Walt Smith 2.1 Rock and Bacteria?
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runzwithscissors
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Looks like it was going through a curing process. Could have been die off from sponges etc. Got my Vanuatu lr from Walt smith and had a similar issue that lasted a week. He recommends several large water changes while curing
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whatchamacallit
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It was already cured, and it was dry rock not live
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whatchamacallit
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Well thought I'd update this. It went away and came back, then went away and came back lol. I spoke to BRS and asked them about my concerns that the rock isn't porous enough and it's causing bacterial blooms. The guy I spoke to said he's been having the same thoughts lately and that I'm not the only one. I ordered a ceramic bio media plate which they said will be the best option to get rid of bacteria blooms. Just thought I'd let everyone know!
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whatchamacallit
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Well im actually contemplating tearing down my tank. I have not won with this bacteria. I keep hearing more and more about people who have been going through the same thing as me. My apartment smells like cat pee and the water is so cloudy that i can barely see anything in it. I'm going on 6 months of having this set up and i have barely been able to enjoy a clean looking tank.
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Since recommending UV last yr we've collected several uv fixes if that helps to know. Cloudy water to clear in three days
The smell you are mentioning sounds like ammonia... do you have a non API ammonia test to check
aware the option exists to take it down as well, but it's fair to present options demonstrated to work ... you have quite the bacterial challenge for sure. You can return the device if it doesn't.
I never saw a distinction between using any hardware that makes a reef work...
Skimmers, pumps, all equal to uv
Part of using it is that when you rid the water of the mass target you don't have to use it unless it's needed again. It was possible to win against the bacteria in November.
The smell you are mentioning sounds like ammonia... do you have a non API ammonia test to check
aware the option exists to take it down as well, but it's fair to present options demonstrated to work ... you have quite the bacterial challenge for sure. You can return the device if it doesn't.
I never saw a distinction between using any hardware that makes a reef work...
Skimmers, pumps, all equal to uv
Part of using it is that when you rid the water of the mass target you don't have to use it unless it's needed again. It was possible to win against the bacteria in November.
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whatchamacallit
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Unfortunately I don't have the money right now it takes to get a uv sterilizer. AIso, there is no ammonia in the water.
I just don't understand how this could even happen. I've never experienced anything like it in all the years of reefing.
I just don't understand how this could even happen. I've never experienced anything like it in all the years of reefing.
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We previously linked other people with this kind rock to your thread as a few of them did have some slime, I really learned something new about brands of rock here. If you aren't dosing carbon as liquid vsv or anything I'm stumped. Not even sure the cloud is bacterial in nature...can you post a fts low on blue lighting, more daylight colored, just curious how it looks currently
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Another cheap Hail Mary pass has potential
Calculate a peroxide run for the whole tank we have over 200 pages of it documented curing probably twenty kinds of tank invaders in some, but not all tanks.
Controlling nontarget losses is our specialty, another benefit of a full tank shot so we can see animals in tow
A dollar fifty gives you quite a chance of battling water-borne invaders. You have steps still available, nice to know some affordable options with a giant practice documented online are readily possible
A decent thread is running in Randy's chem forum as to why peroxide makes tank water so clear...
Calculate a peroxide run for the whole tank we have over 200 pages of it documented curing probably twenty kinds of tank invaders in some, but not all tanks.
Controlling nontarget losses is our specialty, another benefit of a full tank shot so we can see animals in tow
A dollar fifty gives you quite a chance of battling water-borne invaders. You have steps still available, nice to know some affordable options with a giant practice documented online are readily possible
A decent thread is running in Randy's chem forum as to why peroxide makes tank water so clear...
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The way you assess peroxide is by isolating a thick cup sample of the slime and put a couple teaspoons peroxide in the cup, check in 24 hours
Use pretty large sample cup/container so that you are modeling dilution to some degree
we want to use just a little peroxide, not blast the sample, to approximate what it will do under safe tank dilution
Use pretty large sample cup/container so that you are modeling dilution to some degree
we want to use just a little peroxide, not blast the sample, to approximate what it will do under safe tank dilution
Jimbo
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Has Walt Smith had any input on bacterial problems using this dry rock? I can tell you in my experience there definitely is an issue.
Don't get me wrong, other than this,its great rock as far as looks,density,shape. I added a UV sterilizer about the 2 month mark of my tank which helped solve a pretty bad bacterial bloom.
Tank has stayed perfectly clear since adding it. I'm at the 7 month mark of my tank. I decided a couple of weeks ago that the UV had probably served its purpose so I decided to remove it to make more room in in the stand.
At first all seemed fine, no difference observed until day 5 without the UV. Woke up to a very cloudy tank. Re-connected the UV and in a few hours ,crystal clear water again. I'm assuming the white slime would have followed the cloudiness but wasn't going to wait around and see.
Whatever is going on with this 2.1 dry rock, it doesn't go away easily, at least not in 7 months time. Needless to say I'm still running the UV and all is good.
Don't get me wrong, other than this,its great rock as far as looks,density,shape. I added a UV sterilizer about the 2 month mark of my tank which helped solve a pretty bad bacterial bloom.
Tank has stayed perfectly clear since adding it. I'm at the 7 month mark of my tank. I decided a couple of weeks ago that the UV had probably served its purpose so I decided to remove it to make more room in in the stand.
At first all seemed fine, no difference observed until day 5 without the UV. Woke up to a very cloudy tank. Re-connected the UV and in a few hours ,crystal clear water again. I'm assuming the white slime would have followed the cloudiness but wasn't going to wait around and see.
Whatever is going on with this 2.1 dry rock, it doesn't go away easily, at least not in 7 months time. Needless to say I'm still running the UV and all is good.
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whatchamacallit
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Yeah I love the rock besides the constant bacteria problems. My thing is I shouldn't have to run a uv sterilizer. There's obviously something wrong with the rock that's making it so it, and I seriously worry about a year down the road what could possibly happen.
It is upsetting that he hasn't chimed in. I did said him a message on FB with the link to this thread but never got a response unfortunately. I think I'm just going to take out this rock and replace it.
It is upsetting that he hasn't chimed in. I did said him a message on FB with the link to this thread but never got a response unfortunately. I think I'm just going to take out this rock and replace it.
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It won't come back a year down the road. Obligate hitchhikers once burned out don't come back until reimport. When you exhaust instead of support the bacteria it won't come back, we see them rarely in reef tanks using live rock cured accurately. The curing phase of this LR requires uv to guide it, then no more. Agreed replacing it with normal live rock can be sterilizer free, and then again the sterilizers are used to correct issues in live rock tanks as well. Uv is no less legit than skimmers or any other optimal hardware in reefing IMO
The peroxide test is a dollar fifty if cost was a concern, either way that bac needs to be guided out then you could move forward. No harm comes to filtration bacteria we have studied that in good detail
The peroxide test is a dollar fifty if cost was a concern, either way that bac needs to be guided out then you could move forward. No harm comes to filtration bacteria we have studied that in good detail
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whatchamacallit
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Well according to Jimbo his came back full force after a few months of using the uv. I feel like there is something wrong from the chemical makeup of it that causes the blooms.
Jimbo
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Little confused what you're saying. Are you saying there IS a known problem with this rock causing bacterial blooms? If so , what is in it that's causing this?
Also are you saying it takes a year of running UV and then you can remove it? Why a year? Please clarify, thank you.
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If I had specified a year running uv I didn't intend to imply it had to be ran a year...was intending to say after the tank is guided correctly it won't come back, we'd see this more often in aged tanks vs always new ones the threads show.
In my tank rework threads, we run uv just long enough to gain control they aren't permanent where we used them for various cures for pelagic invaders. Mostly we're dosing peroxide, but I collected a few good UV runs not any different than one can search for if we Google up the times people cured things with uv. If op doesn't want to run uv or try peroxide and is willing to lose the investment beforehand, not a prob. Only mentioning options to try before throwing towel, options not tried for six months readily available...especially the peroxide run.
The uv can be removed once an obligate hitchhiker is removed if it was powerful enough during the run time, since most of these mystery invaders rely on hitchhiking to get vectored into a tank. My point was there is a finite time one would have to run it since white clouding invaders aren't typically a mainstay in reefing.
I haven't owned this brand of rock, but being a thread watcher and memorizer I've seen more than one instance of these growths on these rocks...I'm sure key word searching would turn them up over the last year or so.
If someone is using grossly oversized uv, rare for reefing as people are used to buying the one sized for their gallonage, you can get better return on time investment than if you are using one barely sized/flow matched to the tank. I used only pond sterilizers when I had a large tank, oversized, to cheat out various algae and cyano. As far as to why multiple users of this rock are reporting bac or seemingly bac invasions, don't know. Part of the mystery, run a search on Walt smith + bac invasions to see
I googled: Walt smith live rock bacteria bloom got lots of these
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2528402
Perhaps they are farmed from a region where those bac are residents and when combined with any dieoff or organics within the rock or carbon dosing by the keeper they come about? Musing based on thread puzzle pieces, not certain. The takeaway for this thread is that more options are available, if it's cheaper to throw out the rock and not try them that's not a problem.
People that have to run uv long term to suppress growths are typically not using oversized uv, they are just getting by and the results show that. In my giant nano reef.com peroxide thread we took a nano reef of roughly 30 gallons with persistent dinos and fried them back by using 55 watts on the nano/UV
If searching for correct sizing/wattage for 30 gallons the going recommend is approx 9 watts or less depending on model
In my tank rework threads, we run uv just long enough to gain control they aren't permanent where we used them for various cures for pelagic invaders. Mostly we're dosing peroxide, but I collected a few good UV runs not any different than one can search for if we Google up the times people cured things with uv. If op doesn't want to run uv or try peroxide and is willing to lose the investment beforehand, not a prob. Only mentioning options to try before throwing towel, options not tried for six months readily available...especially the peroxide run.
The uv can be removed once an obligate hitchhiker is removed if it was powerful enough during the run time, since most of these mystery invaders rely on hitchhiking to get vectored into a tank. My point was there is a finite time one would have to run it since white clouding invaders aren't typically a mainstay in reefing.
I haven't owned this brand of rock, but being a thread watcher and memorizer I've seen more than one instance of these growths on these rocks...I'm sure key word searching would turn them up over the last year or so.
If someone is using grossly oversized uv, rare for reefing as people are used to buying the one sized for their gallonage, you can get better return on time investment than if you are using one barely sized/flow matched to the tank. I used only pond sterilizers when I had a large tank, oversized, to cheat out various algae and cyano. As far as to why multiple users of this rock are reporting bac or seemingly bac invasions, don't know. Part of the mystery, run a search on Walt smith + bac invasions to see
I googled: Walt smith live rock bacteria bloom got lots of these
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2528402
Perhaps they are farmed from a region where those bac are residents and when combined with any dieoff or organics within the rock or carbon dosing by the keeper they come about? Musing based on thread puzzle pieces, not certain. The takeaway for this thread is that more options are available, if it's cheaper to throw out the rock and not try them that's not a problem.
People that have to run uv long term to suppress growths are typically not using oversized uv, they are just getting by and the results show that. In my giant nano reef.com peroxide thread we took a nano reef of roughly 30 gallons with persistent dinos and fried them back by using 55 watts on the nano/UV
If searching for correct sizing/wattage for 30 gallons the going recommend is approx 9 watts or less depending on model
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whatchamacallit
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Talked to BRS a few minutes ago. They recommended cyano clean...?
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cyano doesn't come in white, so I must debate that? can you show us updated pics of the invader again, isn't it whitish strings?
of additives, Id choose peroxide over that for sure given all knowns so far.
of additives, Id choose peroxide over that for sure given all knowns so far.
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whatchamacallit
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The app isn't letting me post a picture.
