A have 12 gal hospital tank I've recently setup for sponges and other NPS.
I mainly feed them cyclops and phytoplankton (tetraselmis, isocrysis and nannochloris).
I don't have a protein skimmer for this tank and recently took my carbon reactor off-line for cleaning but did not put it back on for about two weeks. The water started turning murky, kinda brownish. I thought it was because of the organics building up. I've hooked up a BRS single reactor filled with GAC and it's been running for 3 days now but the water is still browish.
I've made two 50% water change but still the same thing. Then it occurred to me today that I could be overfeeding this tank with phytoplankton. I took a 250ml beaker of tank water to see if it settle like the phytoplank bottles I have in the fridge.
I checked back later and saw that it didn't settle but whatever it is, it seems to have migrated towards the light coming from the tank (positively phototactic?).
(I turned off the tank light to snap this shot, the light reflected in the beaker is just a room light)
I rotated the beaker with the side that has the milky brown stuff away from the tank but then later saw that it has migrated again towards the tank light.
I think it's the brownish motile phytoplankton, isocrysis but not sure.
I'd like to add this stuff to my DT but want to make sure it's safe.
Please let me know what I should do.
Thanks!
I mainly feed them cyclops and phytoplankton (tetraselmis, isocrysis and nannochloris).
I don't have a protein skimmer for this tank and recently took my carbon reactor off-line for cleaning but did not put it back on for about two weeks. The water started turning murky, kinda brownish. I thought it was because of the organics building up. I've hooked up a BRS single reactor filled with GAC and it's been running for 3 days now but the water is still browish.
I've made two 50% water change but still the same thing. Then it occurred to me today that I could be overfeeding this tank with phytoplankton. I took a 250ml beaker of tank water to see if it settle like the phytoplank bottles I have in the fridge.
I checked back later and saw that it didn't settle but whatever it is, it seems to have migrated towards the light coming from the tank (positively phototactic?).
(I turned off the tank light to snap this shot, the light reflected in the beaker is just a room light)
I rotated the beaker with the side that has the milky brown stuff away from the tank but then later saw that it has migrated again towards the tank light.
I think it's the brownish motile phytoplankton, isocrysis but not sure.
I'd like to add this stuff to my DT but want to make sure it's safe.
Please let me know what I should do.
Thanks!
