I'm dreaming of a brown christmas

[magern2]

Looks like its going to be a brown christmas this year, if i don't solve this problem.

The brown stuff is growing on everything, tank wall, life rock, even my plants! I'm worried it will displace my mushrooms and cover up my star polyps (which are now only 1/2 open).

I did two things before this happened:

1) changed water with "R** S**" salt mix.

2) added iodine supplement (dose as recommended on bottle)

I suspect that one of these two things is the cause of the problem.

I just changed water again to see which of the two reasons is the actual one. I used the same salt mix but used distilled water this time instead of boiled water.

Any commments, anyone??

[SharkBait]

They look more like dinoflagellates to me.

[terryansimon]

urh. iodine wouldn't do much. in fact it may posion your tank and kill everything in it.

how to reduce your messy brown mess?

reduce your photoperiod

practice more frequent water changes

reduce the amount of food you feed

reduce bioload if necessary

upgrade your skimmer if possible

stop adding food additives.

start a refugium and start growing macroalgae ASAP

employ the usage of PO4 removal media like RowaPhos or something along those lines.

[weileong]

do a 4 days blackout followed by major water change should help to get rid of them quickly.

Then follow what the rest of the brothers have advised.

[Golden Tooth]

More water circulation n change the GAC, if u're using. Reduce feedings n do frequent water changing. Employ snails.

[tdmrider]

stop using r** s** salt. it contains PO4 n NO3.

[FuEl]

Do a search on dinoflagellates in the disease section..I remember posting something on how to combat them.

[magern2]

stop using r** s** salt. it contains PO4 n NO3.

OMG! U arnot kidding!? I just used it again!

More water circulation n change the GAC, if u're using. Reduce feedings n do frequent water changing. Employ snails. 

Vas ist GAC?

[terryansimon]

Granular Activated Carbon.

[victorp]

Looks like diatoms...is your tank less than 6 months old? It is caused by excessive silicates in the water. New tanks will go through this period of algae bloom because of the sands. As your tank matures, the silicates will be depleted unless your tap water contains silicates. Try to use Silicates Remover to hasten the depletion process (assuming your tap water is okay).

[iewnehz]

Looks like diatoms...is your tank less than 6 months old? It is caused by excessive silicates in the water. New tanks will go through this period of algae bloom because of the sands. As your tank matures, the silicates will be depleted unless your tap water contains silicates. Try to use Silicates Remover to hasten the depletion process (assuming your tap water is okay).

Diatoms? i don't think so...

Margern2, you may want to gif your rocks a scrab. may work things faster

[SBS_Transit]

stop using r** s** salt. it contains PO4 n NO3.

how sure are u ?

[Eric]

Looks like its going to be a brown christmas this year, if i don't solve this problem.

The brown stuff is growing on everything, tank wall, life rock, even my plants! I'm worried it will displace my mushrooms and cover up my star polyps (which are now only 1/2 open).

I did two things before this happened:

1) changed water with "R** S**" salt mix.

2) added iodine supplement (dose as recommended on bottle)

I suspect that one of these two things is the cause of the problem.

I just changed water again to see which of the two reasons is the actual one. I used the same salt mix but used distilled water this time instead of boiled water.

Any commments, anyone??

If i'm you, I'll dismantle the tank and restart again, the diatoms growth looks like very bad.......you might want to ask yourself these questions........

1)Have I been overfeeding?

2)When was my last water change? & how much?

3)Am I having too high a bioload?

4)Is my photoperiod too long? (maybe due to timer faulty/jam)

5)Do I have enough water circulation inside the tank?

6)What is my phosphate and Nitrate level?

Eric

[magern2]

Kind of ..... extreme to dismantle my tank, dont you think?

I hope it will burn itself out after a while. like a bushfire.

[tdmrider]

how sure are u ?

my friend had tested it with his red sea salt mix with salifert test kits. too bad he doesnt have silicate test kits.

[ryz]

Using red sea salt for quite long already... nothing like what u described.. If it's like whqat u claimed then red sea wouldn't even be selling salt already... red sea salt is from the red sea you know... not synthethic... they just add some supplements to it..

Red sea is ranked higher than even the more popular brands like tropic marine, kent and corallife... cheack it out

http://www.aquacraft.net/s9910.html

[Eric]

Agreed with Ryz, definitely not red sea salt............have been using them for 6mths liao..........no serious diatoms growth............during the 4th month of my tank, slight diatoms starts to appear on the sandbed nearer to my 10K 250W MH side. Switched the 10K to 20K and reduce the feeding plus siphon the sandbed during water change, use biophos II to control the phosphate ..........after that, no more diatoms problem.

Eric

[magern2]

Well, if its not the salt, then it must be me adding too much iodine in. Maybe a bit too heavy handed.

[terryansimon]

I highly doubt iodine overdosing will generate algae growth like that.

I do however believe that iodine overdosing will kill everything outright. all dead matter will decay, and the decay may lead to such an algae growth.

[magern2]

Doesn't iodine boost algae growth in general? Or is dinoflagellate not an algae

[Nemofish]

Using red sea salt for quite long already... nothing like what u described.. If it's like whqat u claimed then red sea wouldn't even be selling salt already... red sea salt is from the red sea you know... not synthethic... they just add some supplements to it..

Red sea is ranked higher than even the more popular brands like tropic marine, kent and corallife... cheack it out

http://www.aquacraft.net/s9910.html

why dont you guys conduct a test yourselves to find out if it's true.