Diatoms not going away.

[ReefMama]

This may sound silly, but have you run a phosphate test on your RODI water? I saw that you used a TDS meter, but did you run a secondary test checking specifically for phosphates? Sometimes the TDS meters don't pick up as well for it; I had a meter say 0 but there was still phosphate showing up. The iron and copper was out but phosphate sneaks through. City water is also bad for phosphates as a general rule.
Hope you get it figured out! Diatoms and cyano just plain suck and they make a tank look awful real quick. I hated my own fight with the stuff.

 

[NanaReefer]

I'm running Radion Gen3, Blues 100% max and whites just 10% max. Still this stuff persists.

 

[chris124]

This may sound silly, but have you run a phosphate test on your RODI water? I saw that you used a TDS meter, but did you run a secondary test checking specifically for phosphates? Sometimes the TDS meters don't pick up as well for it; I had a meter say 0 but there was still phosphate showing up. The iron and copper was out but phosphate sneaks through. City water is also bad for phosphates as a general rule.
Hope you get it figured out! Diatoms and cyano just plain suck and they make a tank look awful real quick. I hated my own fight with the stuff.

Yeah I already checked that but thanks any way.

 

[chris124]

I'm running Radion Gen3, Blues 100% max and whites just 10% max. Still this stuff persists.

I don't think its your lights. My LFS uses those and his Tanks look great. I'm getting close to the point of just letting my LFS see what they can do with it.

 

[erinmegan85]

It's not necessarily the lights themselves, but what the various colors are set at as far as par and such. I don't know how Radions work or how they are controlled, so I can't help on that spectrum. However, I can say that I searched on here and found info on my specific light that I have. I saw a couple thread that said to turn down the reds, greens, and whites, and it definitely helped. I would even venture to say that helped more so than the Vibrant did itself. The two together is probably what ultimately tipped it in my favor though.

 

[Grimreaperz]

Increase flow at substrate level, pretty sure Diatoms feed on silicate in sand and glass once they go away so will the Diatoms....Trochus Snails work wonders for me. And a good glass cleaner....when I had my bloom I just mixed up the substrate to I didn't have to look at it.

 

[Tofty85]

Increase flow at substrate level, pretty sure Diatoms feed on silicate in sand and glass once they go away so will the Diatoms....Trochus Snails work wonders for me. And a good glass cleaner....when I had my bloom I just mixed up the substrate to I didn't have to look at it.

I vacuum my sand once a week, just grows back within couple of hours, I've tried not touching the sand bed for few months, makes no difference, also tried various snails including trochus, can't keep up with the growth, my conch does a good job but only around the parimeter next to glass, I have repositioned my RW 4s lower in the tank to give more flow at lower levels, I see the particulate in the water flowing rapidly above the sand , so pretty sure I have enough flow, I've tried turning over the sand manually with turkey baster multiple times a day, Within an hour it's brown again

 

[James Kanouff]

I'll put it out there that I have a 300 DD with 550 gallons of system water. High load of tangs. no algae to be seen in display on anywhere else except frag tank "75 gallon" area. I have the ability to test par and multi versions of test kits to be sure of test values. reef crystals and Red sea salts for wc's.

in the connected frag system 8" deep on egg crate packed with corals, i get stringy cyano and a bit of diatoms here n there, lots of oxygen bubble during day light cycle on non live tissue areas of anything including egg crate.. i run alot of light a medium high amount of flow.. bare bottom system no gunky live rock was used no leaching nutrients, all dry MARCO rock in a light rock work aqua scape. And I just don't care about the crap on the frags. its not stopping growth and its not hurting anything. I believe its my 4-6 PPM of NO3 that is the issue from tang poop.. i change 50 gallons a month. run 9.0 DKH 450 ca, 1300 mg, ph of 8-8.2 daily cycle. p04 is undetectable. I do not dose vodka i use a light load of bio pellets to try n save a bit of WC. some of it may be bio pellets related. I have a huge 5 foot tall venturi driven LIFE REEF skimmer master piece cranking out half a gallon of nasty every day, And a huge ca reactor. no socks i use foam pads. staggered light cycle. mixed t5 led and Metal halide lights. Kalk in the ATO. Tons of CUC i mens 300+ blue legs 50-60 snails, hand full of emerald crabs. clean the glass once a week. Pretty typical stuff for a big reef tank.

The point is, I see some crap in places i don't want it, I'm not sure what its comes from.. but its there and out competing something else for nutrients. ill try n keep it in check. i would suspect your N03 test kit. if it says 0. and your p04 test kit if it says 0. it is tricky to get a small amount of nutrients for coral growth and not starve the corals. thats a thin line down near "0" i prefer o p04 and barely detectable N03. Then i know I'm "using" as fast as i making vs "starving" or "over cleaning". I also test for K and I and some other stuff. But i find the higher nutrients generally mean more algae growth and brownish colors on corals like everyone says. I'm not saying poo brown acro's I'm saying less than stellar colors on show pieces that can be crazy amazing colors if things are just right. But then they tend to grow real slow i think. its a game, growth or color too far of a shift either way is dead coral.

My goals lately is to get closer to 1-2 n03 with vodka, bio pellets, or some other method to consume nitrate as fast as I'm making it and at the level of Wc I'm doing. more water change is an option when thing get to high "as they have the last to cycles of Wc i have done based on there still climbing not dropping in 30- 60 days periods". less fish is an option or more naturally bacteria driven consumption action is third more "mystery" area I'm exploring using A water change as my back up plan. Maybe thats some helpful info for folks. maybe its not. I'm interested what you conclude.

 

[chris124]

Pretty sure my test kit is good cause I have had my LFS test as well and they get the same results. Anyway I have a funny feeling its my lights. Right now I'm running just blues to see what happens. My lights are cheap aquatraders snake eye LED and as you know you get what you pay for.

 

[chris124]

Well running just the blue lights grows it as well.

 

[Tofty85]

Well running just the blue lights grows it as well.

I have some low powered 12v blue LEDs which I use as moonlight, my brown algae even show up under them! Seems any sort of light encourages growth, I'm 2 days into h202 dosing, I used a turkey baster to blast my sand around before dosing with hope it will kill off the free floating spores, it's early days yet so not seeing much improvement, I might turn off my lights for the last 3 days of my 7 day dosing plan

 

[chris124]

I have some low powered 12v blue LEDs which I use as moonlight, my brown algae even show up under them! Seems any sort of light encourages growth, I'm 2 days into h202 dosing, I used a turkey baster to blast my sand around before dosing with hope it will kill off the free floating spores, it's early days yet so not seeing much improvement, I might turn off my lights for the last 3 days of my 7 day dosing plan

I hope it works.

 

[Tofty85]

Just a thought guys, have your tanks been through the green algae stage therefore allowing the green to out-compete the diatoms? Thought I'd ask as my tank is about 15 months old and I have not had any green algae.

With my previous 4 saltwater tanks I got diatoms then green algae then nothing, the green went with normal maintenance.

I'm thinking maybe due to lighting as my old tanks started with t5s then progressing to DIY led lighting, but the tank I have now has kessil a160s which offer a lot more control, so I dialled them in for a more bluer look,

Could it be I am inhibiting green algae growth?

 

[brandon429]

http://reef2reef.com/threads/the-of...ead-aka-one-against-many.230281/#post-2681445

this makes all diatoms go away. all else is happenstance. only that is pure control/effect. a fun challenge would be for anyone to link one persistent diatom thread on the internet from any forum that undertook that above and still had brown sand.

 

[Tofty85]

http://reef2reef.com/threads/the-of...ead-aka-one-against-many.230281/#post-2681445

this makes all diatoms go away. all else is happenstance. only that is pure control/effect. a fun challenge would be for anyone to link one persistent diatom thread on the internet from any forum that undertook that above and still had brown sand.

My sand bed got changed due to dinos around 3 or 4 months ago, with 1mm coral sand, which I rinsed and rinsed and rinsed again, no silt left at all, I spent a good 20 minutes per half bucket of sand, it stayed white for a good 2 or 3 weeks, then the brown started again not sure if it's the Dino's come back or if it's diatoms either way it looks horrible, I'm trying to explore every concept of why it come back.

 

[brandon429]

Diatoms are covered there tho. Agreed that dinos can self seed again. Dino battles are often long and drawn out I'd try vibrant for them

 

[mcarroll]

@chris124 I dunno if you're still living with the same issue from the start of this thread (or remember me dropping by here earlier), but I thought you might be interested in this thread:
Dinoflagellates – Are You Tired Of Battling Altogether?

Even if you are sure you don't have dinoflagellates blooming, try the advice for raising nutrients as folks there have done....it should help in your case too. PM me or drop me a line on that thread if you feel like getting started!!!

 

[ramona]

Chris124, how is the tank doing now?
Could you share what works and what didn't?

 

[badams.one]

I have had a diatom problem for a while now and its not getting any better. My Nitrates are 0 and with GFO my po4 is under 0.03 ppm. I'm starting to think its my RODI water. Because if I go a month with out a water change it slows down. But as soon as I do my water change its like pouring gas on a fire. What I dont understand is the water coming out is reading 0 tds with a inline tds meter and a hand held meter. My water company dose you well water so I guess that could be a problem. Other than the diatoms algae is no problem knock on wood.

Hello, I came across this thread as I'm battling the exact same thing.. zero on the TDS meter, but have brown covering the sand bed and now the rocks. I just ordered some ICP tests to test my RO, but wanted to check in with you to see if you were able to solve this problem and what you did. Thanks in advance.