Lingering bacteria bloom makes me wanna start over! (Unresolved)

Discussion in 'General Reef Topics' started by insanespain, Nov 7, 2011.

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  1. m2434

    m2434 Giant Squid

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    Yes, it does. You primarily need two things for a bacterial bloom, inorganic nutrients (such as nitrates) and organic carbon. So, if you have nitrate, in a sense, that is half of the reason. Now you just need to figure out why you have organic carbon.

    How is your ATS running? Are you getting a lot of growth? Harvesting often?
    I ask because algae, naturally releases organic carbon byproducts. Typically if the ATS is working well this isn't an issue, but if there is something wrong, it could be the carbon source.

    Also, are you running GAC? a protein skimmer? If your not removing organic carbon with these methods, it could be accumulating. An ATS will not remove organic carbon, it can add it though. You need other methods to remove it.
     
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  3. insanespain

    insanespain Ocellaris Clown

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    My ats isn't doing much. Only been up for a week, had some light growth, and I just cleaned the screen 2 days ago so not much growth yet. I don't know what to do. Water changes are pointless, I've read that the bacteria can reproduce as fast as 15-20 minutes. I'm about to move the 3 fish to my 29 gallon and then let the tank sit without feeding it anything, and add a bigger cuc.

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  4. m2434

    m2434 Giant Squid

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    Water changes aren't pointless if they are your only means of removing organic carbon (of course it depends on the salt, some may will add more than they remove - perhaps such as redsea, for example due to the collection method.). Personally, I would run a diatom filter for a while. That should remove everything, including the bacteria and particulate organics. Still, you'll need to find the source, or it will come back.

    An ATS that "doing much" could also be an issue.
     
  5. insanespain

    insanespain Ocellaris Clown

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    Organic carbon comes from where?

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  6. m2434

    m2434 Giant Squid

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    Lots of places - some of the most common:
    -Food
    -Decay, such as dieoff on liverock
    -Growing and/or dying Algae
    -Some salts are high in organics - Reef Crystals has vitamins which are organics for example. Other do too, or may contain organics in other forms.
    -Salt mixing containers or water holding containers may leach certain organics
    - Tap water, or improperly filtered RO/DI water (maybe due to a bad RO membrane for example) could contain organics.
     
  7. insanespain

    insanespain Ocellaris Clown

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    Well here goes:

    1 - I had a lot of algae film on the glass that I was cleaning daily

    2 - I have only used conditioned tap water

    3 - I feed mysis and brine daily without rinsing (not overfeeding though)

    4 - Decaying feather duster tube was left for a few weeks before removing



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  9. m2434

    m2434 Giant Squid

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    None of the other things you mentioned should add enough organics to be a concern.
     
  10. ricoop

    ricoop Skunk Shrimp

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    Go for the RO/DI, makes things so much easier.
     
  11. brunoboarder244

    brunoboarder244 Torch Coral

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    if the agrocrete was mixed with tap water instead of distilled there may be a little bit of leaching from the phosphates used in the water to make the rock plus also that phosphates in your tap water can also cause similar things to this outbreak
     
  12. dowtish

    dowtish Horrid Stonefish

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    This really might just have to do with the ATS being so "young" in combination with your nitrates. A friend of mine set his ATS up, and it took a good 6 weeks before he was getting the nice green turf. Before that it was various brown and red slimeyness with a little green mixed in. The various stuff growing on the new sheet might be adding to the cloudiness. I mentioned before about purigen and chemipure. I was getting steady 20-30 nitrates on my 10 gallon nano, after adding these, it was gone in a matter of 2 weeks. Readings of ZERO nitrates.