Seachem silicate test?

[fulltang]

Hey all,

My tank has been up and running about 3 weeks now. I'm using Australian live rock from Unique Corals, which I believe had been in their tanks for a number of weeks with the lights off. I've been running pure blues and seeing a pod explosion, purple coralline coloring back up in addition to some brown (what I think is) diatomaceous growth. It does not blow off with a turkey baster, though.

I want to rule out silicates in my source water in regards to the brown stuff as I'm using steam distilled water from this local vendor: https://purewaterplus.org/about-our-water

It does in fact read 0 TDS and looks high quality, but I've just learned that Silicates can bypass TDS meters.

Is the seachem test worthwhile? I'd rather not order the Hanna for a one time test if I don't have to.

For all I know this could be expected, but being so new I just want to stay on top of these things and intervene rather than sitting back completely. I wonder if I should just send out my source water for an ICP test instead?

And for what it's worth, the sand is special blend and I have no clean up crew yet.

 

[fulltang]

Forgot my parameters, taken 24hrs after a 70% wc:

Salt - Fritz
Salinity- 1.026
Temp - 78
Nitrates - .5 (nyos)
Phosphate - .12 (Hanna ulr)
Alk - 8.3 (salifert)

I'm running about 2 tbs seachem carbon and a small piece of floss in the canister filter.

 

[fulltang]

Ended up just pulling the trigger on the Hanna for piece of mind.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

What Hanna device?

 

[fulltang]

What Hanna device?

The silica lr

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I’ve not heard of many folks using it or what interferences there might be. Let us know how it seems to work out.

that said, detecting silicate in the ro/di would be fairly typical, but doesn’t prove the brown stuff in the tank is diatoms.

 

[fulltang]

I’ve not heard of many folks using it or what interferences there might be. Let us know how it seems to work out.

that said, detecting silicate in the ro/di would be fairly typical, but doesn’t prove the brown stuff in the tank is diatoms.

I will report back! I decided on it based on previous comments by @taricha

That would require a microscope? I'm going to order some ceriths this week, and it comes off with fairly aggressive toothbrushing. Doesn't look hairy fwiw.

It looks like that calcified area is coloring back up into coralline, so maybe whatever it is will be out competed?

Edit: microscope ordered

 

[taricha]

The hanna LR Si performs pretty well in salt water, regardless of hanna's warning that it is not intended for such a purpose.
(Their LR Fe checker too - if your Fe was high enough)

here's calibration data from Rick Mathew

Here it is...

and here's some from me.

Rick found it measured 12% low relative to stock. I found it measured high by 9%.
So give or take ballpark 10%, it works pretty well. Plenty good enough for trending Silica in our tank water.

 

[fulltang]

Okay, got my silica tester. Tested my locally distilled water it's .61 ppm, is that high enough to cause diatoms? I'm going to do another source water test and a tank water test tonight.

 

[fulltang]

Some tank shots. The brownish stuff doesn't blow off with a baster, and it looks worse in photos for some reason. I literally have to scrape it off, fwiw. Sandbed and glass are clean.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Okay, got my silica tester. Tested my locally distilled water it's .61 ppm, is that high enough to cause diatoms? I'm going to do another source water test and a tank water test tonight.

Does the tester read 0 ppm on anything? it might be test error. that value seems high for distilled water.

 

[fulltang]

Does the tester read 0 ppm on anything? it might be test error. that value seems high for distilled water.

Definitely possible. I'm still getting used to using Hanna testers, I may have shaken the sample too vigorously. I'll grab some grocery store distilled to test against this locally steam distilled as well.

 

[fulltang]

Does the tester read 0 ppm on anything? it might be test error. that value seems high for distilled water.

Retested my source water and got 0, tank water read .14 (using live rock and aragonite sand). I did use a .22um syringe filter from a pack that I ordered for my phosphate tester as my water has a lot of floating particulates at the moment.