Particulates

[SeaBee]

I always seem to have stuff floating in the water. The water itself is clear, just dust and crap floating around. My fish seem to create quite a duststorm in there at times also. The only thing I have is a sock in the sump inlet, I change it like every three days. I also started using clarity, seems to help a little, clogs the sock real quick. All parameters are good, except I am trying to get my magnesium up over 1600 for an algea bloom. So i guess my real question is how clear is your water? I just cant seem to get rid of all the dust in there. Maybe I am expecting too much? :frustrat:

 

[OmegaOmega]

I run a Fluval G6 with a super fine mesh pre-filter and ROX activated carbon plus 'g-nodes' - it will super super clarify it pretty quickly.

Depending on your livestock, you don't necessarily want your water 'crystal clear', unless you have a fish-only tank.

 

[SeaBee]

No its mostly corals.

 

[BL1]

I have the same problem, all the particles in my tank never seem to make it to the overflow.

 

[OmegaOmega]

Right now I'm dealing with a horrible silt issue in my new tank setup, but my existing tank I'll super clear after a water change and when people are gonna come over, but generally I'll feed with some plankton spray or items along those lines or left over from spot feeding coral food.

The water shouldn't be too clean because of floating food and organisms you want for your corals.

'Scrubbing' your water with carbon will also remove trace minerals and iodine - so you'd generally want to proceed with caution.

I do have a Salifert dissolved organics test I use every now and then - it's something you can use if you feel it's a little /too/ murky.

 

[Ulta]

Have you ever turned off all flow in the tank and let the water get stagnant? I have and you can see that some of the particles are actually alive and moving! I would imagine that they play their vital role in the little ecosystem in our tanks.

 

[sen5241b]

By 'dust' do you mean 'house dust'? Just yesterday I was skimming out house dust from the surface water by holding a styrofoam cup in the water and skimming it off the surface. For other stuff use floss and carbon. Rinse carbon well!

 

[SeaBee]

The surface of my tank is moving quite a bit, no dust there. Maybe it could be pollen, its really bad here now.

 

[OmegaOmega]

I always seem to have stuff floating in the water. The water itself is clear, just dust and crap floating around. My fish seem to create quite a duststorm in there at times also. The only thing I have is a sock in the sump inlet, I change it like every three days. I also started using clarity, seems to help a little, clogs the sock real quick. All parameters are good, except I am trying to get my magnesium up over 1600 for an algea bloom. So i guess my real question is how clear is your water? I just cant seem to get rid of all the dust in there. Maybe I am expecting too much? :frustrat:

Are you using Clarity (brand) or Crystal Clear (by Aqua Pro).

Be careful with either. Crystal Clear can cause a diatom bloom and both products can cause a rapid nitrate build-up if you using any type of fine-mesh pre-filtering system.

Also, with Crystal Clear - make sure that the product is relatively new, especially if you've opened it already and exposed it to air. It will coagulate in the bottle VERY quickly and 'spoil' - it can cause issues with pumps.

And - as soon as your water cycles (a couple hours of so) I'd change your filter floss as soon as you see it brown up.

Clarity is a good product to use if you are scraping off a lot of algae build-up on your glass. I'd recommend shutting off your return pump (just leave powerheads going) and then dosing your tank with the recommend quantity (based on size) and start scraping the algae; you'll immediately start to see it congeal. Kick on your normal filter/return pump and let it process through. This also helps when turkey basting your rocks if you're trying to get rid of nuisance algae. I normally 'double-up' on the filter floss area for an hour or so to help sift it all.

 

[SeaBee]

I only have a filter sock on the water inlet side of the sump. It does turn brown quickly. I change it and clean it right away. I'll do that sump turn off thing tonight and see what happens. Thanks.

 

[yote]

Ulta's right.A lot of that suspended stuff,is live zooplankton and pods.

 

[sen5241b]

Ulta's right.A lot of that suspended stuff,is live zooplankton and pods.

1+ I've always had some "dust" floating in my tank and my invert filter feeders grow like crazy.

 

[BL1]

How do people like dennis take such great shots of their tank then? Every time I take a picture it looks like it's snowing in my tank :shock:

 

[yote]

How do people like dennis take such great shots of their tank then? Every time I take a picture it looks like it's snowing in my tank :shock:

Photoshop editing and know how to filter that stuff out.:D

 

[wontonflip]

How can you tell if it's particulates/zooplankton/pods or microbubbles? Since getting this light on, all of a sudden, my whole view of the tank has changed -- when I had no lights on it, it looked crystal clear. Now all i see are particulates LOL!!!!

 

[SeaBee]

Today I had the pleasure of watching my urchin :pooh:. It was letting this sand like stuff out of the top of his body. I have to guess it was :pooh:. I have to figure that between my tang digging under the rock, the goby with sand like drooling out of him, and the fine sand I have this will be what it looks like. But a natural reef is loaded with stuff in the water from the pictures I see.