Invincible Green Water

I suspect the book was written by or published by a food manufactuerer. I was doing the same thing and wondered why i had a problem with ammonia when I started keeping fish.
 
I also had a problem with green water and those standard steps wouldn't help me at the time. But I finally figured out that my grass plant needed clipping. I had left it for a long time and then I noticed that many of its leaves/blades were dying off. This was giving it enough food to keep the green water. I threw that plant away and now things are great. But I figure for most it is a standard case of over feeding and too few water changes.

Also I tried those algae killers (as I was seemingly desparate at the time) and they work great for 1 day but things just go right back when you are done.

Follow HC's advice.
 
1. How much sunlight is your tank getting? Many of the green water algae blooms that friends have had (I have never had one - hair algae is my recurrent problem) occur when the tank is getting natural sunlight (doesn't have to even summer or direct light).

2. A UV sterilizer will help with green water, but it is still better to find and fix the source of the problem. What are your nitrates and phospates? High levels can promote algae growth.

3. A product called Filter-Aid that you put on your mechanical filter floss will help aggregate the suspended algae particles. However, you do want to clean the filter frequently to avoid all that algae die-off at once which can be a tank killer.
 
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