Golden-Brown Mystery (Bacteria?)- Need ID

EricTheRed

EricTheRed

No, I'm not a communist..
Hey all,

I'm stumped and need some help identifying what's going on in my 90.

Quick background, the tank has been up and running since JUN 2014 and started stocking in SEP 2014.

Nitrates: ~1ppm (I like it here)
Phosphates: 0.02

I keep up with my rodi filters/resin and the TDS is 001. I used new sand when I started the tank 8 months ago so my first thought was just a delayed diatom bloom since there is a golden brown dusting that covers my rocks and sandbed but now I'm fairly certain it is NOT diatoms because it is photosynthetic...like cyano.

Here are a few points:

  • doesn't grow like a thick mat like red cyano
  • easily blows of rocks and disappears in the water column
  • doesn't slough off like when you blow cyano off rocks
  • it does clump the sand a bit
  • it adheres to rock and sand and even sticks to a little hair algae
  • does not stick to my acros
  • ran chemiclean (to kill some red cyano) 3 weeks ago and it did nothing to the golden-brown stuff (killed the red, though)
  • NOT slimy or stringy with bubbles like dino (thank God!)
  • my diamond gobie will not sift it. He will immediately sift the sand if I clear him a clean area.
  • my foxface won't peck at the HA unless I blew the dust off
  • snails will eat the dusty HA but I've noticed more dead snails than normal so I don't think it is healthy

In the morning (before lights) I can see very small patches of it it in the sandbed but within a few hours of the lights coming on it will have covered 80-90% of it. Being photosynthetic I'm ruling out diatoms even thought it looks like them. I'm assuming it is some sort of bacteria yet it didn't die from chemiclean (erythromycin antibiotic) like I would have expected a bacteria to die from.

It's been around for over a month now and doesn't appear to be getting any better (or worse) but I need it gone post haste...
 
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Good luck Eric. I had a similar unidentified problem in the pico that was setup for over a year. I tried everything and could never get rid of it, ended up tearing down the pico, but not for this reason, I was bored with the tank. Because it was a pico I took out the rock and brushed it all off with a toothbrush monthly, it was the only solution I had for it.
 
Sounds like same stuff i had when i redid tank and bleached rocks had that brown stuf for few months eventually went away and was replaced by green alage then bryopsis was fun battle but now tank is running good so cant complain good luck man sorry to hear u haveing more issues
 
Thanks, I'm hoping it goes away. Did yours get worse during the day when the lights came on and then almost go away at night?
 
EricTheRed said:
Thanks, I'm hoping it goes away. Did yours get worse during the day when the lights came on and then almost go away at night?
Click to expand...

Yea id blow it if rocks everyday i never really looked into it or treated really ran some carbon pads thats about it i figured i screwed with tank big time so it was part of a cycle .
 
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