repeating Chemiclean treatment

[asylumdown]

Well I did the second dose this afternoon after a water change, and I redirected the biopellet reactor to a bucket so that the pellets keep tumbling (I don't want them going stagnant) for the time being. The tank looks cleaner than it has in months right now, the last few patches of cyano look pretty dead but I want to be sure it's as dead as I can make it.

My elegance coral retracted half it's tentacles for a few hours after I dosed a second time, but otherwise there appears to be no negative reaction. I'll do a second water change on Thursday, change the GFO again, fire up the skimmer and as soon as it stops going insane I'll start dosing the MB7. We shall see if this combined with my other maintenance measures clears this problem up for good.

[asylumdown]

Well I only did the second treatment for 24 hours. A couple of my LPS were looking particularly unhappy, and my two gorgonians shrivelled up beyond recognition. A few of my larger colonies also retracted 90% of their polyps by the morning of the third day so last night I did another large water change, changed my GFO, and fired up the skimmer. It went crazy for a few hours emptying directly in to a drain doing another partial water change on the tank, but by 10pm when I went to bed it had died way down so I did the first dose of MB7. I put half directly in the BP reactor, though I'm not sure how effective it will be recirculating in the bucket, and the other half in the display.

This morning I was able to turn the skimmer back up to almost where I used to have it set, and I added a mesh bag full of carbon to my filter sock to mop up the final traces of chemiclean and any organics that are floating around in the tank as a result of the treatment. I also did the second dose of MB7.

As of this moment, my sand is as white and sparkling as the day I put it in, and there's not a so much as a speck of cyano or dinos anywhere in the tank. Once the skimmer has had a chance to get back to normal I'm going to do another round of sand bed cleaning in the places the cyano used to be the worst. Here's hoping I've licked this problem for a while at least.

[Delphinus]

TBH I'm a little surprised you felt the need to do a second treatment so soon. Unless I'm mistaken as to when you did round #1. Honestly, cyano being one of the most successful lifeforms on the planet (here long before us, will be here long after us I'm sure), it's going to take some time to recede, but it almost 100% always does after a treatment - just give it some time.

[asylumdown]

Really the only reason I did a second one right away was because I've done a chemiclean treatment once before on this tank when the cyano issue was much less severe, and the cyan began to return in the same spot the same week, leading me to believe that I didn't get it all in 48 hours. I wanted to really make sure it was dead. It was probably overkill, but nothing seems the worse for wear today. All the corals that were shrivelled are looking normal now.

It's not that the cyano was ever really *that* bad, but I'm a neurotic perfectionist, and I didn't like the trajectory things seemed to be on. Someone standing in front of the tank, at a glance, would only have noticed a small patch of it in one spot on the sand, but when you got up close and started looking at the rocks, you started to realize that there was way more of it than it at first seemed. Also, anywhere that my corals would touch and fight, there'd be thick tufts of it, which seemed to be preventing the tissue from being able to heal after I trimmed back offending branches.

On a side note, maybe it's just a placebo effect, but when I looked up from my computer a few minutes ago I thought "hot diggity that water is clear!" It's like practically glittering. It's making me think that I should run GAC more often, this is only the second or third time I've ever put it in.

[Reef Pilot]

Originally Posted by asylumdown

On a side note, maybe it's just a placebo effect, but when I looked up from my computer a few minutes ago I thought "hot diggity that water is clear!" It's like practically glittering. It's making me think that I should run GAC more often, this is only the second or third time I've ever put it in.

That clear water could be from the MB7. I have noticed many times how crystal clear my water became about an hour after adding it. Especially, after cleaning, or my goby was hyper active in the sand bed. Plus you might see more detritus and mulm disappearing, if you have any somewhere.

[asylumdown]

Originally Posted by Reef Pilot

That clear water could be from the MB7. I have noticed many times how crystal clear my water became about an hour after adding it. Especially, after cleaning, or my goby was hyper active in the sand bed. Plus you might see more detritus and mulm disappearing, if you have any somewhere.

Do you notice a hazy white film on the glass after dosing it? Not like the normal brownish slime algae, but a very subtle white haze that comes off easily with a mag float?

[Reef Pilot]

Originally Posted by asylumdown

Do you notice a hazy white film on the glass after dosing it? Not like the normal brownish slime algae, but a very subtle white haze that comes off easily with a mag float?

No, I do not. But my doses are very low at this point in time. And it's been almost 2 years now, since any heavy dosing. But don't remember that.

How/where do you dose it? I just pour mine straight in to the DT (and never shut off my skimmer).

If you are getting a white haze, your bacteria may still not be in balance. See if it still does that after 2 weeks, and you reduce your dosing amount.

[asylumdown]

Yesterday it was 50% in the BP reactor, so 50% wasn't technically going in to the tank water. The other 50% was just in to the display. I set up a feed cycle on my Apex that shuts only the skimmer down for 4 hours so I can have it come back on automatically. I didn't notice the white haze when I started dosing MB7 in November, just this morning a couple of hours after I shut the skimmer down and dosed. Today I put 50% in the display, and 50% in the chamber of my sump that has a bunch of extra rock and lots of cryptic sponges.