Phosphate problem or passing algae phase?

[d2mini]

I have some stringy brown algae on my sand bed and the algae that I have to clean off my glass every day or so is dusty brown. Anything I could/should do about it or is it something I need to wait out?

 

[daugherty]

prob just the alage phase

 

[bobby]

Sounds like diatoms. Comes with new tank pretty much and lack of flow. Make sure you keep up with good tank husbandry, rinse you frozen food, use ro or rodi water, have plenty of flow and it will go away in time. My tanks seemed to get better after about the 6 month time frame, but I have had one that took longer.

Funs not over yet though.LOL Once thats gone you might hit other algae stage, but might not. If you do just be patient and keep taking care of the tank and before you know it you will have a mature pretty tank without all the nasty stuff.

 

[wontonflip]

+1 bobby...I had the same problem when I started my new tank; I rearranged my lrs and my powerheads to get rid of dead spots, and it's pretty much gone now (plus I got snails). The tank's been up for about 3 months now, and the diatoms have been clear for 2 months.

 

[daugherty]

diatoms are usually the first to come and then the cyano and hair. my hair and bryosis alage just started a couple months ago but i think that it is going away now. i have seen tanks that took over a year to get out of the alage part of the cycle. most of that was from poor husbandry on the users part.

 

[d2mini]

Ah, ok cool. It's not overtaking anything... yet... so I can deal with it.

 

[yote]

Diatoms will spring back up from time to time.But it'd still be a good idea to get in the habit of running some GFO for phosphates.
Might (notice I said might) help keep the worst algaes from being so bad.

 

[d2mini]

So is there anything I can get to help keep the top of my sand bed clean?
Diamond Goby? Some kind of snail?
My nassarius, turbos and nerites aren't doing it.

 

[bobby]

Nassarius, conchs,and gobies help, but the diatoms grow soo fast. Atleast for me they did.

 

[d2mini]

It's not the diatoms (those are little brown flecks, right?) but the longer stringy brown stuff that's bothering me. That and there is also a bright green dusty type mixed in.
My nassarius don't seem to be doing anything with the top of the sand.

 

[bobby]

Diatom I think will start to string. It could be cyno as well. Both are just as nasty as the other. I think diatom are brown, redish or rusty colored and cyno is purplish if I remember right. My nassarius help somewhat but the conch helped the most. Usually nassarius spend most of their time in the sand, but they help mix it up a bit.

 

[yote]

Diatoms can have those strings too.And the green dusty algae is just a part of the tank maturing,just like the diatoms.

 

[d2mini]

I was looking around and those little phosban reactors are cheap.
Think it's worth getting one?
Any suggestions for my little 46g tank?

 

[Bifferwine]

Yeah they are worth it. I think they are at least.

 

[clearblue]

dont mean to hijack , but I have this stuff growing in my 30g. Recently started adding coral and switched to a wet/dry. I was thinking about backing down my light time by 30 minutes will this help?

 

[Altohombre]

lol that's not bad at all. My whole sandbed and rocks turned brown from diatrus algae.

 

[Bifferwine]

Those are diatoms. There's really nothing you can do about them, as they are a normal occurrence in a new tank. You can keep up with regular water changes and keep a good cleaner crew to keep your sandbed stirred up (nassarius snails). As your tank matures, you will get fewer and fewer diatom outbreaks.

 

[clearblue]

Thanks for you reply. Much appreciated.

 

[clearblue]

Picked up 5 more Nassarius snails to try to keep floor bed stirred up.

 

[d2mini]

I picked up a brown bristle star today. We'll see if he helps keep the surface of my sand clean.