Cali Kid Corals

Thoughts on approaching cyano bloom

IOnceWasLegend

IOnceWasLegend

Frag Swap Coordinator
BOD
BARcard
I have a cyano bloom. Tank parameters:

Salinity: 1.0255
Nitrate: 10 ppm
Ammonia and nitrate: 0 ppm
Phosphate: 0 ppm (undetectable; getting an ULR checker soon to confirm)
Alk: 9 dkh
Ca: 460-480 ppm
Age: ~3 months
Livestock (outside of CUC): One clownfish, one bar goby (IM Nuvo 20)

After getting rid of my GHA problem, I've been experiencing a cyano outbreak (primarily on the sand, with some on the rock). Given this, I'm leaning towards it being a nutrient issue, but I'm not quite sure where it could be coming from. Looking for some input and thoughts, given I've been doing the following with no noticeable reduction:

1. Siphoning every day/every other day

2. Skimming heavily

3. Reduced feedings to one every other day. Feeding frozen mysis shrimp (Hikari) rinsed with RODI water every other day; approximately 1/4th of a cube.

Any thoughts/tips?
 
Bump your po4 a bit cyano will dissapear. That's it.
All other remedies will remove cyano for short time then it will come back if your paramaters are the same, that I can guarantee
 
Last edited:
IOnceWasLegend said:
I thought cyano needed po4 to grow?
Click to expand...
Cyano can get its phosphorus from the air as opposed to other beneficial algae and bacteria. So when u zero your po4, you are giving all the advantage to cyano cause you are suppressing other algae and beneficial bacteria in the system. Cause at zero po4, these beneficial bacteria and algae cease to grow and consume nutrients and compete with cyano, while cyano continues to do so.
 
Last edited:
ofzakaria said:
Cyano can get its phosphorus from the air as opposed to other beneficial algae and bacteria. So when u zero your po4, you are giving all the advantage to cyano cause you are suppressing other algae and beneficial bacteria in the system. Cause at zero po4, these beneficial bacteria and algae seize to grow and consume nutrients and compete with cyano, while cyano continues to do so.
Click to expand...

Interesting. So, cease skimming, lights out, overfeed? And any other way to bump up po4 quick?
 
Correction I meant nitrogen not phosphorus. Cyano can get nitrogen from the atmosphere.
And no, do not cease skimming. Bring po4 up a bit naturally. If u using gfo, stop or reduce the flow to half..
 
The natural way to combate cyano is to make sure there is competition through enforcing your beneficial bacteria and your biological filtration.
Zero no3 or zero po4 usually suppress the growth and efficiency of these beneficial bacteria so cyano thrive.
Po4 feed your biological filtration, these bacteria need nitrogen, carbon and phosphorus to grow just like any other organism like coral, fish..etc.
So, while chemichal solutions or darkouts can help reduce cyano, it's doing so temporarily, since the light is back, it the chemichal is out of the water cyano will pop back up.
Also many of the chemicals solution can also hurt the beneficial bacteria as much as its hurting the cyano which in reality means making things worst.
Hope that helped a bit
 
Last edited:
Awesome; thanks for all the help, everyone.

So, would I be correct that my optimal route would be:

Cease GFO, continue activated carbon

Feed more heavily

Potentially dose additional bacteria (I have some microbacter 7)

Cease water changes to let nutrient levels build

Continue manual siphoning

Keep an eye on ammonia/nitrite while I do this
 
IOnceWasLegend said:
Awesome; thanks for all the help, everyone.

So, would I be correct that my optimal route would be:

Cease GFO, continue activated carbon

Feed more heavily

Potentially dose additional bacteria (I have some microbacter 7)

Cease water changes to let nutrient levels build

Continue manual siphoning

Keep an eye on ammonia/nitrite while I do this
Click to expand...
Do not feed heavily this will creat more problems down the road.
Reduce or remove ur gfo until your po4 is between 0.05 to 0.08 or even 0.1
Continue carbon
Siphon to help reduce cyano
Clean and vacuum sand whenever u can during water change.
Do not have ur no3 go higher(over feeding will do that that's why I advice against it)
Test po4 and no3 weekly. When po4 is high put gfo back but be mindful of the flow rate so you do not tank po4 again, more flow rate faster reduction of po4.
Continue water change. Weekly 10% or bit weekly 20% is good rule
I do not like adding bacteria like that but do not have strong openion against it. My fear of adding bacteria randomly is that if your system is carbon limited or nitrogen limited these bacteria will not have nutrients for them to thrive so they die off eventually.
Finally. patience patience patience. U need your system bio filtration to thrive and strengthen by time.
 
IOnceWasLegend said:
Awesome; thanks for all the help, everyone.

So, would I be correct that my optimal route would be:

Cease GFO, continue activated carbon

Feed more heavily

Potentially dose additional bacteria (I have some microbacter 7)

Cease water changes to let nutrient levels build

Continue manual siphoning

Keep an eye on ammonia/nitrite while I do this
Click to expand...
That all sounds about right to me. As for the feeding do t out in a lot all at once. Several small feeding per day are good, as long as it’s all getting eaten.
 
What are the red and green channels set to on your light? I have noticed cyano to get worse when those are above like 10%. But I don't know if there's really anything to that or not.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top