I need help please!! DINO?? not DINO? how to fix it!??

GSU why sps die with no obvious change or swings in parameters is extremely hard to nail down.

If I had to guess I would say that something happened water chemistry or parameter wise while you were absent for a week.
The tank looks young in the images and that may have contributed to it as well.

Silicates usually are used by diatoms during the diatom bloom. Adding new equipment can introduce silicates but that usually does not initiate a bloom. Using some substrates not meant for reef tanks such as some types of sand will add a lot of silicate.

Some have said that the use of egg crate contributes as well.

If you are not seeing the beginning of purple coralline algae you might want to wait to introduce sps.

 

I actually do see spots of purple coralline here and there. When I introduced this SPS I was kinda expecting it to die because it was the first one to be introduced. Somehow it always happens like that. This tank is about 4 months old though. I was kinda hoping it survived though because it seemed like it was doing nice for the first week in the tank :-/

Could it be that the barrel where I store the water be the big source of silicates? It is a rain barrel we bought from lowes. The rest of the stuff I used should not have introduced that much silicates into the tank.

If it is the barrel leeching silicates into my top off water, do you know what I could do to maybe remove the amount because each top off could just be introducing even more silicates.

Also, would this bloom halt the addition of anything else until I get this under control? or should the bloom not affect the tank negatively other than aesthetics?

 

Bump

 

That is a massive, huge, gigantic, and in all ways GARGANTUAN problem. Those things are made to be decorative for the outdoors. They're designed to hold some rain water to throw in your flower bed or over your lawn. You're not supposed to use that thing for anything involved with animal, let alone human, let alone delicate coral consumption.

If you're mixing up salt water in that thing, it's probably a small version of Chernobyl by the time it hits the tank.

So, just so we're clear,
GET RID OF IT.

Go back to Lowes or Home Depot and get yourself a Rubbermaid Brute Commercial Grade garbage can. They're gray. A decent sized one will run you about 50 bucks. They're made of commercial grade plastic that will not leech anything back into the water. You can quite literally eat off of them. They're safer than a paper plate.

Don't put one more drop of water from that rain barrel into your tank.

ADDED: When you get the Rubbermaid home, put a few cups water in it. Add 1 cup of your salt mix. Yes, it's going to be thick and nasty...but scrub the fool out of the inside of the can with that mixture. Rinse it out well. Then get a couple cups of fresh IO water in there and wipe it down all over on the inside. Dump that and you're ready to mix good, clean, non-toxic water...forever.

 

I don't think most plastics leach silicate. Do they even contain Si? I can't find the type of plastic most rain barrels are made of. I think the most likely source is your top off water... the R/O may not be removing everything. Most cities publish a drinking water report at least annually, and they can be available online. If you can find a report, it may be a good idea to check it for Si.

Also, even if the main problem is silicates, limiting phosphate/nitrate may still help. Even algae that utilize Si need phosphorus and nitrogen

 

I don't think I have nitrates, and phosphates have been reading 0 since day one.
I rarely feed anything because I don't have much in the tank other than 2 cleaner shrimp and a hermit crab.

Say there are silicates. It think they are the most likely suspect. IS there a way to test for them? and most importantly... HOW do I remove them? IS there some type of filter I can buy? or a reactor? anything?

 

GFO is probably the easiest way to remove silicates. I suggest Warner Marine Phosar because it does not clum together over time.

 

I think I am missing something here. I don't see any diatoms in the pictures. So, why do you think silicates?

Maybe, but I'm told by an expert in dinoflagellates, that dinoflagellates and Chyrsophystes are so similar that they can only be differentiated under a microscope and even then are difficult. Often they still require genetic analysis. Also, most experts seem to think Chyrsophystes are extremely rare and wouldn't do well in our systems. So, to my a more likely explanation is classic dinoflagellates, but just my .02...

 

+1

 

It doesn't look like dino to me.. In the pictures I see online its more slimy looking.
In my case is more fluffy and hairy looking. I can get more pictures later if you guys want. It's getting a bit worse so maybe at least it will be easier to tell.