I think my Mustard Algae is back.....

*sigh*....a few weeks ago I tried treating this problem i am having with Sodium Bromide...and I thought I had it cleared up. This may or not even BE mustard algae. But something is going on. A month ago I was seeing piles of tan colored sand on the bottom that if left alone would turn bright yellow..i cleared this up with the sodium bromide and lots of clorox. Then a week after it cleared I started seeing miniature " maybe a third the size of a golf ball" little piles that were multi colored kind of green/brown that were loose and seemed to hover on the bottom like tumbleweeds. I was told this may be pollin? Anyway, I vacummed them up and now yesterday after a bad storm I see ALOT more of these ...and without thinking this morning I vacuumed them all up and then I took the DE filter offline and cleaned it and cleaned it and cleaned it. I now have it back running with fresh DE and I am wondering what I should be doing. I keep my FC between 3 and 5 with a CYA of about 35. I was thinking about throwing in a bottle of polyquat...but first I will listen to what you guys think...and if they show back up in a day or two this time I will take a picture. Inside the DE filter was a kind of gross sludge even after backwashing all the DE out of it.

PS after the fresh DE I raised the FC level to about 10.

Tundra,

I'm sure you'll get lots of good help here.

First confirm that you've got algae. Scoop up some of the gunk and rub it between your finger and thumb. If it's gritty, it really is sand.....probably not. It'll probably be pretty slippery (and slimey) but let's confirm that first.

Second, please post current test results for FC, CC, ph, Alk, and CYA....that'll help us all understand better what you've got going on and advise you of a path to get it fixed.

FC 10 (ussualy I keep it around 3-5)
CC 0
ph 7.6
Alk 100
CYA 35

I never thought to get in and scoop it up....i'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer sometimes.:)

Cliff notes update...

The stuff I am seeing is gritty feeling not slimy...can I rule out algae of any lkind and just vacuum it up?

Hi Tundra,

My pool has been throwing out small amts. of sand for a couple years. They came and put new sand in this season, and it continued. I had them come back out and empty the sand again, and double check that the laterals weren't broken and they weren't, as I looked with the pool repair guy. He said there were only like 3 things that could cause sand to come in, one being broken laterals, and I can't remember the other 2, but he said I didn't have any of the 3 problems. So, it is a mystery. You could be having sand coming in from your returns, or have you had much wind lately that would be blowing in gritty debris possibly from the surrounding environment around your pool?

John

Quote:

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Originally Posted by CUTURHAIR

Hi Tundra,

My pool has been throwing out small amts. of sand for a couple years. They came and put new sand in this season, and it continued. I had them come back out and empty the sand again, and double check that the laterals weren't broken and they weren't, as I looked with the pool repair guy. He said there were only like 3 things that could cause sand to come in, one being broken laterals, and I can't remember the other 2, but he said I didn't have any of the 3 problems. So, it is a mystery. You could be having sand coming in from your returns, or have you had much wind lately that would be blowing in gritty debris possibly from the surrounding environment around your pool?

John

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I have a DE filter....but I do have a dirst driveway...and we have been having loat of rain and wind...who knows.

Tundra,

I get sand/dirt in the pool every time I mow and also when it is windy out. I don't think it is algae from what your describing. When I had the mustard algae it would literally multiple overnight it seemed like.

Even though you vacuum it up some is floating around and when you shut the pump off it settles to the bottom. If the clumps seem to be in the same spot all of the time(due to the flow of the return) and the sides are clean it is more than likely debris from the wind and rain.
You can definitely feel the different b/t gritty vs slimy. Gritty is good:)

A classic cause of medium coming back into the pool is a pump that has a higher capacity than the filter can handle.

That's after you eliminate broken laterals in a sand filter, and torn screens or fingers in a DE filter.