Diatoms

Is there any way that i can get rid of this stringy like brown algae, it just looks terrible!!! I want it gone and soon, it makes my tank look dirty and gross and is slowly getting all over my rocks that are beautiful with coraline algae.

 

Are you sure they are diatoms and not dinoflagellates? The stringy description makes me wonder if it is dinos. Look up a picture to help id them or better yep post a picture. There will be a difference in how you deal with them.

 

Well I assume diatoms because my tank is 7 weeks old, and about two weeks ago this outbreak occurred

 

on the sand looks like cyano but the bubbly stuff could be dinos.....hopefully others more familiar with dino can chime in....

 

What is on the rocks appears to be dinos to me. I've been struggling with them for a few months.

There are several approaches you can try to take to try to deal with them but unfortunately there isn't a magic bullet. How are your water parameters?

 

Water parameters are pristine, with my pH around 8, calcium around 450. I'm not sure if the algae is producing those bubbles or the fact that I just did a water change and put a ton of bubbles in there and they just stuck to it. If this is Dino, I will be really discouraged! The tank has only been up for 7 weeks! Terrible start

 

Unfortunately it does look like dinos to me as well. What size tank do you have? How long is your photoperiod? What kind of livestock do you have?

I'm dealing with this stuff myself right now, mike is right there is no magic bullet but you will have a better chance of getting rid of them with a multi-pronged attack.

First raise your ph to 8.4 or higher, next you want to place your tank in a complete blackout for 3 full days, not just lights out, cover the tank so no light can get in but be mindful of gas exchange. During the 3 days try your best to maintain a high ph.

If you have some animals in the tank then after the 3 days, as much as you want to, avoid changing your water, water changes seem to feed dinos. Next limit your lighting, start with just the actinics for only a few hours a day, keep an eye out for any regrowth and be sure to syphon it out as soon as you see it, over the course of the next week or so slowly increase your lighting all while still watching for regrowth. Hopefully aftef a couple of weeks you'll have it beat

Btw where does your source water come from?

And don't get discouraged just keep at it and you'll be able to beat it, we all go through stuff like this at some point

 

I just reduced my photo period to 6 hours, and I have corals in that tank, I'm not sure if they will survive a three day blackout, also I have a blue tang and two clowns as well as a CUC, would they survive that kind of blackout?

Source of water is distilled water from store and Catalina saltwater from LFS

 

They will be fine with a three day blackout. The first time dinos appeared in my tank I did a three day blackout and that took care of it for several months. They reappeared again two months ago and have been much more hardy. I tried cutting the lights twice for 3 days, vacuuming them daily, and dosing hydrogen peroxide at 1ml/10 gallons but that didn't work. I finally covered my tank in trash bags, turned out the lights for 6 days, dosed peroxide 2x per day at 2ml/10 gallons, and stopped water changes. I'm on day 4 of ramping my lights back up and there is no sign of them so far.

People have also reported that raising the pH above 8.4 also helps. Mine tends to be low so this was difficult to do. As you read up on them you'll see that people have success with different methods probably because we are dealing with different species. I'd try the 3 day blackout and temporarily cut out water changes first and see if that works. If not you may need to get more aggressive.

 

yeah your corals and fish will be fine, I just finished my 3rd day of my black out, I'm probably going to start dosing H2O2 as well, I haven't turned my lights back on yet but I want to be aggressive with this the first time through. I'm gonna turn on my actinics when I get home today and see where I'm at.

but yeah your livestock will be fine