i thought i was done with algae problems, but ive been having some problems lately. i thought after adding a whole bunch of caulerpa, my nitrates would go down, and so would the algae but nope. can anyone tell me how to get rid of it? its brown btw. and i just did a 25% water chnge the other day and its still everywhere
ok i had it really bad at one point so what i did i went to the fish store and i found these cloths that you put in the tank for 48 hours and is does god knows what but after the 1 day i already saw so little aglge it was amazing ill try to find the name of the product
do you ues ro water? let us know a little more.lights ,how often you change water how old is your tank. hear i go again...dont use chems to solve a algae problem ...imo..it does not solve the problem it hides it. and a 25 gallon water change is big..stick to a 10% a week you could cause a imbalance in your water it could cause algae.
brown diotom is going to be caused by tap water or overfeeding silica.phosphates and over dosing iodine..
no, i dont use RO water, i cant afford a unit. i use plain old tap water, i know its bad, but on my budget, its gonna haveta do. i have a very strong light, a 130watt Power compact for my 10 gal tank. i am very careful not to overfeed. my water quality isnt bad. i havent had any deaths, my anemone is doing fine, (i know my water isnt good when my anemone starts to loook bad) and my shrimp, featherduster, hermit crab, snails, star, and fish are behaving like normal.
pimpin is right do 10% changes, anything over that is too much. before i came on here, i was doin big water changes. pimp told me 10%!!!!!lol. ever since that, ive had 1 small bloom of algea. i think the bloom was from something else though
well i would say your problem is your lights. you actually have 13 watts per gallon, nuicense algaes will thrive on lights like that and overpower any chance of growing coralline. the rule of thumb is 3-5 watts per gallon for LPS and 6-8 watts per gallon for SPS.
imo.if you have nutrients in check there should be no algae.also brown algae is not a true algae{brown diotom} most likley causes
tap water it has sillicas,silicates,phosphates,nitrates and many other undesireable elements..so check your water or have it tested at your lfs..this may not be the problem just my 2 cents
good luck
swp
As soon as snowboss started using the r/o water his brown algae cleared right up and he had it real bad. His tank is real clear now and is startin to look nice.
Not sure where your located but here in NY we get our r/o water for 33 cents per gallon at our local wal*mart.
If you get a couple 5 gallon jugs it's def a way to budget your r/o water. You don't wanna spend all kinds of money on nice stuff for a saltwater tank and have it all mucky with brown algae.
well my work is done here ....LOL ........seriously though serial is absolutley correct ....other than the gas for the trip I go through ten gallons of RO water a week and its 1.97 at wally world {the Culligan dispenser, it's RO and UV filtered} i paid 12.96 for each of the five gallon jugs full of water and then just refill them after that........i am fortunate to be living in a rental that my local plumber used to own and come to find out this entire area has very high silicates in the wells ......my parameters were perfect , the fish were healthy and that brown crap was everywhere ....i started doing my regular 10% changes with RO and topping off with RO and holy crap the tank exploded for about 4 days ....I mean it was nasty, not only the brown diatom algae but the water itself looked like thick smoke ....then literally one morning I walk by the tank to make coffee....and it was totally crystal clear....and has been ever since.........took about 4 days
I also support NOT useing chems ..........not that some people don't have great luck with them ....but eventually they are back asking about a problem elswhere in the system ....not always...but for the most part .......
repeat after me ............................ "there is no majic bottle" lol only band aids
Good luck....switch to RO and your about a week and a half from crystal clear water ...i promise.....Snowboss
thanks guys, i had no idea that i could buy RO water from walmart. thats great seeing as i have 3 of them near my house. i will definately try that. one final little question....red slime...ive got that stuff too. all over my rock. is it from tap water and phosphates and the works, just like the brown gunk?
now thats real algae ....i know you said your careful about feeding but that is a big conteibutor most of the time...RO will help for sure ....is the tankexposed to natural sunlight {that will bloom algae as well} there are crabs and such that will work on Cyano algae/bactieria...if you have a pretty hefty filter you can take a turkey baster {not you wife/girlfreind/sig other or moms....lol} and gently blow it off everything ever day or so and let the filter work on it
if you have white lights and actinic you could cut the white ones down to just a couple hours a day for a while as well........the blue light doesn't have the spectrum to be a benifeit to algae ..........
Boss
I have 2 walmarts as well ...one has the culligan machine and the other doesn't ...if you can't find that machine the "Value" brand {wal-marts brand name} 1 gallon jugs with the green label are RO filtered {the blue label is UV filtered} and they are about 66 cents a gallon ...Boss
