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Anyone beat it?
- Thread starter KenPA
- Start date
1) Get rid of the mechanical filtration. Unless you clean it thoroghly every day, it's just a storehouse of uneaten food and other waste. Let the detrivivores in the tank take care of small particles.
2) Check your carbon brand. If it is leaching phosphates that certainly won't help.
3) If you do the above and the skimmer is well tuned and properly sized, the cyano will be starved out in a couple months. You can help the process by siphoning it out - it will remove more more nutrients from the system as it grows back.
2) Check your carbon brand. If it is leaching phosphates that certainly won't help.
3) If you do the above and the skimmer is well tuned and properly sized, the cyano will be starved out in a couple months. You can help the process by siphoning it out - it will remove more more nutrients from the system as it grows back.
The second best advice after curbing nutrients is to increase dissolved oxygen levels system-wide. Oxygen saturation can be accomplished via pressurized oxygen injection, increased protein skimming, and/or increased water motion. Often times, cyanobacteria exists in areas of lower flow (especially near detritus pockets) and lower light.
Most cyanobacteria strains are nitrogen fixers that possess heterocysts which must be sequestered from oxygen. Oxygen is toxic to its metabolic functions. Although cyanobacteria have developed mechanisms to export oxygen from its cells (being photosynthetic, it must), it probably can only perform this up to a given threshold. Increasing dissolved oxygen levels in areas where cyanobacteria exists may be an effective "poison," retarding their life cycle.
Most cyanobacteria strains are nitrogen fixers that possess heterocysts which must be sequestered from oxygen. Oxygen is toxic to its metabolic functions. Although cyanobacteria have developed mechanisms to export oxygen from its cells (being photosynthetic, it must), it probably can only perform this up to a given threshold. Increasing dissolved oxygen levels in areas where cyanobacteria exists may be an effective "poison," retarding their life cycle.
Ok where to start. I have the mechanical filtration only to add extra surface water movement and for a place to store my carbon. I just added this, this week as is the carbon (Black Diamond). Will this help?
Water movement: I just rearranged my tank last night and took out some rock so there are absolutely no dead spots. I figure 3 powerheads is plenty? could be wrong. I don't have the hoses hooked up to my powerheads to make those little bubbles but if that helps with increasing my 02 levels please let me know. I thought my skimmer would do that?
The only water I use for my tank is from work which is ultra pure. It goes through sediment tanks, softeners, carbon tanks and 1 micron filters.
I was feeding once a day, probrably to much for 2 clowns and a 6 line and will start every other day if you all think this won't harm them.
The tank is 2 years old, parameters are fine, I skim, lighting is 440watt vho's I had on for 12 hours and have cut back to 8. I am definately interested in raising my 02 level but am unsure how? Thanks for the help.
Water movement: I just rearranged my tank last night and took out some rock so there are absolutely no dead spots. I figure 3 powerheads is plenty? could be wrong. I don't have the hoses hooked up to my powerheads to make those little bubbles but if that helps with increasing my 02 levels please let me know. I thought my skimmer would do that?
The only water I use for my tank is from work which is ultra pure. It goes through sediment tanks, softeners, carbon tanks and 1 micron filters.
I was feeding once a day, probrably to much for 2 clowns and a 6 line and will start every other day if you all think this won't harm them.
The tank is 2 years old, parameters are fine, I skim, lighting is 440watt vho's I had on for 12 hours and have cut back to 8. I am definately interested in raising my 02 level but am unsure how? Thanks for the help.
Hopefully, you're rearrangement of rocks/powerheads will work for you. With the setup described, it sounds like you've got plenty of water distribution, and I suspect it's more a nutrient availability problem. Although your nutrient levels may read "fine," test kits do not accurately reflect total nutrient levels within the tank. Growth of cyano indicates a presence of excess nutrients, and the reason your test kits read zero is because these nutrients have been assimilated and recycled by various organisms, least desirable of which is cyano.
In light of this, my advice is perform a series of larger (30-50%) weekly water changes over the next few months, and siphon out as much cyanobacteria as possible every time you perform a water change. This will effectively export nutrients (dissolved in water and assimilated in cyano) from the system. It's imperative your source water is nutrient-free. Although you claim that your work water is pristine (and probably is), I would test it nonetheless for ammonia/ammonium, nitrogen oxides, and phosphor oxides. The only form of nutrient export is source water and feedings/additives (you may want to cut back a little on these).
This is probably advice you've already been given, but aside from nutrient control and oxygen availability, there's little else you can do to control cyanobacteria short of antibiotics.
In light of this, my advice is perform a series of larger (30-50%) weekly water changes over the next few months, and siphon out as much cyanobacteria as possible every time you perform a water change. This will effectively export nutrients (dissolved in water and assimilated in cyano) from the system. It's imperative your source water is nutrient-free. Although you claim that your work water is pristine (and probably is), I would test it nonetheless for ammonia/ammonium, nitrogen oxides, and phosphor oxides. The only form of nutrient export is source water and feedings/additives (you may want to cut back a little on these).
This is probably advice you've already been given, but aside from nutrient control and oxygen availability, there's little else you can do to control cyanobacteria short of antibiotics.
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