Red Slime (Cyano Bacteria)
Cyano grows on top of nutrient rich areas of low flow. There are a number of things that need to be correct or possibly corrected to combat this without the use of chemical additives. The biggest thing is to get rid of the extra nutrients.
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Evaluate your feeding. If you are feeding more than can be eaten in about 1-2 minutes it is too much and the remainder of it is falling to the rock and sand and becoming nutrient.
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Evaluate your flow. If you have areas in the tank where there is little to no flow this can be corrected by adding power heads or repositioning the ones you already have. You don’t need to create sand storms just have water moving over the area to keep detritus suspended in the water column for removal by your filter – skimmer.
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Evaluate your water changes. The solution to pollution is dilution! You want to continually remove unneeded nutrients as well as replace those things that are used by the system. 10% weekly is a good change schedule. Some do 20% every other week and some vary the schedule from there, but a good start is 10% per week.
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Evaluate your lighting schedule. About 10 hours of daylight is all that is needed.
If you have a Cyano outbreak do the above 4 items and:
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At water change time siphon off the Cyano first. It will come up easily almost like a blanket.
After siphoning stir the affected areas a little to suspend any detritus for the water change and filtering - skimming removal.
Use a turkey baster on the rockwork now and at every water change in the future to again suspend the detritus for removal by the water change and your filtering – skimming.
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Keeping nutrient levels low to non-existent will help to avoid Cyano outbreaks and any algae outbreaks as well as keep your tank and you happy happy.
Hope that helps.
