Please help with this cyanobacteria

[Sambino]

My tank is covered in cyanobacteria and I've been having some trouble trying to figure out how to beat it. I would like to stay away from using chemi-clean as much as possible. I am waiting to get my clean-up crew through quarantine so that I can add them to the tank and they can help out a little bit and I've also added some pods in hopes that they might help a little bit too, however I understand if it will just take some more time in order for them to start out-competing the cyano. Since the cyano outbreak I've been using a small powerhead to blast the rocks during water changes and have slightly increased the amount of water being changed from 25 to 35 gallons. I believe that my issue is with flow as I have only been using 2 MP40's on either side at about 60%, since the outbreak I've increased the MP40's to run at 85%. I have a gyre that I have added to the tank at the surface of the water on the back of the tank above where the cyano seems to grow rampant on the sand. I was feeding TDO pellets, but since I've read that dry food could be the cause I've swapped to feeding frozen for now. With that being said I am feeding one sheet of nori per day that I cut in half, rub in some selcon and garlic guard, then put each half on an algae clip.
The tank has been running since January so could this just be my ugly phase?
What can I do to try to combat the cyano? Could flow be my issue and if so what's the best way to accomplish this? If more flow is needed, I would be more inclined to get an additional MP40 as opposed to using the gyre just because I much prefer having all my powerheads linked through mobius so it's easier to turn off flow when it comes to feeding time.
My tank parameters are as follows:
PH: 7.9
Salinity: 1.026 SG
Magnesium: 1375 ppm
Alkalinity: 7.3 dKH
Calcium: 458 ppm
Phosphate: 0.05 ppm
Nitrate: 5.9 ppm

I've attached some videos and photos of my tank and the cyano that's on the rocks.

 

[DaJMasta]

While I don't think chemiclean or similar is a magic bullet with no drawbacks, but it is effective, and at some point cyano can cover corals and be unsightly enough that it's well worth the disruption to the microbiome in my opinion.

That said, at least for my tank, cyano and dinoflagellates seem to crop up with specific nutrient imbalances. I usually have phosphates on the high side, but cyano really seems to get going when my nitrates are low and my phosphates are normal high levels. Dinos seem to do best when both are low. For my targets, both of your nutrient levels are low, and a little higher of each should reduce the prevalence of cyano. It may be that your tank has different dynamics, but it's worth trying to identify if there's a pattern based off the parameters.

One of the least invasive things that could help: siphon out some of it when you do your water change and see if it ends up coming back.

 

[Sambino]

While I don't think chemiclean or similar is a magic bullet with no drawbacks, but it is effective, and at some point cyano can cover corals and be unsightly enough that it's well worth the disruption to the microbiome in my opinion.

That said, at least for my tank, cyano and dinoflagellates seem to crop up with specific nutrient imbalances. I usually have phosphates on the high side, but cyano really seems to get going when my nitrates are low and my phosphates are normal high levels. Dinos seem to do best when both are low. For my targets, both of your nutrient levels are low, and a little higher of each should reduce the prevalence of cyano. It may be that your tank has different dynamics, but it's worth trying to identify if there's a pattern based off the parameters.

One of the least invasive things that could help: siphon out some of it when you do your water change and see if it ends up coming back.

Thankfully the only corals in the tank are a few rainbow bubble-tip anemones and the cyano doesn't seem to be affecting them too much.

I have been trying to feed more in order to raise nutrients, but I have switched to only feeding frozen food and nori soaked in selcon and garlic guard at the moment and it seems like my nutrients aren't going up. With that being said I am not sure what else I should do to try to raise the nitrates and phosphates in the tank and feel like adding more nitrates and phosphates will just continue to fuel the cyano growth.
Would this mean that it could be better for me to bottom out my nutrients at 0ppm in order to starve out the cyano? Should I consider doing a black-out when I get my nutrients to 0ppm?

This week I did 50 gallon water change and siphoned out as much of the cyano as possible.
I tested the tank parameters before doing the water change and they read as follows:
PH: 8.0
Salinity: 1.025 SG
Magnesium: 1350 ppm
Alkalinity: 7.4 dKH
Calcium: 444 ppm
Phosphate: 0.01 ppm
Nitrate: 4.6 ppm

Attached is a video of how the tank looks after the water change. The water is fairly cloudy because I have been using a smaller powerhead to blast the rocks with flow in order to dislodge as much cyano as possible and suspend any detritus that may be trapped underneath the cyano.

I did go ahead and pull the trigger on getting the 3rd MP40 for the tank in order to ensure that I am getting enough flow behind the rocks. Hopefully it will help in preventing the cyano from building up on the sand.

 

[Nicholas Dushynsky]

Hi, have you had any luck beating the cyanobacteria in your tank yet?

 

[Sambino]

Hi, have you had any luck beating the cyanobacteria in your tank yet?

Hey, I did more research and figured out that my tank is actually being overrun with dinoflagellates. I am not entirely sure which type of dino I have, however I have been dosing the tank with microbacter7 at 1ml/10gal daily and vibrant as recommended on the bottle since realizing this. I have also been trying to feed relatively heavy in order to keep the nitrate and phosphate levels from zeroing out because I read that dinos love zero/low nutrient tanks. I guess this is just the 'ugly phase' for my tank even though it's been up and running since January.
The main reason I could tell that I was dealing with dinos was from all of the bubbles being produced by the dinos and the longer, rust colored, strings that were flowing in the water.

Since dosing the microbacter7 and vibrant to the tank the dinos have definitely stopped growing so much.
I stopped using a powerhead to blow the dinos off the rocks because in reality I believe that was just helping spread them all around the tank. Now, I just siphon the dinos out of the tank as much as possible when I do my water change on the tank, which I have also adjusted to doing my water change on the tank every 2 weeks instead of every week since I am trying to keep the nutrient level elevated.

 

[BiggestE22]

Ozone.

 

[Sambino]

Ozone.

I do not have an ozone generator and am a little hesitant to get one because I have heard that it is relatively easy to overdose ozone to the tank.

Would dosing hydrogen peroxide work? What is the recommended dosing regimen that I should follow in order to fight back these dinos?

Thanks in advance for any help!

 

[Nicholas Dushynsky]

Good

Hey, I did more research and figured out that my tank is actually being overrun with dinoflagellates. I am not entirely sure which type of dino I have, however I have been dosing the tank with microbacter7 at 1ml/10gal daily and vibrant as recommended on the bottle since realizing this. I have also been trying to feed relatively heavy in order to keep the nitrate and phosphate levels from zeroing out because I read that dinos love zero/low nutrient tanks. I guess this is just the 'ugly phase' for my tank even though it's been up and running since January.
The main reason I could tell that I was dealing with dinos was from all of the bubbles being produced by the dinos and the longer, rust colored, strings that were flowing in the water.

Since dosing the microbacter7 and vibrant to the tank the dinos have definitely stopped growing so much.
I stopped using a powerhead to blow the dinos off the rocks because in reality I believe that was just helping spread them all around the tank. Now, I just siphon the dinos out of the tank as much as possible when I do my water change on the tank, which I have also adjusted to doing my water change on the tank every 2 weeks instead of every week since I am trying to keep the nutrient level elevated.

Good luck with your dino outbreak, keep us updated with your progress, I'm currently going through a cyano outbreak, I'm 1 week in with dosing 3% peroxide twice a day at 1ml per 10 gallons, I syphoned out what I could on Friday and it hasn't come back as strong currently. I'm going to continue the peroxide for at least another week.

I had a dino outbreak in my other tank and that took a lot of patience, I dosed peroxide once a day for a long time, I don't even recall for how long, I did a sort of water change once a week, which involved syphoning the water/dinos into a bucket through a filter sock and putting the same water back in the tank, with a little new water to top the level back up. That way I wasn't technically getting rid of the little nitrate and phosphates I did have.