Cyanobacteria

[drm180]

I've been trying to get rid of the cyanobacteria in my tank for about a month now with no improvment. I did get rid of my hair algae and dinoflagellates in a short time by shortening my photoperiod from 14 hours to 10 hours. It doesn't seem to be doing anything to the cyano, however. I siphon it of rocks and out of the sand and it begins to return by the next morning. I was looking at the different additives you can get to combat them but I feel like they would be bad for my tank so I don't really want to try them.
What is an acceptable level of phosphate? I'm getting ready to test everything now so I will get the results up soon. Thanks in advance.

 

[VAreef]

phosphate should be zero. The less amount of nutrients you let the cyano have the less it will grow. where ever the cyano grows you can add some flow as cyano is not a big fan of higher flow areas.

 

[drm180]

Okay my phosphates and nitrates are both 0. Would adding a carbon and GFO reactor help anything. I'm thinking about buying one,

 

[AdeptMrSniffles]

Have you tried a "lights out" period? If not, cut your lights off COMPLETELY for about : days and do a few small water changes. When you turn your lights back on only run them for about 8hrs and SLOWLY increase it over time. Like what was said before, make sure you have substantial flow in your tank.

If you DO endup using something like Red Slime Remover make sure you follow the directions, seriously. However, I uses this product and a few
weeks later it came back, and with a vengance.

 

[drm180]

Can I black out the tank even if I have a BTA and a torch coral? How much flow is too much? I have a K2, and Penguin, and a Maxi-Jet 1200 running my skimmer.

 

[yote]

A 3 or 4 day black out wont hurt anything in your tank except the algae.
The wild reefs dont get blasted with full sun light for 12 hours a day 365 days a year.There will be times when they'll go a few day,a week,and sometimes several weeks with basically no sunlight because of storm systems and rain.

On your flow,as long as your sands not in suspension,you dont have to much.

 

[drm180]

Okay. Do I just keep the lights off or should I cover the whole tank with something to keep all the light out? I'm going to add another K2 that I've had just in case to see if it helps as well. Thanks

 

[yote]

Just leave the lights off.

 

[Jmck]

Dealing with Cyanobacteria (Red Slime Algae) - Reef Health

if your still struggling, this is an article I found when battling Cyano and explains all ways to get and prevent it. Might be of some help :)

 

[drm180]

First day of the blackout and it already seems to be helping. I think I'm going to do it for 2 more days. Should I feed my fish or should the be okay?

 

[Bifferwine]

How often do you normally feed your fish? Just keep your fish on the same feeding schedule during the black out.

 

[drm180]

i feed every other day. Just frozen mysis. Thanks

 

[drm180]

I turned my lights back on this morning and everything looked great. I hadn't realized how yellow the water was before and now it is crystal clear. The cyano is coming right back though. I don't know what the problem is. Will it just starve itself out eventually?

 

[Hiker4twenty]

Did you try to syphon any of the cyano out? There is something in there which is feeding the algae and causing it to grow. Also, it wont hurt the fish to not feed them for a few days while the blackout is going on. That will also help to reduce excess nutrients into the system. You should also do a good water change the day you decide to turn the lights back on to get all the spores out of the water and start off on a cleaner slate when the lights go back on.

 

[drm180]

I did siphon out as much as I could. I've been skimming as wet as I can for the 3 black out days and I didn't feed anything. I got about 4 gallons of skimmate, very watery but I guess it had a higher nutrient content that the rest of the water did. I'm going to do another today. Are there any snails or anything that eat cyano? I'm willing to try almost anything now.

 

[jarock]

i would recommend u get an agent called RowaPhos it helped my tank a ton i had horrible cyano and after around 3 weeks almost all gone . i gurantee you will be happy with this product.

 

[ggNoRe]

Also, I think running GFO and carbon is a great idea to help in this battle. They keep nitrates and phosphates down big time!