Help - My FOWLR Tank Has a Lawn of Filament Algae

[skiffalope]

Yup, most of my sand in my tank is covered with with a green grass like filament algae. I'd like to ask some advice on how to fix this. First off, I thought the hermit crabs would do the job, but they've been there since May and it has gotten worse. Second, I got an LMB, but he's not even making a dent.

I don't have a lot of money to spend on this right now, so I want to do the least amout for the most good.

1. Should I change my florescent light to a 10K light? What I have now is a general spectrum light that came with light fixture. If I do this, will this make the algae go away?
2. Should I add more hermit crabs?
3. Should I manually cleanup algae (and if so, any recommendations on how).

Oh, yes, water quality is great, no sun light on tank, light is on 12 hours per day. All fish and are happy and healthy and everyone seems to be doing fine.

I don't have much to spend, so I'd prefer to not have to make a major chagne.

Thoughts?

[gomrjoe]

Hi,

A couple of questions?
1. How old is/are your light bulbs now? The same thing happened to me when my light bulbs started getting old. I changed them out and my cleanup crew was eventually able to catch up and gobble up the algae. When the bulbs are starting to fade, the algae usually starts to creep up. Generally speaking, 6 to 8 months is about the life of a bulb. If you have yours on 12 hours, then I would say closer to 6 months for the life of yours.
2. It seems to me that your lights may be on too long. Generally speaking, lights should be on an average of 8.5 hours a day. Anything more and you are feeding potential algae blooms.
3. Are you testing for phosphates? Because if you are not, you should be. Algae blooms are usually indicative of multiple causes, one of which is almost always, phosphates.

Hope this helps.


-------------------
the only dumb question is the one that goes unasked!
-------------------
100 gal tank
35 gal wet/dry/sump
Skimmer
UV Sterilizer
2-3 dsb
mated pare perc clowns
3 reef chromis
1 yellow tang
1 pac blue tang
1 firefish
1 coral beauty
1 diamond watchman goby
star polyp, yellow colony polyp, bubble coral, pumping xenia
purple tip haitain anemone, yes the percs really are hosting in it

[skiffalope]

Hi,

A couple of questions?
1. How old is/are your light bulbs now? The same thing happened to me when my light bulbs started getting old. I changed them out and my cleanup crew was eventually able to catch up and gobble up the algae. When the bulbs are starting to fade, the algae usually starts to creep up. Generally speaking, 6 to 8 months is about the life of a bulb. If you have yours on 12 hours, then I would say closer to 6 months for the life of yours.
2. It seems to me that your lights may be on too long. Generally speaking, lights should be on an average of 8.5 hours a day. Anything more and you are feeding potential algae blooms.
3. Are you testing for phosphates? Because if you are not, you should be. Algae blooms are usually indicative of multiple causes, one of which is almost always, phosphates.

Hope this helps.


-------------------
the only dumb question is the one that goes unasked!
-------------------
100 gal tank
35 gal wet/dry/sump
Skimmer
UV Sterilizer
2-3 dsb
mated pare perc clowns
3 reef chromis
1 yellow tang
1 pac blue tang
1 firefish
1 coral beauty
1 diamond watchman goby
star polyp, yellow colony polyp, bubble coral, pumping xenia
purple tip haitain anemone, yes the percs really are hosting in it

Thanks. My guess is that it is the lights. I've got PhosBan in XP3 just for this purpose. The lights age is unkwown. I bought the tank with the stand and lights at PetSmart (Gasp!) Originally planned for Freshwater, but switched to SW later.

I'll try the lights next and may shorten the day cycle.

Thanks.