Dont shut off lights for cyano if you have clams

[duke62]

i know many of you will say it wasnt because of lights it was something else but i have to tell you my clam was flourishing for 2 years.it tripled in size and was my favorite creature i had in my tank.i was battleing cyano so i decided to shut my lights down for 4 days and when i opened them up today i noticed that it wasnt fully exteneding.then when i feed the tank i looked in and it was gone.i checked all parameters and everything was the same as always.so please if u have clams think twice when u decide to shut lights off to kill off unwanted cyano....

 

[prattreef]

4 days is way too long. The recommendation is 2 days.

 

[mr_X]

shutting off the lights won't rid you of cyano anyway. you don't think clams get 4 days in a row of complete cloud cover in the ocean?

 

[marrone]

Shutting the lights off for 4 day, which really you should only do it for 3 at the most, does have an impact on getting rid of Cyano. It doesn't get of all of it, then again you never really get rid of all of it and you need to do other things too, but it does have an impact of removing it from the tank. You also need to do a good size water change once the lights come back on.

If you have a lot in your tank you should have siphoned out what you could first before you left the lights off for that many days. I've found that some of my SPS have bleach, which is probably from the Cyano dying off, but my LPS and softies have all been fine.

 

[Marteen]

shutting off the lights won't rid you of cyano anyway. you don't think clams get 4 days in a row of complete cloud cover in the ocean?

Sure they may get 4 days of heavy cloud cover but there is still some light coming through. It's never as black as night for 4 days straight.

 

[James]

Go to anywhere even remotely close to the equator (basically the tropics) and you will get burnt to lobster status even if under heavy cloud cover. just because you don't see direct sunlight doesn't mean that serious light and uv isn't penetrating the atmosphere. learned this lesson the hard way at the galapagos islands. This is a dramatic re-enactment of me getting burnt (assuming I was yellow and had no body)
:letitallo

 

[ming]

I never tried leaving the lights off against cyano, but siphoning it out if its become a problem has always been pretty easy. And you can feel better knowing you removed the nutrients out of the tank. Leaving the lights off lets the nutrients back into the water column only to let it grow back again

 

[mr_X]

i said complete cloud cover. you won't get burnt under storm clouds. and i didn't see that the OP covered the tank with a blanket either. i'm assuming the tank was still getting ambient light.
cyano is a nutrient issue.

 

[prattreef]

cyano is a nutrient issue.

And for an organism with photosynthetic capabilities limiting light is thus limiting nutrients-- one more tool in the tool box for combating ( not eradicating) this complex and difficult nuisance.

 

[Master Shake]

they are mostly photosynthetic, turning the lights off is a way to get rid of the problem not the source. Cyano is a nutrient problem, try lightly syphoning the sand lightly with a python to get the some of the trach out of there. and you might want to look into a better skimmer depending on what you have now. Also you cant compare a fish tank to the ocean, no matter how much cash you spend on it trying to make it like the ocean

 

[mr_X]

i'm comparing the absence of light to the absence of light. you don't have to spend any money on that.

 

[Will C]

please don't let this thread get crazy - I also have a cyano problem and appreciate the good advice in this thread. I have been syphoning and water changing (amount = to the syphon usually 7galls) every other day w/ progressive improvement but if I stop it will come back w/ a vengance! My corals (sps & lps) all look great and are growing beautifully and my params are good - the only thing I can think of is an old light over my sump was REAL old and that led to the problem. So, please continue - 'Duke' and I need the advice!

 

[prattreef]

http://www.manhattanreefs.com/forum/reefs-magazine/57131-did-i-say-algae-any-other-name.html

 

[duke62]

when i turned the lights back on i saw no cyano in the tank.i did do a water chande and i ddint feed the tank in those days.i did notice today a little spot where it is growing back.mr.x total cloud cover will still bring light into the ocean.when we have total cloud cover during the daylight hours you can still see correct.you dont need glow sticks to see children coming out of school.my clam died from the lack of light im sure of.i have had cyano problems for a couple months now with no ill affect to the clam.its no coinsedence that i turn lights off and it dies.and i just read the cyano page and i stated that the person had his lights off for a week with no ill effects.im just letting people know yes it slowed the cyano down for the meanwhile and yes it had ill effects.and i have a good skimmer as well.euroreef

 

[tosiek]

Sorry to hear about your clam Duke. Most coral can survive 5 days or so without light, just working on ambient light from a window and filter feeding whatever it is in the water and the most damage your gonna see is some fading in colors. Clams not so much and im surprised noone mentioned to be cautious about clams and the light off treatment for cyano when writing about the lights out treatment.

Will C there are like 4 great cyano threads on MR. You should look for them. One is very very recent as well as the link that Prattreef posted linking to the MR mag article is a good read as well. Id don't think this is going to be another cyano thread as there are a bunch and the people that posted their experiences probably think its getting repetitive.

 

[Imbarrie]

If you didn't remove the cyano before you turned the lights off wouldn't the bacteria start to decompose?


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[marrone]

If you didn't remove the cyano before you turned the lights off wouldn't the bacteria start to decompose?


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This is the reason you want to remove as much as you can before you start the treatment, lights off, and do a big water change when you put the lights back on. You should also put the lights back on slowly, maybe just the VHO for a day and then the MH, or if you're running LED run them lower than usually and slowly build them up.

 

[Imbarrie]

Better yet, suck the bacteria out, shut the lights off for two days max, during this time do the big water change.
If you don't change the water that decomposing matter will feed further cyano out breaks the second those lights return.

One thing that worked for me was syphoning the cyano through a filter sock and returning the water to the sump. Repeating this every other day without changing the water for as long as you are comfortable. Two weeks for me.
The theory is the cyano is feeding off something in the water and will keep growing until the nutrients have been depleted. When that happens the cyano cycle will end. By constantly returning the water your cyano will deplete their food scource faster than if you keep changing water.

There is a post about this in MR.



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[mr_X]

when i turned the lights back on i saw no cyano in the tank.i did do a water chande and i ddint feed the tank in those days.i did notice today a little spot where it is growing back.mr.x total cloud cover will still bring light into the ocean.when we have total cloud cover during the daylight hours you can still see correct.you dont need glow sticks to see children coming out of school.my clam died from the lack of light im sure of.i have had cyano problems for a couple months now with no ill affect to the clam.its no coinsedence that i turn lights off and it dies.and i just read the cyano page and i stated that the person had his lights off for a week with no ill effects.im just letting people know yes it slowed the cyano down for the meanwhile and yes it had ill effects.and i have a good skimmer as well.euroreef

the cyano came back because the lack of light did not kill it. it didn't slow anything down. it just appeared to be gone. you are aiming at the symptom, not the cause. it's the same with using erythromycin, it will completely remove the visual cyano, however, if you don't change your tank husbandry and remove all those excess nutrients, it comes right back as soon as the antibiotic is gone.
it's not the lights off that is helping, it's the water changes afterwards!
btw, did you cover the tank with a blanket?
then it would be the same light as cloud cover. you didn't need glow sticks to view it did you?

 

[marrone]

the cyano came back because the lack of light did not kill it. it didn't slow anything down. it just appeared to be gone. you are aiming at the symptom, not the cause. it's the same with using erythromycin, it will completely remove the visual cyano, however, if you don't change your tank husbandry and remove all those excess nutrients, it comes right back as soon as the antibiotic is gone.
it's not the lights off that is helping, it's the water changes afterwards!

Actually this is not true. The lights off does kill some of it and does slow it down quite a bite. You'll find that after going without lights people tanks are free of the Cyano for months, especially if they also do other things to improve their water quality too. If it was just the water changes that got rid of the Cyano then everyone would be able to get rid of the Cyano by doing water changes, which isn't the case especially when the Cyano starts to take over. You need to cut off sources of nutrients to it, light being one of them.

In the end you never truly get rid of the Cyano, whether a little piece is left or even spores, it will comeback when the conditions are right. You see it in almost every tank.