Diatoms?

[dochardrock]

Hello to all and thanks in advance for any advice. My tank is currently a little over 8 months old. I am still dealing with what I think is a diatom/brown-green slime algae problem. It is much better now, and I recently added a sand sifting cucumber and 8 cerith snails. However, the reason I am writing is because I have noticed a couple of the new snails have died already! Everything else is healthy and all parameters are zero. 40 gal tank, SG 1.024, temp 79, alk 9.2, fish and other inverts, feather duster worm, and purple shrooms all healthy. I can't figure out why I am still dealing with an algae problem and why my snails are dying. Any ideas? Could this be a dinoflagellate problem and not diatoms?

 

[rtspeed]

well what kind of water are you using, is there a protein skimmer in the tank, are you running a sump?
Snails how did you acclimate them?

 

[dochardrock]

Yes I am using a skimmer. I use RO water. I drip acclimated the snails, and the first night all of them burried in the substrate and were feeding the next morning.

 

[tjone752000]

Originally Posted by dochardrock
http:///forum/post/2486231
Hello to all and thanks in advance for any advice. My tank is currently a little over 8 months old. I am still dealing with what I think is a diatom/brown-green slime algae problem. It is much better now, and I recently added a sand sifting cucumber and 8 cerith snails. However, the reason I am writing is because I have noticed a couple of the new snails have died already! Everything else is healthy and all parameters are zero. 40 gal tank, SG 1.024, temp 79, alk 9.2, fish and other inverts, feather duster worm, and purple shrooms all healthy. I can't figure out why I am still dealing with an algae problem and why my snails are dying. Any ideas? Could this be a dinoflagellate problem and not diatoms?
could it be your alk is high. It should be 2.5-4 meq/l

 

[apos]

What sort of snails? I've recently had all my cerith vanish, and when you mention burrowing snails, it's pretty much nas or cerith we're talking about most of the time. I've heard that cerith are very finicky about water conditions.
Of course, it could also be that the snails came damaged by the LFS and/or aren't really the species you want in a reef tank. For instance, some stores sell something as a nas snail which is really a cooler water cousin that generally dies quickly in reef temps. Other places overcrowd the snails, so they come starving. Even once they hit your tank and have food, sometimes its too late.
Diatom blooms are normal in a new tank, and while critters will eat some, they will mostly just go away on their own as the water quality restabilizes.

 

[u=strange]

hello