Please identify.

Have Ben running my new t5 bulbs for a few days and have my new mushroom. Noticing alot more if this brown stuff in sand and on some rocks. Is it normal? Thanks

 

Looks like diatoms. They should burn themselves out once they remove all silicates from the water.

 

Is that a bad thing?

 

normal, they will eventually go away

 

If you want to help keep them down, get some nass snails to keep turning the sand bed over. It at least helps out with the aesthetics.

 

+1 on nassarius snails. You'll want some of those anyway.

 

Is this mainly because I'm using my new lights and running them so much more than I was? My rocks are getting very brown also. I'm also seeing green and pink spots on the rocks

 

what r your nitrates

 

I did a 10% water change today. Yesterday they were around 5

 

ok try and shot for 0

 

The diatoms seem to be increasing today. And now I'm seeing some little spurts of hair algae towards the bottom of my glass. Not too much...again is this normal. What do I do? I added 2 more frags lastnight. Is this all because of the new lights and new cycle. I used to run my old lights like 2-3 hours a day just whenever I was home. Now I'm running 8 hours with my new t5

 

Did you also add some snails? What kind of a clean up crew do you have in the tank? Keep doing water changes and reduce your nitrates. What kind of water are you using?

 

You should have about an 8 hour photoperiod. Get some snails do a water change every few days and it'll burn itself out. Make sure to use RO/DI, though

 

I have a rodi unit. Have been using ro water for 6 weeks. I just bought some snails and a conch. I have some hermit crabs also.

 

they will get worse befor they get better

 

In my experience they will disappear just as fast as they appeared. Grab some snails and wait a few days