It's snowing in my tank!

[Ocelot199]

And it doesn't look too good :/ I'm guessing its a bunch of copepods/isopods etc. That for whatever reason just had a population boom.

I was going to get a UV steralizer with my next paycheck. Would that help cut back on the levels of snowflakes? Or is there anything else I could try?

[Phurst]

Are you sure it's not a precipitation event? Pushing CA and Alk levels too high will force the elements to precipitate out of solution. That's generaly referred to as a snow storm.

What other info can you give us? How big is the tank, what are your levels, how long has the tank been up, what have you done to it recently?

[Ocelot199]

Tank is 75 gallons. It's been up since mid october of last year.

Recently... uh. I put in my Mandarin dragonette (who is AWOL currently). Before that, I put on my MH fixture (about a month ago now). Other than that, nothing notable.

It's hard to focus on individual particles, cause they're all flying around in there, but the stuff thats sticking to the glass is definately some sort of microfauna (i'm pretty sure they're copepods, from comparing pictures -.-).

I don't have any more CA test (due to sucking at holding bottles of stuff), but my Alk is at 9.0 dKH, which is actually pretty low for my tank.

[Seahorsedreams]

If it is a pod bloom it will go away without intervention.

[Ocelot199]

Thats good to know :)

Just cause I'm curious, what causes it?

[Seahorsedreams]

Nutrients wax and wane.... availability of food. But it's kind of like life. There's a rabbit population explosion so the foxes eat good that year and produce lots of babies. Lots of fox babies growing to adults reduces the rabbit population. Natural fluctuations seen in every living thing.

[Phurst]

Glad to hear it's biological. Your Mandarin must be happy, assuming he's OK. Maybe he's sleeping off the effects of the all-you-can-eat buffet.

[Rob]

i have to say, i have went though "pod blooms" but nothing that resembled "snow"
have you been adjusting and/or testing your Ca and Alk?
precipitation evens can cause this, maybe its a combo of both

[Ocelot199]

Nope, I don't use any sort of additives.

Like I said before, my Alk is at 9.0, and I don't have a Ca test right now... I actually just ordered one, it should be here Wednesday. I guess I'll see then.

It's looking better today, but still not great... If the Ca isn't off, I'll just wait it out. Nothing in my tank seems effected... all the corals come out every day in full, the fish are all happy and don't seem stressed. So I dunno :/