- Today on the 5 Minute Saltwater Aquarium Guide,
it's time to kick cyano, or those ugly red slimes,
out of the reef tank.
Give me five minutes and I'll show ya how.
(upbeat music)
Hey, I'm Ryan, your host to BRStv
and the 5 Minute Saltwater Aquarium Guide.
This a clear, simplified, and direct path to setting up
that first successful reef tank.
Today, if you're watching this, it's probably
because you have some funky red slime growin'
in your tank and you can't seem to get rid of it.
In the next five minutes,
I'm gonna show you what people are saying,
what got you here, why I believe
that's just straight up wrong,
and then give you some legit solutions
which will solve this for a vast majority of you.
The red slime in your tank could either cyano or dinos.
In this episode, we're focusing on the cyano red slime
which is easier to beat, but the next 5 Minute Guide
is some more challenging dinos.
Most of these slimes look pretty similar
and identifying it correctly is valuable
for the most advanced approaches of reefers,
but, if we're being with each other,
correctly identifying bacteria and protozoa
is just outside the scope of the first year
of owning a fish tank.
In general, cyano is red slime that can be stringy
or slime that coats surfaces.
dinos often tend to be brown and more snot-like
with lots of bubbles.
However, cyano is by far the most common
and my advice to new reefers who are having
a hard time identifying the difference
is just treat it like it's cyano because it's the easiest
to treat for and, if that doesn't work,
progress on like it's dinos.
So, today's all about cyano and what I would refer
to as a fairly new concept in cyano control.
In the past, almost all of the conversation
was related to nutrients like nitrate and phosphate
and poor maintenance fueling these slimes,
not because there's lot of evidence suggesting it,
but more so just because high nutrients sounded plausible.
Well, it could be the case and I do see cyano
more often in poorly-maintained tanks.
I'm gonna brave the waters and just say it,
I do not believe elevated nitrate or phosphate
is a direct cause of cyano and I have two reasons
for saying that.
First, I've personally witnessed cyano outbreaks
in hundreds of tanks, both high
and low nitrate and phosphate levels.
Second, maybe more importantly, I can tell you
I've never personally seen, nor has anyone I know seen,
reducing nitrate or phosphate to be an effective solution
for treating or eliminating cyano.
If it's not gonna be an effective component of the solution,
the elevated nutrient debate is really of minimal value.
A better way to think of this is good maintenance
in a well-cared-for, stable system
that is sometimes associated with a reasonable nitrate
or phosphate level as a component of that good maintenance,
sometimes is a solution on its own.
So, less about chasing numbers and more about
the overall approach to good maintenance and water quality
in our tanks.
So, that leads us to step one of our approach,
get back to the basics,
follow that general good maintenance practice
that we outlined in this series, and wait it out.
Often, the issue will just go away on its own.
Good maintenance, in this case, primarily keeping
the rock surfaces clean,
as well as reasonable feeding habits,
but also means keeping that skim running optimally
and doing your water changes.
This a good time to test nitrate and phosphate
and make sure they're not off the charts.
If the nitrate and phosphate are off the chart,
there are dozen reasons why you should fix that,
even if it won't solve this issue.
This is not a good time to try anything cute,
like carbon dosing, brand new fuges, or filter media
to get the nutrients down.
It's a good time for good old fashion water changes.
Do three to four 30% water changes over
the next couple weeks to get them down.
If the nitrate and phosphate are absolute zero,
that can also cause issues, so I'd start feeding
a bit more, reduce filtration like reducing
the lighting period on my refugium,
or what the skimmer collects, until you get a reading.
Basically, anything above absolute zero is enough.
The only addition to this system I'd consider adding
is additional powerheads at this time
because additional flow is generally just good
for the entire tank, eliminates dead spots
or even flushes the surface and can solve
some of these red slime issues.
Waiting it out is obviously a better option
if the slime isn't bothering corals or harming anything,
just give it some time and see how your increased approach
to maintenance goes.
This is where step two comes in if waiting isn't
an option or the cyano's actually hurting corals,
it's time to up the game.
If the cyano outbreak's in still
a reasonably controllable phase,
I suggest dosing some competing organisms with MicroBacter7,
Dr. Tim's Waste-Away, Vibrant, or KZ's Cyano Clean,
whichever is your favorite brand,
but MicroBacter7 and Vibrant being the most popular options
that we offer.
It's hard to definitively share the exact mechanism,
how the heterotrophic bacteria in these products work,
but some are believed to out-scavange nutrition,
likely out-compete surface area and territory,
and some may even be aggressive enough to consume
the cyanobacteria, but in any case, most of these
have been used to beat cyano effectively for many reefers.
When you use these types of competitive bacteria products,
you need to understand it took months for the cyano
to out-compete the organisms in the tank
and become the problem that it is.
That means it's gonna take a couple months
for the bacteria to out-compete the cyano now.
I know we'd all like it gone today,
but nothing good happens fast in a reef tank,
so have some patience, dose as directed on the bottle,
and let the bacteria do its work.
However, if you have what amounts to a cyano outbreak,
which is actively killing corals,
you just can't handle looking at it any more this way,
and you just need to solve it today,
in this case, I'm gonna say either Chemi Clean
or Red Slime Remover.
Both are awesome at removing cyano from the tank.
Chemi Clean and Red Slime Remover are often treated
like a last resort or bandaid for an underlying problem,
but if you've already followed step one
with a good solid maintenance plan for your tank,
these types of treatments can be like a reset button
that gets things back on track.
When used as directed on an otherwise healthy tank,
they can remove the cyano in a single or a few doses
over a day or two.
While there's risk to dosing anything to the tank,
I would call negative results exceedingly rare.
However, like I said, nothing good in the reef tank happens
overnight, so don't be surprised if the cyano comes back
over time, so I'd probably use both tools
with either the Chemi Clean or Red Slime Remover
to wipe it up temporarily, then one of the products
like MicroBacter7 to keep it at bay.
In this case, I'll also say that Chemi Clean
and Red Slime Removers are also really solid
diagnostic tools for new reefers as well.
If neither Chemi Clean or Red Slime Remover result
in major progress, I'd say there's a very strong
likelihood that what you're dealing with is dinos
and it's probably time to move on
to a much more aggressive approach.
So, that's our next episode.
So, you have dinos, what do you do?
They can be tough to beat, but with the right approach,
conquering these types of things is what makes reefing
a hobby and so cool.
The entire 5 Minute Guide to Saltwater Aquariums
is always available here, but if you wanna know what dinos
are and how to beat them, this is it.