After tank move, problems....

So it has been about a month and a half after my tank mov/upgrade. My parameters have all been fine during teh whole time. I noticed there was a mini-cycle since there was a small diatom bloom for about a week but that dissipated. Now (about 2 weeks after that bloom) it seems that the diatoms are back and they are taking over. All of my nerite/nassarius/cerith snails are all ontop of my sand bed and not burrowed which they should be and my corals are not looking good at all. I have stayed ontop of my water changes and i am going to do another shortly.

What is going on with my tank? I had some chaeto but it was going all over my display tank so i put it inside of a container for about a week, the diatoms seemed to really grow on the chaeto so i just recently took it out all together. Any advice???

 

Are you using tap water? What is your phosphate value? Do you use GFO and GAC?

 

When you upgraded, you had a new source of silicates hence the diatom bloom
this can happen in localised areas even when you add just a single new source of silicates like a new power head or wavemaker ( they get the cocoa powder on them but the diatoms dont occur in other areas IME)

If you have diatoms on the sand bed that may explain the snails behaviour as this becomes easy pickings for them (My snails clambered over my new wavemaker to clean it for me)

Steve

 

Dont test for phosphates and I dont have the money at the moment to buy phosphate, mag, iodine kits. Not sure I know what the abbreviations for GFO and GAC are.

 

That does make sense, I totally forgot about this. And the fact I purchased a new hydor koralia after I got the new tank probably added to the silica problem.

 

GFO granulated ferric oxide removes phosphates and some nitrate,

GAC granulated activated carbon removes impurities to keep your water more stable and keep it from turning yellow.

 

Since i dont have a skimmer/any form of equipment filtration I do not use any activated carbon etc. I have been keeping sw tanks for some time now and had good success simply using great flow and a good knowledge basis. So due to monetary problems I will not be able to buy a skimmer/filter or use activated carbon. so that cant solve this issue, its just a bit weird, largest/kinda random diatom bloom.

 

Hopefully it clears soon. Best of luck.

 

IME - If it is a Diatom bloom and I assume you have seen enough of them to know for certain, then there is no action required

as you know the brown powder you see is the dead remains of the live diatom, and these break down reasonably quickly and get eaten by the snails etc

the only issues I have ever had with a secondary diatom bloom ( I dont normally add anything until after the initial bloom has come and gone) is that I had some GSP in my tank that did seem to refuse to open fully, until I had scrubbed them off with a baby toothbrush , but other than that I cant recall any issues

Steve

 

I agree, no intervention needed, at this time. If it is still hanging around in 3 weeks than I would look to a cause. You may even see a break out of GHA after the diatoms.