G&D's Foray Into a 90G Tank (Take One)

[gridley]

Originally Posted by Leah

I do not mean to rain on your parade, and hopefully someone else will chime in here.

I think you have the right idea sort of with the black out, but you need to cover the tank for three days. Do not feed the tank or even peek at it then on the third day you need to do a water change...just can't remember how much!
Then slowly turn your lights, say half a day for 2 days and full on the 3rd.

Leah

Thanks for the input Leah - and if anyone else can chime in, that would be helpful as well.

I have to admit that I did peek under the blanket - I couldn't help myself - couriosity took over, I was out of control! LOL

What you say here regarding the water changes amd turning lights on slowly makes sense. (I had done a WC earlier this evening) By all appearances I may have gotten off lucky. As I've been thinking about this there may be several reasons for the luck . . .
1. My lights (RADION) are only at 50% because I am still stocking the tank with coral.
2. All my corals are still quite low in the tank - the most are within 3 inches of the bottom
3. As the tank is still newer there are not that many fish so that the bio load isn;t that high.
4. Though the cyano was spreading it wasn't heavy yet.

If anyone has thoughts I would apprecaite it as I am sure this will not be the last time I need to deal with this.

[gridley]

The first round goes to the cyano!

I thought that I had an early victory over the cyno with the blanket wrap approach. A week ago Sunday when I took the blanket off, the tank looked great! However, on Saturday there was some suspicious looking algae growing and I now have three areas of cyano growing on the sand.

So . . . onto round two! Any suggestions? . . .

[kien]

Originally Posted by gridley

So . . . onto round two! Any suggestions? . . .

Have you tried chemiclean? That stuff is MAGIC!!

[gridley]

Originally Posted by kien

Have you tried chemiclean? That stuff is MAGIC!!

Thanks Kien - I'll be proceeding with this today.

[kien]

Originally Posted by gridley

Thanks Kien - I'll be proceeding with this today.

The key thing to remember is to keep your tank oxygenated during the treatment period of 2 days. Either use an air stone and pump or you can keep your skimmer on but take off your skimmer cup to allow it to overflow into the sump. If you keep your skimmer on and allow it to overflow you may get lots of microbubbles into the tank and it'll look bad for a couple of days but it'll all clear up once the treatment period ends and you do your recovery water changes at the end of the 48 hours. I did two consecutive 20% water changes then put my skimmer cup back on.

[gridley]

Round Two has begun! I purchased some Chemiclean this afternoon and treated the tank this evening. I turned off the carbon and pulled the cup off the skimmer as suggested by Kien. On Thursday evening I will do a 20% wc and then wait to see if I've won or if it goes to Round Three!

[gridley]

As I continue the battle with the bit of cyano that I have had in my tank I tried the Chemiclean as recommended (thanks Kein!). So far I have been very happy with the results. I treated the tank with Chemiclean last Tuesday and 48 hours later did a water change. The tank now looks great. I plan to do another water change tonight or tomorrow. And I will be keeping a close watch to see if the cyano begins to return. The challenge now is that I have been having a problem with the skimmer. When I turned it back on after the treatment it was "boiling over" and I have been trying to redial it in ever since.

Below are pictures showing the progress with the treatment.

January 22



January 23


January 24

Looking good and glad to hear that you are winning the cyano battle.

[kien]

Originally Posted by gridley

When I turned it back on after the treatment it was "boiling over" and I have been trying to redial it in ever since.

Glad to see you're winning! This is typical and for the reason I did 3 20% water changes. After the third water change my skimmer started to get back to normal. Still not quite where it was prior to the treatment but it at least stopped boiling over to a point where I could put the skimmer cup back on. A couple of days after the last water change my skimmer was back to normal. You just have to give the system time to settle back down.

Also, did you put in some carbon into your sump to help clear up the meds? You can get a media sock and throw in some extra carbon into it and place it in your sump. I did this as well for a few days.

[gridley]

Originally Posted by kien

Also, did you put in some carbon into your sump to help clear up the meds? You can get a media sock and throw in some extra carbon into it and place it in your sump. I did this as well for a few days.

Thanks for the advice. The skimmer is working a bit better today. Regarding adding carbon - we are running a GFO / Carbon reactor - how often should they be changed out? Would adding some carbon to a filter sock be effective?

Thanks