Help Help Help!!!!! Algae out of control

ldjaz

ldjaz
Dec 26, 2007
9
0
0
:help:I have a 55 gal tank. My dream is to have one of those beautiful planted tank. I have been an avid gardener all my life so I have done the research. Now I'm think I have done something really wrong. I first changed my light to grow lights which are 30 watt. No problem. Than I got 130watt light for 1/2 price. The guy warned me to watch out. The first week I noticed Bearded algea on one of my plants and by the end of the week I needed to clean the glass, filters, tubes, rocks etc. This week I went back to the 30watt grow lights, cleaned my tank and now the water won't clean. Its foggy and I just cleaned the glass yesterday and its slimmie again.

My water tested fine last week, yesterday my amonia was .20 everything else was 0.

1 pleco
6 Neons
4 Platys
4 Tetras
1Albino Cory
 
what kind of ferts are you using? are you using co2? Plants and alage fight tooth and nail for any nurtraints they can get so if your light is on the highside which yours is I'd drop some food in and start doing 50% water changes weekly..thats what worked for me I use to have a nasty alage problem just like you until I started putting in ferts and co2 along with 50% weekly changes the tank looks 40 times better.
 
I put in fertilizer tabs at the base of the plants, and I have tried the co2 that you make with yeast without much success. I am starting the water changes and I think I'll pull some of the plants with to much algea on them. Any other ideas?
 
pending on the type of algae you have you might be able to take it off with a toothbrush or rub it off just be gentle. if that doesn't work again pending on the type of plant you could remove the algae part and let it regrow. what problems were you having with the co2?

edit: and what kind of pleco do you have?
 
Last edited:
With that much light you must dose CO2 and ferts or the algae will go nuts.
 
AquariaCentral.com