Trying to raise nutrients, bacteria blooms.

Miami Reef · Apr 11, 2022

I have a coral QT with a large maxima clam, acropora, and a lot of snails and urchins. Barebottom and very small amount of rocks.

My phosphates like to stay at 0.01-0.02 ppm and I just wanted to slightly raise them.

I usually feed half a wafer a day with no problems but I fed 1 tablet for the past 2 days and now my tank is cloudy with a bacteria bloom.

Does this mean I don’t have enough surface area?

Spare time · Apr 11, 2022

How old is the QT? Usually I find bacteria blooms to be a result of not enough of "other" organisms to break down the food instead of the bloom bacteria.

Miami Reef · Apr 11, 2022

Spare time said:
How old is the QT? Usually I find bacteria blooms to be a result of not enough of "other" organisms to break down the food instead of the bloom bacteria.

That makes sense because they food tends to get attached to the powerhead so it makes sense that the bacteria is the only thing that can eat it.

The tank was cycled with KP rocks a few months ago. There’s definitely a lot of life in the tank.

Spare time · Apr 11, 2022

Miami Reef said:
That makes sense because they food tends to get attached to the powerhead so it makes sense that the bacteria is the only thing that can eat it.

The tank was cycled with KP rocks a few months ago. There’s definitely a lot of life in the tank.

It might just be simpler for you to dose something like fuel or reef energy. Alternatively, you could add a hermit crab (or a halloween hermit if you want to get fancy) and just let them snack on it.

Spare time · Apr 11, 2022

Miami Reef said:
That makes sense because they food tends to get attached to the powerhead so it makes sense that the bacteria is the only thing that can eat it.

The tank was cycled with KP rocks a few months ago. There’s definitely a lot of life in the tank.

How do you like the KP rock? I thought about setting up a 2 gallon with just that and some funky filter feeders.