dreaming reef gravel??

[iceman86]

Does anyone have experience with this sand? I bought a bunch of bags from aquagiant when I first got into this hobby over 1 year ago. Its an asian brand of sand. My first tank was little cube and I had I battled diatom blooms the whole time. My parameters were always perfect, so the only thing I figured was lack of flow which was lacking but still decent.

3 weeks ago i upgraded tank to a bigger tank and transfered all my rock but left the gravel behind. I put in the same gravel as the last tank because i still had so many bags left over Ive got a skimmer, phosphate reactor, filter socks changed every 3 days, chaeto in the fuge, big clean up crew, 50+times turnover flow, lights are only on for 9 hours per day, 10+% water changes per week with ro/di. Parameters are still perfect in this tank too.

Theres algae everywhere in the new tank. First week was fine and in the second week it hit again. Ive done 2 50% water changes and it helped for a couple days and then it grew wild again. I dont have much on the rocks but its on the sand and it leaves a crust on the top layer.

Live stock is a couple clowns, naso tang, and clean up crew. I only feed as much as they eat.

The only thing I can think of thats causing this is the sand. Possibly full of silicates?

Any ideas??

[The Guy]

I'm no expert but I think I would lose the sand. When you say you battled diatom blooms the whole time with your last tank is the clue. Like I say I'm no expert on this, but I think your no-name brand sand might be your problem.
Maybe others out there can shed some light on this.

[canadianbudz604]

There's got to be a whack of silica in the sand. Kind of like using play sand from home depot. Get rid of it.

[tang daddy]

Well if your tank is new like 3 weeks old then that's normal, the sand bed is new so it's gonna have to cycle, your just gonna have to ride it out. Usually when people start with new substrate they usually experience hair algae for a cycle then later it disappears and if your lucky you skip diatoms or cyano as you sand populates with bacteria.

Make sure you try to turn off flow and powerheads when you feed so that it doesn't go flying everywhere in the tank fueling the algae.

[RumRunner]

+1 new tank syndrome

[asylumdown]

it's entirely possible that this gravel is leaching phosphate.

If you want to test it, take some if your gravel, put it in a sealed 5 gallon bucket, and fill the bucket with R/O water and put it somewhere dark. Test the water immediately after filling, then again every couple of days for a week.

I've also heard you'll get a more 'true' reading of the phosphate that's actually in the water if you heat it up to 80 degrees C before you test it. Supposedly it causes some of the bound phosphate that might be available to plants but invisible to the test kits to decompose, though plant available phosphorous is a surprisingly more complex and difficult to account for parameter than you probably would think (seriosuly, google the Hedley Fractionation Method to get a sense of just how far scientists have to go to measure plant available phosphorous).