I don't use a phosphate product, which is why I think cyano is exploding now that I have the biopellets in there (I read somewhere that cyano does well in a low nitrate/high phosphate environment).
I am using a seachem test kit that's about 6 months old. I've been testing for total alkalinity, just did the test for borate alkalinity and discovered that my carbonate alk is actually about 7.28, so on the low side.
I also picked up a much better pH test kit, and it's also lower than I thought, around 7.8-7.9.
Spent the morning reading about water chemistry, and I think I really should have been baking my baking soda first to drive off that extra hydrogen. I think it's caused my pH to fall too low for some of my colonies, ones that I assume are more sensitive to pH (some are doing just fine). I just spent the last hour baking my baking soda and made a new batch of top off solution. Going to do a water change now and see if things improve over the next few days. Hopefully they do as the burning colony has survived all my other trial and error learning experiences, I'm kind of attached to it.
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