turf algae or something.

 

[Andrew Schubert]

Some kind of turf algae was what I have been thinking all along. Any suggestions getting rid of it, or how it's getting fuel works any nitrates or phoshphates? Might take a small rock out and test to see how long in the dark it takes for the algae to fall off

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Fluconazole/reeflixhd is the least impactful to the tank.
New cuc and and old school toothbrush is an option while you try it.

 

[Ron Reefman]

If you can pull rocks out of the tank without making a huge project out of it, you can use a fine wire brush and some hydrogen peroxide to scrub the turf algae off most of the rocks. It's even pretty safe for the rocks with coral on it, just make sure you don't get TOO CLOSE to the coral with the brush or the peroxide. That could eliminate a lot of your issue quickly. Then use other means, like those listed above to finish the job.

And rather then doing the lights out test, try blue lights only (assuming you have leds). Most algae doesn't use blue for photosynthesis and the corals do. So you can go for several weeks with all blue and the corals will still open up every day like normal (no stress) and the algae should (hopefully) die.

 

[Andrew Schubert]

If you can pull rocks out of the tank without making a huge project out of it, you can use a fine wire brush and some hydrogen peroxide to scrub the turf algae off most of the rocks. It's even pretty safe for the rocks with coral on it, just make sure you don't get TOO CLOSE to the coral with the brush or the peroxide. That could eliminate a lot of your issue quickly. Then use other means, like those listed above to finish the job.

And rather then doing the lights out test, try blue lights only (assuming you have leds). Most algae doesn't use blue for photosynthesis and the corals do. So you can go for several weeks with all blue and the corals will still open up every day like normal (no stress) and the algae should (hopefully) die.

Yeah I have kessil ap700... May try the blue light thing. Not sure hydrogen peroxide will work. I tested that on a small rock today soaking all day in the peroxide and still can't scrub the stiff off.

 

[Ron Reefman]

Really! every time I've used it on almost anything alive in my tank, it kills it. So this is very stubborn stuff.

I did the blue lights treatment on 2 different tanks. One for hairy algae and one for dinos. It worked on both but the dinos took much, much longer. I had lights all blue for a month.

 

[Dolelo96]

Think I may have a similar problem. Velvet wiped out my fish in September. Finished my 76 days at the end of December. Started Red Sea A&B every day and Reef Roids twice a week. When I was feeding, I did A&B every 2 days and Reef Roids 1 a week. Started the second week of feeding, 3 week had bubbles. Stopped feeding and bubbles went away, but algae stayed. It’s really thick. Friendwho works at LFS said it looks like a red carpet algae. Hasn’t spread any more, it’s around some of my frags but hasn’t touched the coral. Been spacing my feeding out. No more bubbles yet

 

[Andrew Schubert]

Really! every time I've used it on almost anything alive in my tank, it kills it. So this is very stubborn stuff.

I did the blue lights treatment on 2 different tanks. One for hairy algae and one for dinos. It worked on both but the dinos took much, much longer. I had lights all blue for a month.

Now that I think of it I wonder if I can do just blue lights with Kessil. I know they have the LEDs optomized by default to the light spectrum corals need. So there isn't as many options as with other LEDs. So even there all blue lights I'm not sure is completely 100 percent blue.ill have to look into that. I could set it to just night lights, but that won't help the coral growth though.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Now that I think of it I wonder if I can do just blue lights with Kessil. I know they have the LEDs optomized by default to the light spectrum corals need. So there isn't as many options as with other LEDs. So even there all blue lights I'm not sure is completely 100 percent blue.ill have to look into that. I could set it to just night lights, but that won't help the coral growth though.

Kessil logic is basicly 16-20-30k kelvin dial. Still contains the rest of the spectrum. So no , it’s not blue only.

 

[Dolelo96]

Remembered something... I run a Gieseman Aurora T5/LED. I turned off the white channel, using only the Blue LED’s. T5 bulbs , 1x Actinic Blue, 2x Aqua Blue Coral & 1x Super Actinic.

 

[Andrew Schubert]

I ordered some Reef Flux. Gonna give that a try.

 

[Andrew Schubert]

Really! every time I've used it on almost anything alive in my tank, it kills it. So this is very stubborn stuff.

I did the blue lights treatment on 2 different tanks. One for hairy algae and one for dinos. It worked on both but the dinos took much, much longer. I had lights all blue for a month.

My test rock soaking in peroxide has lost Bout 70 percent of the algae now....but this is after 24 hours in pure peroxide. So yeah, not sure that remedy is gonna be an option for me

 

[Andrew Schubert]

Here's a question. Since this algae is present there has to be something feeding it. However my nitrates has been at 2-3ppm and phosphates at .01ppm for a good month plus. Yes I've heard this could bc the algae is eating it too fast. So do I dare run GFO and up my skimmer time on? Can't imagine wanting nutrients any lower, but something must be feeding this stuff?

 

[dmoore12341920]

I had some red algea similar to that and I got a fox face and he keeps it manageable. Do I'd reccomend looking into getting a foxface