Brown dusty algae?

A

aquanewb7

AC Members
Sep 16, 2005
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Alberta, Canada
I have quite a lot of this brown dusty type of algae in my 33 gal planted tank.
I have 2 x 36 watt pc lights and aquaclear 200 filter. Heavily planted with diy co2. Anytime I disturb something in the tank this stuff goes everywhere and makes the otherwise clear water dusty for a while. Is this diatoms?
Is it going to go away after my tank settles in ?? Tank has only been set up for 2 1/2 weeks.

thanks !!
 
I believe you are correct that they are diatoms. It should be dark brownish, kinda crunchy, easily removed...I am not sure about the "dustiness" you describe, but that is kind of subjective, as is my "crunchy" :)

plantgeek.net has pictures of it to verify. click the algae section at the top of the page.
 
I didn't think fish ate diatoms...
 
I would clean up what you can with an algae scraper, but it should go away on its own after a while. I'm not sure if it was the same algae you have, or "diatoms", but my bristlenose pleco cleaned all the brown algae out of my new tank a while back. He did quite a good job too:)
 
This stuff doesn't even need scraping, it just starts floating if it is disturbed at all.
I was planning to get some Otto's this weekend. Hoping that they will help. Would a bristlenose pleco eat the plants??
 
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