BIG WATER CHANGE

viruzjk

viruzjk

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Aug 21, 2007
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:sim:here me out for a second... i have had an outbreak of algae in my tank. i set up the tank with tap water with a water conditioner. but i want to start using ro water. i plan on doing a 20 percent water change with the ro water. then change 15-20% weekly. adding a canister filter so i can use activated carbon. and i have a seaclone100 skimmer allready running, my tank is 36 gallon. any ither suggestions to help me with the algae problem would be appreciated. it is cyano alage bubble algae and green algae blooms everywhere in the tank...
 
Yep, tap water is terrible. Do you have a cleanup crew? Cutting back light may help.

I think you basically need a large cleanup crew, I'd do mostly snails, but red leg scarlett hermits seem to eat more algae than the other blue legged variety, Emerald crabs do a great job at cleaning bubble algae so I'd get a couple of those too. Check your levels, and make sure you have sufficient flow with powerheads so that they move the water more and ensures that the skimmer picks up more ****. I'm no expert though! Just MHO
 
thanks, yeah i have a 6 turbo snails, 1 emerald crab, like 5 hermits, 1 coralbanded shrimp and 2 false clowns. i have 1 power head on the oppisite side as the skimmer shooting toward it. with the RENA FilStar xP3 Canister Filter that im hooking up tommorow that would increase flow right? and i only feed like a pinch of flake food a day. lighting i run orbit 65w x 2 power compacts actnics get run from 10pm-12pm 10k run 12pm-10pm. basically the light is on 24/7
 
If you dont have any Corals then I would just run the lights enough to feed your fish and maybe go every other day for that and if you have hair algea I would add a few Hawian Hermits also called zebra hermits( at least around here ), they are hair algea eating machines
 
so run the lights how often? to feed fish
 
If you dont have any corals then the lights are more for you so cut your lighting cycle back as far as possible and that will help to get rid of your algea, it wont take care of it but it will help along with what everybody else has suggested
 
as archer says above and to add to that, i would just cut the lighting down to a couple of hours at night for a while at least and start to starve the algae of one of the nutrients it needs to thrive..

Niko
 
Your water changes should be fine.

I do ~17% weekly (just because the #s work out well with 5 gallons of water).

:)
 
I agree, the water change schedule is fine. I would look into a phosphate adsorber as well as activated carbon. That should help with the algae. Also be sure to change the mechanical filter media (floss, pads, etc) in your canister filter. I wouldn't count the flow out of the skimmer as much of anything. Even with the canister, I would shoot for one more powerhead. That should keep things looking cleaner. As others have said, you shouldn't have the lights on 24/7. It not only encourages algae, but it is stressful to many organisms. Without anything that actually needs the light, I would shoot for about 6 hours. That is usually plenty of viewing time for fish only. ONce you add corals, I would move up to around 10-12 hours with your lighting.
 
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