HELP! CRISIS MODE! What do I have? Dino, lyngbya, gha? All of the above?

[Stupidkitty84]

I started a new 15g nano tank in December 2022 and around March/April 2023 I started noticing what looked like GHA growing on a firework clove frag. I would pull it out but it would come back, eventually growing on an adjacent rock. I then started having red cyano grow on the sandbed, bottom rocks and glass and did a Chemiclean treatment. Cyano disappeared but the "GHA" exploded. I waited a few weeks and did FluxRx treatment and had to abandon that after 10 days as it was killing off every SPS in the tank and the "GHA" looked unaffected. So I figured I had lyngbya.

Last month, I treated the tank with azithromycin (supposed Lyngbya treatment) and it did nothing. I accidentally introduced this nuisance algae/bacteria into my other tank (32gal Biocube with rocks and fish from 2007, very established biome). Iy will probably take over in a month or two if I don't identify and treat correctly soon. The 15g nano is covered top to bottom. I lost every coral in there except zoas but they haven't opened in over a month now.

I bought a microscope recently and just looked at it today. I'm seeing multiple things so I'm doubly confused. Def some ostreopsis diatoms (the almond-popcorn kernel shaped things). Cannot tell if the long strands are GHA or Lyngbya.

Any help is much appreciated!

*Posting tank and microscope photos below. Last photo is the 32g Biocube. 2nd and 3rd to last photo is of the 15g nano that is head to toe covered.

 

[JoJosReef]

Definitely dinos present. Not sure what the filaments are, though. The dinos don't have the telltale "beak" of amphidinium, at least from what I can see, so I would go full blast with UV to clear them. If ostreopsis (my guess), they will clear quickly, and you can focus on getting your water parameters and microbiome in check so they don't come back. For the filamentous algae, we'll have to see pics when you don't have so much dinos covering everything.

 

[brandon429]

you need to rip clean this tank

then from the clean condition strictly, you reevaluate the system and try and suppress or stop growback.

how to rip clean/study with detail all answers are held within a 1 hr read:

Algae Identification

Any opinions on what type of algae this is growing on my rocks and sand bed?

www.reef2reef.com

you can see along the way in study, ID of your invasion doesn't matter nor do tank params.

you do not want to kill all that mass and rot it into your system, that's why a rip clean is #1. the steps #2-> onward all come after totally instating the clean condition, it is currently in the wrecked condition. all research, attempts to correct, come after the rip clean and there's no method that can take the place of rip clean as first move

killing all that mass and rotting it in the tank can never be better than the results shown above. depending on your degree of will, you can make your tank look brand new by tomorrow.

 

[brandon429]

some of the corrective steps after the rip clean are:

these lights are way too bright and possibly too long in duration for that system, hence the overgrowth. one or both of those factors should be changed once we get details

water quality/ RO+DI quality verified: 0 tds sourcewater needs to be verified

cleaning and export methods realigned

UV sterilizer if you want to speed things up

all come after the rip clean

 

[taricha]

GHA + dinos (ostreopsis and coolia, I think)

 

[paintman]

After your get done listening to the CUC cult, and the bottled potion cults......Look yourself in the mirror and ask "do I really want to beat this crap"? If you answer yes......Then go out and buy yourself a turkey baster and build a powerfilter.

 

[brandon429]

Paintman

can you post a link where you wrote that in another thread and it worked to cure them

those with link examples bring the best likelihood, because it keeps us from using our own reefs as stated examples

getting results for others as a pattern is very hard to do

 

[paintman]

Paintman

can you post a link where you wrote that in another thread and it worked to cure them

those with link examples bring the best likelihood, because it keeps us from using our own reefs as stated examples

getting results for others as a pattern is very hard to do

Sorry I have know idea where that thread is. I have written about this so many times I might just sit back and watch everyone kill CUC's and wast their money. When in reality all they need to do is put a lilttle bit of hands on effort into the problem.

 

[brandon429]

@Stupidkitty84


whats the status of your tank

was curious how much delay is in place to getting the deep fix

this took a few hours to attain:

before
dinos ridden

after
rip cleaned. no bottle bac no parameter testing other than matching salinity and temp of new water to the old water.

 

[brandon429]

there is no setting in which rotting all the mass in the tank slowly over time is ideal

that's what owners of super large tanks must do, due to inaccessibility

for nanos you just rip clean them, make them mass-free overnite in one big prep rescue run. its taking complete control over the biosystem all at once. that way is ideal

the specific fix for the invasion will be multi-fronted after the clean condition exists in any nano reef invasion, ID of in the invasion doesn't matter. without knowing the ID of a given invasion, that after pic is possible in any nano reef. the system instantly breathes better, flows better, oxidizes waste better, has less irritating compounds from eutrophication allowed.

it is reef tank cpr in every way. large tankers make the rules, you don't have to follow them

after the rip clean we down-adjust your lights and sustain them at the new rates.

we ensure topoff water quality

you do guiding micro cleans along the way: if a rock develops some regrowth you lift it up out of the tank, detail it externally, set back into a clean tank. no spots are allowed to remass, there's follow up work required when presenting a tank this eutrophic.

-UV sterilizer may be used depending on veracity of regrowth. you can try methods like brightwell razor additive etc in the clean condition setup.

it will be easier to prevent the overgrown condition when there is no mass, and you can begin on the first speck of invasion vs work backwards with it all left in place.

 

[crabgrass]

I was in a similar situation. Did a series of tactical cleanup + chemi-cure + razor/clean (not all at once). All helped, but did not stop.

Opted to Rip clean, which took about 3-4 hours to do (half of which was troubleshooting equipment). Here is my thread. GHA + Cyano Issues