The cyano blues :'(

[Katweet]

Specs: 10g nano fowlr (planning to upgrade to a 15g with 10g sump as soon as my stand is finished), a little over a month old, stocked with two young clownfish
Amm 0, trites 0, trates 40 (ugh)

My tank is blood red with cyanobacteria right now. I remove some by hand but it's taken over again in under a day. What can I do about this? Is this just "the uglies," and my system will have to work through it on its own? I'm using RO water, do I need to find a dionization unit? Lessen my photoperiod? I need to do water changes to bring those trates down but I know that's just fueling the cyano. I'm just not sure if this is simply a 'new tank bloom' or if there's something I should be doing differently.

 

[Reefing Madness]

Get more flow in the tank. Suck out what you can after that.

 

[Masoniac]

Starve the cyano, it survives on light and nutrients. Cut the lights off for 3 days and do so 50% water changes and after that keep up on tank maintenance and you should be okay. Ways to keep cyano from coming back, feed less and water changes especially in a system that small.


Sent from my iPad using Aquarium Advice

 

[Reefing Madness]

Starve the cyano, it survives on light and nutrients. Cut the lights off for 3 days and do so 50% water changes and after that keep up on tank maintenance and you should be okay. Ways to keep cyano from coming back, feed less and water changes especially in a system that small.


Sent from my iPad using Aquarium Advice

Yup, then turn the lights back on, and back the cyano comes.....Water changes don't touch it.

 

[Sniperhank]

Manual removal by siphoning it out is also necessary during these water changes to bring down the nutrient issue. Then the increased flow can assist with it not forming again.

 

[Beej1254]

^^^ +1 I had some nasty patches on my rocks and sand that these guys helped me with.

Increased flow and water changes are a must and make sure to manually remove as much as you can. I had to do this multiple times just for smaller spots. I also had lights off for 3-4 days and didn't feed at all.

 

[melosu58]

We have an article about it in our SW articles section.