White smokey haze... ugh

[One Day Lsx]

Getting irritated with this cloudy water... Parameters are perfect. Cycled tank with bio spira. Made diy live rock with grout, crushed coral and cured for 3 months. Protein skimming wet. 150 micron filter socks. Black silica sand. 2 165w china lights.

100 gallon display with a 55 gallon sump.

Dosing reef fusion 1 and 2 for the last 2 days. I'm getting a white film on the glass as well. Probably 2 different things.

7 fish as livestock.

What's going on? Tank is 2 months old. Looks like white smoke rolling around in the tank.. worried for my fish's health. Water change did some good but back to cloudy smoke..

 

[Flippers4pups]

First, what kind of "grout"?

 

[One Day Lsx]

White sanded grout. Just the basic stuff. I followed another members directions. Seems like once the blues come on, the smoke dies off. Overnight its relatively clear. I do have crushed coral in my sump I think I'm going to take out. I just assumed the white cloudy stuff along with the white film was my calcium falling out of suspension but I just dont think that's it, as I have nothing in the tank taking calcium out

 

[Flippers4pups]

Could be bacterial. I've never heard of using grout. I'd be concerned it could leaching things out, possible pH swing.

What's your PH?

 

[One Day Lsx]

Was 10+ while curing.

Cured 3 months. Ph is 8.0-8.2 and is stabil

 

[SandJ]

Do you have a like to the grout you used? Was is something like this?

 

[One Day Lsx]

It was maper brand from Lowes. I followed a members tutorial, but as far as I can tell it's not effecting the fish. I'm getting diatoms growing on it and some coraline is forming on one of the rocks.

I'm 50% sure it's a bacterial bloom but I dont know for sure. How do I distinguish if its bacterial? Dump in some nitrifying bacteria??

 

[taricha]

UV would clear a bacterial bloom but not change the haze if it's just particulate material.

 

[One Day Lsx]

I am going to go look at a 24w UV... but that seems like a bandaid.. idk. Been cloudy like this for a few days.

 

[blasterman]

Your common bacteria bloom looks like you dumped milk in the water. Normally they dont bother anything other than make a skimmer go nuts. Some LPS might be annoyed.

One way to tell is lighting changes affect the bloom and water changes no matter how big have zero effect.

It will go away on its own. UV sterilizer will nuke it in a couple days but kind of a waste of money.

 

[One Day Lsx]

It looks like milk rolling in the distance

 

[One Day Lsx]

Still cloudy... might be getting worse. 8.2 pH today. What's going on.....

 

[Waters]

If I had to guess it is bacterial and as stated, will clear up quickly with a properly sized UV. It will go away on its own, but can take some time. I run UV 24X7.

 

[Shufflepig]

You’re not adding the reef fusion 1 and 2 at the same time are you? That will definitely cause a precipitate which is white. Is the cloudiness worse just after dosing the reef fusion? Not sure you need to dose without coral or a bunch of snails to use up the alkalinity and calcium.

 

[vetteguy53081]

ChemiPure Blue will polish water nicely

 

[One Day Lsx]

It's not, I have 2 bags in my reactor. On a plues note my nitrates are down alot. Gonna get a UV

 

[One Day Lsx]

So I added the UV Sterilizer, water parameters are 0 ammonia, .25 nitrite and 5 nitrate (shade darker than the yellow that API bottle 1 gives)

Why do I have nitrite present? Do I unplug the skimmer and the UV sterilizer and add some bio spira?

Also do we feed everyday? Sometimes twice a day? None was added into the tank to cause this. Tank mates are:
2 Platinum Clowns
1 Misbar Black Clown
1 Coral Beauty
1 Brown Powder Tang
1 Sailfin Tang
1 Lawnmower Blenny

 

[shwareefer]

You have nitrite because your bioload is bigger than your current bacterial population, hence the bloom.

 

[One Day Lsx]

For a 130 gallon system?

 

[shwareefer]

30 yrs ago when bacterial additives did not exist and "cycling" products were nothing more than a bottle of ammonia, the common way to start a salt water tank was to introduce a hardy "sacrificial" fish to the system with the express knowledge that said fish would pollute itself to death. Common starting point was 1 or 2 blue damsels in 90 gallons of water and there was still a good chance they wouldn't make it especially with the addition of food. The volume of water is not as significant as you think.

I understand your frustration but if it is in fact a bacterial bloom as many in this thread suspect, it will pass and you will be on your way to algae bloom, lol. The bright side is your nitrobacter population is growing (converting nitrite to nitrate since you measured both) now it's just a matter of time.