Silicate in aquarium – Diatoms

Silicate is not bad! And you don’t need to filter it out of your aquarium. Normally, you notice that you have silicate in your newly set up aquarium when you see diatoms or rock algae. They look like brown coatings and usually don’t stay long. After about one month, they will go away by themselves.

After that, you should not have any problems with diatoms any more. Except of course if your substrate is dirty and your filter has not been cleaned for too long, as these are also causes of diatoms.

Diatoms exist in all natural water bodies. Moreover, your plants and fishes do need silicate! Fishes accumulate silicate in their fish bones and silicate makes the plant stronger. It is a very important micronutrient. You can’t get the silicate out of your aquarium anyway. Even if you have an osmosis installation or a silicate filter, you always get silicate produced from your substrate or ceramic decorations.

Filters have to be cleaned regularly to be able to work freely. A muddy, dirty filter is not a run-in filter but a clogged one. This can lead to major problems! In a well cycled aquarium, you won’t see any diatoms except in the starting phase.

Silicate is after oxygen the second most widespread substance on Earth. Silicate has a very important role in the nature! Silicate is also often added to water by water suppliers as a protection against corrosion for water pipes. Silicate or rather silicate dioxide is the basic element for sand, gravel, clay minerals, quartz, asbestos, slate, sandstone and in different metallic combinations. Silicate is indeed the second most widespread element in the crust of the Earth. When the ph increases, the proportion of silicate increases because silicate can dissolve itself better when the ph is high. Silicate is not the enemy of either fresh or sea water aquariums.