Does the diatom bloom come before or after the ammonia spike?

[king_neptune]

I haven't registered an amonia spike. My test kits are garbage for ammonia, but I did leave town for three days, so Im starting to think it may be my fault.
My nitrate/trites are down to nothing(before I was getting .25), so Im thinking it came and went already.
My tank is loaded with diatoms. Rocks, drain lines, rock wall, sand, even clouding the water a bit now.
Tomorrow will be my third week of cycling, I used 50lbs of LR from an established tank, so it came with sponges and a wide variety of life already on it. They seem to be flourishing. My rocks are covered with an inch of hair algea, so I think its safe to say the tank is nice and healthy.Even though my ammonia readings are scattered...the majority say 0.
I was thinking I could get a light CuC later this week:
3 emeralds -for the brown hair algea that is rampant
1 arrow crab -I gots me some bristle worms
12 assorted snails to tackle the diatom bloom
Waddya all think?

 

[flower]

Originally Posted by King_Neptune
http:///forum/post/3121113
I haven't registered an amonia spike. My test kits are garbage for ammonia, but I did leave town for three days, so Im starting to think it may be my fault.
My nitrate/trites are down to nothing(before I was getting .25), so Im thinking it came and went already.
My tank is loaded with diatoms. Rocks, drain lines, rock wall, sand, even clouding the water a bit now.
Tomorrow will be my third week of cycling, I used 50lbs of LR from an established tank, so it came with sponges and a wide variety of life already on it. They seem to be flourishing. My rocks are covered with an inch of hair algea, so I think its safe to say the tank is nice and healthy.Even though my ammonia readings are scattered...the majority say 0.
I was thinking I could get a light CuC later this week:
3 emeralds -for the brown hair algea that is rampant
1 arrow crab -I gots me some bristle worms
12 assorted snails to tackle the diatom bloom
Waddya all think?
The algae is after. Well it was in my tank.

 

[uneverno]

With established rock and no other critters in the tank, you may well never have gotten an ammonia spike. Unless you were ghost feeding, given the small amount of live rock vis a vis water volume you have (per your profile), it surprises me that you got Nitrite readings.
I'd be calling the entire test kit package into question at this point.
Before going any further, I would have the results independently verified. Most LFS will do that for a nominal fee.
If those tests come back w/in parameters - proceed with caution. You should be ok, but...
Without further information, it may be a little early in the discussion to differentiate between diatoms and algae as well, save to say what you are describing don't sound like diatoms to me.

 

[king_neptune]

I ghost fed it 4 mysis shrimp cubes a day for the first week.
28cubes. Basically a pack of frozen shrimp.
Ill take a sample into the LFS and have them test it.

Pretty sure this is diatom bloom. Please double check. I can snap some more shots if you need.

 

[uneverno]

A picture's worth 1000 dollars.

Em are diatoms - they should go away on their own after time. Bit of hair going on too, but it doesn't look out of hand. The only thing I'd be concerned about there is that they not choke off the polyps on that rock. Maybe cut back on the lighting a little 'til you can get something that will eat it.
Meantime - get some critters in there!

(Slowly and after you verify the tests, but looks perfectly normal to me.)
Nice tank.

 

[aquaguy24]

Sounds like ur cycle is about done. Everything seems normal. Ur scattered ammonia is prolly from bacteria tryn to catch up with all the ghost feeding ur doing. I would stop ghost feeding. Take ur water to ur lfs just to double check. I thnk ur bout ready for some snails and maybe a couple emarald crabs. Wats ur lighting schedule look like.

 

[king_neptune]

Sporadic.
I mostly put it on to test temp fluctuations, and take pictures. Otherwise I don't have any need to keep it on. The diatom showed up faintly last week, but didn't explode like this till about 3 days ago.
ex: it hasn't been on for almost 24hours.
I plan to put My MH's on timers eventually, 8/16 with my T5's going on 2hours prior and after. But that wont be till I get corals in. Till then Ill just do t5's morning till dinner, with my Moon light on in the evenings. Im going to call all the LFS's and see which one can do water tests.

 

[bizzmoneyb]

whens the last time you did a water change?
when i started my tank it had horrible diatoms for about a week, then i did a nice size water change and it all went away like magic.

 

[king_neptune]

i havent done a water change yet, since I wanted to pollute as much as possible on the cycle. But now that its all reading 0, Ill start doing %10 a week for the next 2 months.
I also have the phos/carbon reactor and Scrubber that I have delayed putting on, but now that the cycle is done. Ill do that later tonight.
I just checked the water, and it was good.
8.2 ph
4.5 alk
0 trite
0 trate
0 amonia
Picked up a pair Emerald's and 3 small blue legg hermit crabs for the algae at the LFS, and ordered some nas/cerith/turbo snails 10pack each right hear from SWF.com
And later this afternoon, Ill pick up a sally light foot they had for $8.
I know its kinda heavy, for a CuC as far as snails is concerned, but I am counting on not all making it, and I also got a 29g nano that will be cycling shortly. so I can transfer to there in the future.