Removing Phosphates (1 Viewer)

[tang]

I am starting to get a bunch of Red Algae or maybe Cyano in my fuge and starting to form blockage in my return pump.

I heard phosphates is to blame for this algae problem. What is the best way to remove the phosphates?

 

[tektite]

Do you know how high your nitrates/phosphates are? Do you have macroalgae in the fuge? What's flow like?

 

[Ostentum]

Cyano is not caused by phosphates. Its a bacteria

 

[soymilk]

Im going to have to disagree, in most cases cyano is caused by too much nutrients.

Ways to removes phosphates include gfo, refugium, and systems like zeovit/microbacter7/vodka. I agree with cat though, check your tank for phosphates first before starting any kinda regime.

Take a picture if you can.

 

[soymilk]

Double lost ftl.

Also how much are you feeding the tank? Also how often?

 

[Ostentum]

I am going to disagree again because I have a small amount of cyano with less than .05 phosphates and nitrates. Yes usually its due to excess nutrients and lack of flow, but the patch I have is 4 inches from an mp40. Cyano is a bacteria not an algae.

 

[soymilk]

yes i agree sometimes there are other causes for cyano. In an ulns sometimes there can be cyano if theres an abundance of carbon. I have also had a cyano mini outbreak when I increased my vodka dosage once. But, in the majority of cases involving a new tank (less than 6 months) with someone new to reef keeping, more than likely it has to do with a surplus of nutrients, no3 and po4. Lets try to keep this relevant to the OP's thread and his problem.

 

[tang]

I haven't bought a tester for phosphates yet. Will test before I start treating something I don't have

Also how much are you feeding the tank? Also how often?

I feed the fish once a day. Every other day with pellets and switch off with frozen brine not more than 4 pellets per fish. They eat almost all of that, but the frozen brine basically gets everywhere. The brine is more for my LPS.

I don't think it's a lot of extra because the nassarius snails gobble that up.

Will get a picture of the algae or cyano soon.

 

[soymilk]

Do you rinse the frozen brine shrimp cubes before putting them in the tank?

Usually the water in the frozen cubes has nutrients and vitamins. It's a good idea to get a little strainer and run the brineshrimp thru it first before putting it in the tank.

 

[tang]

Do you rinse the frozen brine shrimp cubes before putting them in the tank?

Maybe I should start doing that...

 

[RocketSurgeon]

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/bluegralgae.htm

 

[tang]

Here is the pics of my problem all this is in my sump. None are in my Display tank. Is this red algae or cyano?

 

[tektite]

Is it fuzzy? It might be the start of something like pink cotton candy algae. Hard to tell from the pics.

 

[tang]

Did a search on cotton candy algae. That is exactly what it looks like. Seems like the remedy is turbo snails. That's probably why I don't have the problem in my display tank

Thanks tektite!!!