Help with Green Water

K

kidmaxx

Registered Member
Jun 4, 2006
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I've had a 12g acquarium w/ 3 guppies for a year now. No significant problems until about 3 weeks ago the water relatively quickly turned green on me. Nothing about the tank had changed prior to the color change (no direct sunlight either).

I assumed it was algae (although I haven't had algae problems before & there wasn't any growing on the sides of the tank; just green water) so I started some algae control. That didn't seem to be having any noticeable effect, so I began 25% water changes every other day.

I've been doing the water changes now for over a week. The shade of green has lightened some, but it's still quite green.

Any suggestions?
 
The green water, is an algae bloom. Free floating planktonic single celled algae growing at a rate that turns the water green. The cause is always the same, too much light and excess nutrients often resulting from overfeeding. Excessive light which can be attributed to the aquarium lighting or intense room lighting and direct sunlight. nutrients can be phosphate or nitrates or both and in turn, are due to excessive feeding and/or insufficient water changes. additionally, phosphate 'can' come in with your tap water or the type of carbon you may be using (a great many of the available carbons on the market contain phosphate).

Keeping nutrients low can prevent Green water, while water changes 'may' provide little to no help in clearing the water. The algae spores are readily available in most well and municipal waters used for changes, thus water changes don't help.

try removing any carbon you may be using or switch to Marineland carbon which is phosphate free. note that many available carbons say they are phosphate free but in fact are not.

increase your water changes to weekly and vacuum the gravel concurrently.

finally, cut down on feedings to that amount which the fish can consume in about 2 minutes ... with none of it hitting the gravel. this means dispersing it gradually rather than just dumping in some food.

Some insist that turning off the lights will eliminate the problem, only to add that the problem just keeps re-occurring. So this hardly seems like a solution.

Algae will consume oxygen at night during photosynthesis. A severe algae bloom can deplete the tank of oxygen, so adequate oxygenation must be provided during the light off period.

Dying organic matter creates phosphates, so the filter should be rinsed more frequently during an algae bloom, eliminating some of the decaying matter. Vacuuming the gravel will also help.

A couple of more expensive solutions would be to use a diatom filter or a UV filter. The diatom filter uses a very fine diatomaceous earth to trap the algae while a UV filter kills the algae by destroying it's DNA.
 
Thanks for the info. I thought it was probably algae, but the wierd thing is that nothing has changed (location, feeding, tank maintenance, filter, fish) for the past year. My nitrate levels are very low, so it sounds like it's probably a phospate issue that must have built up over time.

While I work on my phosphate levels, is there any way to clear the tank? I've been using the Tetra algae control every 3 days, but it hasn't had a noticeable effect.
 
Green water is caused by NH4+ not phosphates. Did you do anything to disturb your substrate. Have you cleaned your filters recently? You could waterchange your head off but GW will not go away unless it is removed by a diatom filter, killed by UV or killed by a blackout. Waterchanges tend to make it worse specially if your water is treated by chloramines.
 
Green water is caused by NH4+ not phosphates
Click to expand...
it's an algae. therefor any usable nutrient including phosphate is a potential cause? got a reference that says phosphate is NOT involved? i've got plenty that say it IS.
 
liv2padl said:
it's an algae. therefor any usable nutrient including phosphate is a potential cause? got a reference that says phosphate is NOT involved? i've got plenty that say it IS.
Click to expand...

Yes phosphate is a nutrient and algae will use it but it does not trigger algae blooms. Here is a few papers from respectable institutions concerning phosphates in the induction of algae.

http://fishweb.ifas.ufl.edu/Faculty Pubs/CanfieldPubs/Aquatics2004LR.pdf

That study was done on lakes in Florida. It shows that lakes containing submersed aquatic plants had little to no algae problems even when phophates were up to a concentration of 166 ppm. It also shows that lakes where the substrate is constantly disturbed (releasing compounds like NH4+) had algae problems.

Here is an article on a type of algae called
Coleochaete orbicularis from the University of Maryland. It states that to induce this algae you need oligrotrophic water conditions (low nutrient levels such as phosphates). http://www.life.umd.edu/labs/delwiche/Strp/Coleo/Corb.html

Here is an article written by Tom Barr (BS in Aquatic Biology and MS in Botany. He is working on his PhD is plant sciences) involving the dosage of excess nutrients to improve plant growth and reduce algae growth in an aquarium. http://www.barrreport.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1

These articles clearly state that excesses in phosphates and nitrates will not trigger an algae bloom in tanks with sufficient macrophyte populations. It also state that NH4+ trigger algae blooms.

If you still don't believe me, get some elodea, and few bowls containing water and float the elodea (same amount). Fertilize them using the scientfic method where you increase the concentration of Nitrates and Phosphates and keep the same amount of trace elements. You will probably not see algae. Now supplement the Nitrates with an ammonia based fertilizer and you will have pea soup very quickly.

You are right that Nitrates and phosphates are nutrients and will be used by algae. In a non planted tanks they could feed algae but Green Water is always induced by ammonium (NH4+). If you have any credible sources that speak otherwise please post them.
 
Check your local fish store, a couple of mine rent diatom filters - only 15$ + a refundable deposit. The diatom filter takes out all that algae in one fail swoop. The stuff doesn't die - causing a sudden increase in ammonia - like if you do a blackout on the tank. Once it is gone, try to figure out your permanant solution.

Cathy
 
Without getting into the chemical debate, I had a green water problem for 5 weeks that would not cure with water changes or low feed levels (I really starved my fish). I succeeded with a lights off (I did not completely black out the tank but I'm sure you could). It took 3 days, but I have had about 10 days of crystal clear water. I think one of these posters (Cathy G) had directed me to an awesome article- http://www.aquahobby.com/board/viewtopic.php?t=2286 -that provided a short list of algae solutions (water changes was not one).
 
I very much appreciate the info. Thank you all.

I'll look into renting a diatom filter to deal with my constant state of green & start working on a permanent solution. Sounds like one of my biggest problems was not having live plants to compete with the algae for nutrients.

Given the fact that I've never been able to keep a regular plant alive for longer than about a week, it should be interesting. At least I don't have to worry about overwatering.
 
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