Fighting cyano algae - what's best phosphate remover???

richtpe

richtpe

AC Members
Dec 20, 2004
89
0
6
Atlanta, GA
I'm a relative newbie that's been fighting a cyano outbreak in my 55 gal. for a couple of months now. I've tried just about everything I could find in these forums (increasing circulation, reducing feeding, reducing light time, using RO water for changes) and have been slowly winning the battle, but I'm stuck on getting my phosphates down to 0. First time I tested them they were a little higher than 1.0 on the test's color chart. I've gone through about 3 quarts of Kent Marine phosphate sponge in the last few weeks, but phosphates are still reading b/w 0.5 and 1.0. Am I doing something wrong or does this product just suck? I've used other Kent products and been perfectly satisfied. Can anyone recomend a phosphate remover that really works? Am I missing anything else in the cyano war? Any help is appreciated.

FYI - ammonia, nitrites, nitrates all at 0; ph and alk are normal. Calcium's at 350 which I've been trying to increase using kalk. Have an aqua c remora skimmer, uv sterilizer, and penquin bio-wheel as filtration. Current load is blue tang, purple tang, pink margin wrasse, ruby head fairy wrasse, blue spot watchman goby, purple firefish, 2 clowns, a dozen LPS and soft corals and a few anenomes.
 
Check your foods and salt mix--many include phosphates, and may be why you can't get them down. The salt mix in particular--with low calcium I would suspect your salt mix uses a phosphate based buffer instead of a calcium based one. I am not really familiar with any of the reducing media available.
 
Thanks for the suggestions. I use Instant Ocean brand sea salt, which says "phosphate free" on the container (hope this isn't one of those times when I shouldn't believe what I read) and food is san francisco bay brand frozen cubes (feed about half a cube per day). Are these known to be phosphate culprits?
 
The salt mis should be okay--I use it, and while I have one tank with a bit of cyano, it's mostly because there aren't enough cleaners in the tank (several predators in the tank prevent me from adding more). I don't know about the cubes--are they brine? Or a mix? How do you feed them?
 
They're frozen cubes, about 1 inch by 1 inch. I thaw one out and feed them half a cube per day (& discard the unused portion), though lately I've been trying to feed them 1/4 cube twice a day. One type is brine and the other is a mix of krill, mysis, and some other stuff (I switch it up from day to day to give the little guys some variety).
I've been thinking I may need some more cleaners. Currently have about 5 snails and maybe 8 blue-legged hermit crabs. Could this be more the problem with the cyano? The cleaners don't seem to eat it much as is.
 
Try straining the solid bits out and discarding the liquid used to thaw the food. It contains a lot of nutrients that the fish can consume, and go unused if you don't have filter feeders in the system. A few more cleaners would probably help, and there are a few that will eat cyano. Queen conchs are the only ones I can think of right now...It hink there are a few crabs that will eat it as well. Very few cleaners can actually stop an outbreak--they are better at limiting than eliminating.
 
How far have you reduced your light time? I got busy last week with houseguests, etc., & two days in a row forgot to turn on my tank lights until I got home from work! Amazingly enough, all my cyano just disappeared!! My sand went from black (a mix of green algae and cyano) to almost entirely white again-just a hint of tan in it.

I have been using Kent's phosphate sponge (at least I think that is the one), since it is the only one for sale at my local LFS. It is an aluminum based remover.
There is another one you can buy, which is an iron oxide based one. Which is better? Don't know.

HTH, and good luck!
 
Right now I've got the actinics on for a 10 hour cycle and all lights on for 8 hours (with a 4 x 65w PC light set-up). I'm probably going to reduce that to go to 9 hours actinic and 7 hours all.

I ordered some PhosBan on the internet and will post here if I get better results. Of course, in the back of my mind I realize that I'm going to have to figure out the source of the phosphates and eliminate that at some point.
 
One thing that'll do away with cyano is Chemi-Clean. It's perfectly reef safe... Put in the amount that you need to, and within 24 hrs, do a big water change so the dead cyano doesn't pollute the tank.
 
cyno is a bacteria! red legged hermits love it.
To old of lights and to much light feed it.
phospates won't help it that much but over feeding and to much light feed it like ferterlizer.

I had it last spring and had to do 15% water change every week to rid it
from my tank.

20 red legged hermits and 20 turbo snails helped a lot too.
:soda:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom