Cloudy Water

I don't know what's going on in my tank. Yesterda I installed two new powerheads (Maxi's 900s), my tank's only 46 GALs. Anyway, I installed them, and after an hour or so, my water got cloudy, a witheish cloud. SOMETHING ODD, my skimmer is not foaming...I know it happens after I put my hands in the water, but it usually starts foaming after an hour or so (Remora). My tank was done cycling about 1 week ago. I haven't done any water changes, I haven't add any fish. The ony fish in there is the yellow tail damsel that I had durying the cycle. I added 5 blue leg hermits and one snail. ANOTHER thing i noticed, after the tank cycled, all the diatoms died off...I mean, I scrubbed the glass and never saw them come back. They would ususally take a a few days to re-appear, but nothing now. Any ideas? Oh...I almost forgot, YESTERDAY as well, I added some fresh water (RO) to top off. when I looked down the bucket, I noticed a few dead ants in there...not sure if that did it...

 

Just a "few dead ants" - :Halloween44:

Maybe something much more nasty that you can't see....:-/

 

Only thing I can think of is that the new powerheads strired up your gravel. Or, you got a bateria bloom. In any case the cloudy water should go away in a day or two

 

Omard: yes, it was only a few dead ants, my buckets...well, they're jugs, they are pretty sealed, but the ants got in through the ari scape opening at the back, I forgot to put the little cap on...I checked the water for other stuff and nothing...it's RO water.

Bulltrader: yeah, I thought about the sand getting stired up.

Question for both of ya: do you recommend a water change? water cycled about 1.5 weeks ago.

Thank you both for repplying.

 

Depends on your water parms.
If Nitrite=0, Ammonia=0, Nitrate=0 then no
If Nitrate >5 then yes.
IMO

 

WATER still CLOUDY....it's been two days now....SKIMMER still not working either....did the powerheads creat too much current/flow? my tank's only 46 GALs....did the powerheads creat so much current/flow that they stirred up everything making the skimmer stop working? or could it be that the powerheads released something into the water? I need help please!!

 

It may be a little dust or sand dust

HI,
I have in the past used those filter pads to remove any cloudy dust from the water column.
One of those fairly cheep penguin filters have those white pads that will become sticky almost over night and remove the dust.
your skimmer may need a little time to break in.
Water height in the skimmer is critical to function.
Finally just take it slow. I ve seen water cloud up cause I added to much calcium to fast and didn;t understand the relationship of Mag,KH, calcium.
You can't just keep adding calcium without testing, or you may start a precip event that will really cloud up the water.
Doug

 

UPDATE UPDATE!!!

I don't know if this has gotten to do anything with it, but I was takinga closer look at my tank, to see if I'd notice any dust, etc, but to my surprise....this TINY TINY white bugs are all over the tank, on the glass, rock, sand, they're the size of probably one quarter of a grain of salt, probably smaller...what are they?????!! could they be the culprites? I NEVE noticed them until now...two days after the powerheads were installed.....HELP.

 

They may be good

HI,
food for many animals and a sign of a healthy tank.
Co-pods, are ther favorite food for many animals, heck they sell them on ebay to people who can't seem to keep up with supply and demand,
Once you add a fish they will go down very fast..
Doug

 

Clownfish,

Couple of things, hows the cloudy water? If its still cloudy I would just give it some time. When I first started my tank, it got cloudy about 3 weeks after i started it up and it took about 3 more weeks to have it clear. As long as the parameters are all good then I wouldnt do any water changes just yet.

2nd, gratz on the co-pods. Good Sign that things are comming along. As DJ said above the co=pod population will come and go. If you want to help along the process do the following. Stack a couple of snail shells together in a corner of your tank to make a little in tank refuge and you will see how quickly they use this as a mating ground
Cheers
Chubbs