Part of diatom bloom or something else?

[Pjy95]

Sand is largely covered and most of the rock. Figuring it’s all apart of the current diatom bloom but just want to be safe and ask you guys

 

[reefstarter]

Parameters? Hard to say from pictures with anything really. Looks kinda stringy but don’t want to say the D word lol

 

[Pjy95]

Parameters? Hard to say from pictures with anything really. Looks kinda stringy but don’t want to say the D word lol

I’m actually do for some testing I’ll be honest it’s been a few weeks since I’ve tested anything so that could be part of my problem lol

 

[DylanCameron]

Definitely some type of dinoflagellate…not diatoms. Check NO3 and PO4 with a high quality test kit.

 

[Drichards]

Agree with @DylanCameron Dinos

 

[Pjy95]

Definitely some type of dinoflagellate…not diatoms. Check NO3 and PO4 with a high quality test kit.

Thank you! Will def do that this weekend. Best treatments to clear it up ?

 

[Pjy95]

Agree with @DylanCameron Dinos

Thank you for the input! Any treatments/ tricks I should do ?

 

[Drichards]

Best case scenario is get a microscope and identify the strain to figure out a treatment plan. Different Cell structures (species) will be less likely to respond to things like uv. I would bet your P04 is 0. I would start by getting that number up to 0.10- 0.15 and dosing MB7 daily for 2 weeks. With as much manual removal as posible. So many ways to treat. Totally beatable! Do some research on the different ways and you'll be good. Also for me testing nutrients happens 2 times a week. A good routine of maintaining steady numbers will only increase your success rate.

 

[Pjy95]

Best case scenario is get a microscope and identify the strain to figure out a treatment plan. Different Cell structures (species) will be less likely to respond to things like uv. I would bet your P04 is 0. I would start by getting that number up to 0.10- 0.15 and dosing MB7 daily for 2 weeks. With as much manual removal as posible. So many ways to treat. Totally beatable! Do some research on the different ways and you'll be good. Also for me testing nutrients happens 2 times a week. A good routine of maintaining steady numbers will only increase your success rate.

Thank you ! Def going to pick some of that up this weekend and start on dosing. I’m also for sure gonna remove what I can this weekend, definitely going to start testing way more frequently I’ll 100% own up to slacking when it comes time for testing so lesson learned I’m that aspect. Is it worth starting to look into dosing pumps for the future ?

 

[Pjy95]

Also any thoughts on a blackout? I see some say do it some say it won’t make much of a difference was curious if you’ve had any experience

 

[DylanCameron]

First thing you need to do IMO is check nutrients and dose if necessary…I prefer to dose NO3 or PO4 vs just feeding more (but do make sure your fish are fat and healthy) because it gives you better control over which nutrient you’re increasing and by how much. Manual removed helps, I usually siphon but make sure you’re not changing too much water because that can strip your nutrients further.

There’s more than one way to skin a cat but I prefer going the biological route by making nutrients detectable + adding some “good” bacteria, and adding things like phytoplankton and pods help to out compete / consume the dinos. If you’ve got a skimmer running I would turn it off until they start to die back. Blackouts definitely help knock them back, but you have to make sure you address the root of the problem, otherwise they’ll come right back.

 

[Pjy95]

First thing you need to do IMO is check nutrients and dose if necessary…I prefer to dose NO3 or PO4 vs just feeding more (but do make sure your fish are fat and healthy) because it gives you better control over which nutrient you’re increasing and by how much. Manual removed helps, I usually siphon but make sure you’re not changing too much water because that can strip your nutrients further.

There’s more than one way to skin a cat but I prefer going the biological route by making nutrients detectable + adding some “good” bacteria, and adding things like phytoplankton and pods help to out compete / consume the dinos. If you’ve got a skimmer running I would turn it off until they start to sie back. Blackouts definitely help knock them back, but you have to make sure you address the root of the problem, otherwise they’ll come right back.

Thank you for the info! I’m sure it’s hard to say but you think my weekly water changes could’ve contributed to this ? Been doing it once a week since I added livestock. Also do you dose manually or have it set up on an automatic doser? I’m all for the biological approach to fix problems so all this input is greatly appreciated and I just turned skimmer off

 

[iKenreef]

Looks like Dino.

 

[DylanCameron]

Thank you for the info! I’m sure it’s hard to say but you think my weekly water changes could’ve contributed to this ? Been doing it once a week since I added livestock. Also do you dose manually or have it set up on an automatic doser? I’m all for the biological approach to fix problems so all this input is greatly appreciated and I just turned skimmer off

I prefer to dose N and P by hand. Usually it only takes a few doses over the course of a couple days to bring them to a detectable level. If you have a doser, you should start with alk and calcium. Those are the most important things to automate because they’re constantly being consumed in our tanks, and if you have a good light + acceptable calcium/alk levels then you get nice pink / purple coralline algae which helps to out compete other ugly algaes

 

[Pjy95]

I prefer to dose N and P by hand. Usually it only takes a few doses over the course of a couple days to bring them to a detectable level. If you have a doser, you should start with alk and calcium. Those are the most important things to automate because they’re constantly being consumed in our tanks, and if you have a good light + acceptable calcium/alk levels then you get nice pink / purple coralline algae which helps to out compete other ugly algaes

Perfect thank you !! I haven’t purchased a doser yet I’m trying to learn everything I need to know about them before I dive into buying one