What is this? I can easily brush it off with a tooth brush. Some of it will come off with a turkey baster. It comes back no later than the next day.
Mystery gunk
- Thread starter leon.1980
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Hard to tell but likely a type of algae or possibly a sponge
thats the start of chrysophytes
recommend: rip clean your system as we do, so that it's invasion free by your hand/surgery on the rocks and sandbed. this reduces the mass as much as possible
then, in the clean condition, install a UV sterilizer rightly sized for the tank or face the wrath of searchable full on chrysophytes invasions / honest assertion
it's a requisite hitchhiker no parameter does this, no bad lighting does it, grazers are usually not helpful.
if the tank is too large to do a rip clean your chances of control drop significantly since many cells will be left in the system, and UV only catches the few that transit the water. you need this mass removed from the tank, before starting prevention protocols. don't leave it in, and try to kill + degrade it all inside the system, dinos will soon takeover once the accumulation of dying material begins. rip cleans start the tank with no offending mass, and you work as prevention vs removal=key to sustained wins and not bleaching your corals during the fight.
I rate this invasion as #2 just after dinos on invasions we have trouble beating that absolutely causes some tanks to be lost. acting early is your best bet. if this was common green or red cyano I'd rate it #7 on a scale of one to ten of risk. but this is #2 I think it warrants serious preemptive action based on searchable threads. if this was GHA that's easy to beat, almost no challenge, fluconazole lets someone cheat burn it down in one dose.
but chryso's, they wrecked tanks a lot of the time.
recommend: rip clean your system as we do, so that it's invasion free by your hand/surgery on the rocks and sandbed. this reduces the mass as much as possible
then, in the clean condition, install a UV sterilizer rightly sized for the tank or face the wrath of searchable full on chrysophytes invasions / honest assertion
it's a requisite hitchhiker no parameter does this, no bad lighting does it, grazers are usually not helpful.
if the tank is too large to do a rip clean your chances of control drop significantly since many cells will be left in the system, and UV only catches the few that transit the water. you need this mass removed from the tank, before starting prevention protocols. don't leave it in, and try to kill + degrade it all inside the system, dinos will soon takeover once the accumulation of dying material begins. rip cleans start the tank with no offending mass, and you work as prevention vs removal=key to sustained wins and not bleaching your corals during the fight.
I rate this invasion as #2 just after dinos on invasions we have trouble beating that absolutely causes some tanks to be lost. acting early is your best bet. if this was common green or red cyano I'd rate it #7 on a scale of one to ten of risk. but this is #2 I think it warrants serious preemptive action based on searchable threads. if this was GHA that's easy to beat, almost no challenge, fluconazole lets someone cheat burn it down in one dose.
but chryso's, they wrecked tanks a lot of the time.
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Oh it’s not just in one spot. It’s everywhere. I been brushing it off for months. I have a 25 watt pentair uv that pulls its water from the skimmer chamber and deposits it into the return chamber as I’m doing it at a rate of 90 gph.
By rip clean do you mean pull all rock out of the tank and scrub it off?
I’m assuming I need to remove my coral for this or can I do this in a tub with fresh saltwater in it?
This may explain why my green slimer is bleaching.
Algae Identification
Any opinions on what type of algae this is growing on my rocks and sand bed?
www.reef2reef.com
yes that's really close to being it
the thing we provide is absolute control over your cycle
the whole reason people fear rip cleaning is the tank destabilization part, fearing a cycle or mini cycle
we can absolutely guarantee it won't happen, notice we didn't do any ammonia testing there, we command what it will do vs retro measure it like most cycling approaches. the key is clean rinsing of the sand, and rock (rock gets saltwater scraped + rinsed and sand gets tap water rinsed) that cloudlessness ensures the skip cycle. we're excluding the invader at that point, but trace cells remain that can remass if we don't make changes. Big UV is the change I'd recommend after a rip clean.
**I haven't seen a full tank pic yet/perhaps/hope you dont need a full rip clean they're a lot of work. it's what I would do/take top measure right off the bat/but some people may want to forego a complete tank cleaning to save the work if it's just one rock that has the chryso's
how it presents on the tankwide scale influences the final decision imo
Algae Identification
Any opinions on what type of algae this is growing on my rocks and sand bed?
yes that's really close to being it
the thing we provide is absolute control over your cycle
the whole reason people fear rip cleaning is the tank destabilization part, fearing a cycle or mini cycle
we can absolutely guarantee it won't happen, notice we didn't do any ammonia testing there, we command what it will do vs retro measure it like most cycling approaches. the key is clean rinsing of the sand, and rock (rock gets saltwater scraped + rinsed and sand gets tap water rinsed) that cloudlessness ensures the skip cycle. we're excluding the invader at that point, but trace cells remain that can remass if we don't make changes. Big UV is the change I'd recommend after a rip clean.
**I haven't seen a full tank pic yet/perhaps/hope you dont need a full rip clean they're a lot of work. it's what I would do/take top measure right off the bat/but some people may want to forego a complete tank cleaning to save the work if it's just one rock that has the chryso's
how it presents on the tankwide scale influences the final decision imo
Attachments
Could you show me what you see as chrysophytes please, I have never seen this before, from pictures it looks like a relatively new aquarium so what would cause this or is it something that's added like an hitchhiker, does it grow on its own? Thank you
Hey in a setup like that, you could easily lift out each rock one at a time, put them through reef dentistry and set back. They'll skip cycle over and over you may not need sandbed cleaning although it's always beneficial to have a clean bed. Either way, nice setup for sure. Very accessible rocks unlike most scapes.
Not sure if chrysophytes as chrysophytes will rarely if ever blow off and suspect is Lyngbya which is filamentous and requires light scrubbing preferably placing rock outside the tank to prevent particles from being spread throughout the tank and give the tank a good siphon and clean all filters and skimmer if you have one.
Scrub the rock with a firm toothbrush Or auto detail brush and agitate to shake off particles before returning to tank and add cleaners such as Pitho crabs, chiton snails, ninja star snails and Caribbean blue leg hermits to help with control and reduce white intensity a little and increase water flow.
You likely have inadequate flow which allowed this to adhere to rock.
I set it up with thst in mind. Believe it or not even the structure on the right is two pieces that were built at the same time. They slide into each other in a very specific way on purpose to make easy to remove.
Following, I have never seen this before
If the UV doesn't help, it may be aiding the issue as less bacteria in the water is around to compete.
What test kit do you use for nitrate?
I wonder what would happen if you up the nitrate to let's say 8 and begin adding stuff like pns probio. Might be something to try.
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