Question: White powdery stuff on bottom of tank??

[TashaLou]

I keep seeing lots of white powder all over the bottom of my CFBN tank. Is it skin, or just general rubbish from feeding or whatever? Is it something I need to worry about? I use a turkey baster to take out food and any other bits of debris, and change 20% of the water each week, but this white stuff keeps appearing! I don't have anything on the bottom of the tank, so it's quite noticeable sometimes.
Any suggestions would be very appreciated!

 

[Jennewt]

Tank rubbish is generally a brown color, so I'm stumped. Is the water cloudy at all, or crystal clear?

 

[TashaLou]

It is sometimes a bit cloudy yeah..?

 

[TashaLou]

Do you think maybe it's just normal dust from when I have the lid off? Or maybe junk from aerosols or things in the air? Weird :s. It's not a thick layer, and not all over the bottom of the tank.

 

[Jennewt]

I doubt that dust from the air could accumulate enough to see in the tank. I'm thinking that whatever makes the water a bit cloudy could be settling to the bottom as "dusty" material.

When you clean the tank, do you to "total" clean-outs? I used to live in an area where the water in a new setup would cloud up, then a dusty material would settle out of it - I think it must have been a chemical precipitate from the water treatment process. Never did figure it out. It might also be bacteria or dust from the sand/gravel settling out.

 

[TashaLou]

No I don't clean out the whole tank at the same time. Every week I change 20% of the water, and every other week along with that I take out a few of the rocks and pebbles to rinse. I always use spring water in the tank, but the powdery stuff does seem to be worse just after I clean the tank...! I was hoping to take a photo to post, but I've just taken out some debris and topped the water up and there isn't enough of it now to take a photo!
Thanks for getting back to me!

 

[asew50]

have you solved the problem yet?
are you using an old filter?

 

[TashaLou]

It's still there sometimes, not as much though =/. No, I don't have a filter in this tank, was advised by members on here not to use one. Any ideas what it could be?

 

[Binx]

I have some white powdery stuff in my tank, but I have a working filter and a 20 gallon tank so it doesn't appear to be related to those. Is it waste or digested sand coming out???

 

[AngieD]

Probably not newt waste or skin, as newt stools are dark brown, the shed skin is dark brown too, and I've heard that newts eat their shed skin

 

[kiathepooch]

Yeah definitely not waste like Angie said.
Skin wise a few days after my newts arrived,they shed and it was more like one whole weird,see through viscose like thing,which freaked me out a bit(I scooped it out to see what it was),might be different colours for different newts.plus if you're cleaning regularly the white stuff you mention should have cleared up?
Do you have mopani wood in the tank?that gets a kind of white almost slimy thing on it for a while.
Last thought is it could be a bacteria bloom?
I'm fresh out of ideas other than that!


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