What's the difference?

Killing off cyano...

What's the difference between the green seaweed sheets that I feed them on the clip and the green algae that grows like a blanket across the sandbed in my tank? The blue tang, algae blenny, and cleaner shrimp will eat the seaweed from the clip, but not the algae on the sand bed (sometimes they'll just "pick" at it). The algae starts out a very thin layer, then builds up almost like a blanket over the sand. The cleanup crew either doesn't eat it, or can't keep up with it either. What's a good addition to the tank for getting rid of it? I know the sand sifting starfish and nassarius snails will just stir up the sand and bury it a little, but what kind of marine animal eats this stuff. I'll post parameters tomorrow, but last week when I checked the phosphate was 0. I'm thinking of getting a UV light, but think it might be just a PITA to hook it up inline with my canister filter. I'm thinking of also trying both the koralia #2 and #3 at the same time. I had the #3 in first, but replaced it with the #2, b/c the flow was making craters in the sand bed.
Any ideas that worked for anyone else are much appreciated.
Thanks,
Bogie

 

IMO the #1 help against nusaince algae is... good water param. Make sure you are testing everything you should with good test kits. If this doesn't work find out the exact algae and target any new additions to stop the algae. But the water parameter thing works most of the time, something is probably off.

 

PH, MG, Calcium to name a couple.

 

they're both algae and they're both made of millions and millions of one-celled creatures. Not to be trite, but the algae that you feed the tang is expecially tasty (in the tang's opinion), while the green algae on the sandbed isn't. The green algae on the sandbed may be more closely related to red slime algae, also called blue-green algae.

 

Well, I couldn't get the water parameters posted eariler.
I was fertilizing the lawn this weekend, and I didn't want to take a chance with any of the nitrates from the fertilizer getting from my shoes to hands to tank... it's toxic for the fish. So no hands in the tank for a few days.
This morning I did 3 tests, I'll add the other parameters later, when I have more time in the afternoon.
I didn't do pH, b/c I don't do pH testing in the morning before the lights come on.

Ammonia = 0 ppm
Nitrate = 0 ppm
Nitrite = 0 ppm

So if everything else is withing good range, have more than enough flow, and the daylight lights are only on 8 hours, what could be causing this algea all over the sand?

 

Hermit crabs will eat the cyano

 

I must have 20 hermit crabs - 15+ blue and 5 scarlet. They are more inclined to stay on the LR than eat the algae covering the sand bed. I doubt adding more hermits will help this at all. Are you sure it's green cyano?

 

You will rarely be able to test for Phosphorus nor Nitrates when you have a cyanobacteria bloom. They are able to grab them out of the water column so fast that when you try to do a test, they are gone from your water sample. However, trust me, you have an abundance of one or the other or both.

 

I would go for an algae blenny and see if he helps they are great fish to have in any situation he might help. I would check your Phosphates as well if you don't have a phos test kit bring some water to your LFS and ask them to test it for you.

 

Inwall, thanks for the info. I didn't know that about the phosphates not showing up b/c of the cyano. Does that look like cyano in the pic above? I'll try a phosphate remover in my canister filter to see if that makes any difference. I never bought the phosphate remover before, b/c tests always showed 0 ppm. Thanks.

Hey Crabby Jim, didn't you see (in my sig) that there was an algae blenny in the tank? He never ate the green algae on the sand, though. He only ate algae from the LR, back wall of the tank, my old powerhead, and the heater (in addition to the tang's seaweed on the clip). The hermits and snails take care of the rock, sand, and glass, so I doubt I'll get another blenny. Thanks.