It is also reuseable which makes it worth while in the long run.
Can i wade in with a question....to make it reuseable, requires bleaching it? Thats what i read, and that was the deal breaker for me.
It is also reuseable which makes it worth while in the long run.
... but it is very different as it will deal with ammonia, nitrite and nitrate as well, unlike carbon.
In other words, it can starve your bacteria by removing the ammonia and nitrite from your water. Unless you plan to continually use this stuff, be very careful about how you use it and what you do when you remove it.
Why? If you would have read a little further you would seen that to purify the bleach you use dechlorinator such as prime. I couldn't imaging having purigen in the cupboard and not in the filter. What a waste! I wish they would send me some! Fancy flogging it?
Something better such as what though?
Unsure how much prime you think you have to use, but its not that costly that it makes it unaffordable to use.
It's a shame this thread got sidetracked into the pros and cons of Purigen (interesting though it was) because this problem sounds like a standard case of green water to me.
That being the case you need to address the root cause of the problem, not add in unecessary and costly additives.
Green water (free floating algae) is caused by: excessive light (intensity and/or duration), overfeeding, overstocking, excess nutrients, lack of plants, inadequate filtration.
Looking at your stock level it doesn't seem excessive (although if all fully grown it's getting close) so rule that out. You should for a few days keep the lights off permanently and, if practical, shade the windows to see if it helps the problem. And don't overfeed, feed half of your normal amount for a few days. That combination should eliminate the green water and you then need to decide how to maintain that state which will be a combination of reduced feeding and/or reduced light level/duration. Also adding fast growing plants such as hornwort (which the dollars shouldn't eat) will rob the algae of their nutrients which may be the best option.
Also you never stated your actual water readings (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, ph). The readings should never be anything more than ammonia:0 nitrite:0 nitratereferably less than 40ppm.
It's a shame this thread got sidetracked into the pros and cons of Purigen (interesting though it was) because this problem sounds like a standard case of green water to me.
That being the case you need to address the root cause of the problem, not add in unecessary and costly additives.
Green water (free floating algae) is caused by: excessive light (intensity and/or duration), overfeeding, overstocking, excess nutrients, lack of plants, inadequate filtration.
Looking at your stock level it doesn't seem excessive (although if all fully grown it's getting close) so rule that out. You should for a few days keep the lights off permanently and, if practical, shade the windows to see if it helps the problem. And don't overfeed, feed half of your normal amount for a few days. That combination should eliminate the green water and you then need to decide how to maintain that state which will be a combination of reduced feeding and/or reduced light level/duration. Also adding fast growing plants such as hornwort (which the dollars shouldn't eat) will rob the algae of their nutrients which may be the best option.
Also you never stated your actual water readings (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, ph). The readings should never be anything more than ammonia:0 nitrite:0 nitratereferably less than 40ppm.
as stated in my earlier posts it IS NOT green water but white. i was very careful not to over stock as i did my research before getting my fish so the tank would be best laid out for these two species. also not over feeding and also tried the lights off for a few days so went through all the common sense check lists first. again as in previous post i said they are not anywhere near windows so again that isn't a problem and as previous stated they have artificial plants due to the silver dollars.
i have also stated all water readings were spot on using a API master test kit. if you read back all the factors you mentioned i answered in original post questions for white water not green xx
this is why I am also stumped and posted the question what may be causing it.
as stated in my earlier posts it IS NOT green water but white.
as stated in my earlier posts it IS NOT green water but white.
Ah, ok, I saw you say it was like 'pea soup' which led me astray somewhat!
Well if it's white and you've eliminated any possibility of it being from your sandy substrate then there are only a few possibilities left.
What you need to do is fill a clear glass with the cloudy tank water and put it somewhere where you can observe it easily. Watch what happens to the cloud, it'll do one of three things:
1. stay exactly the same, in which case it's a bacteria or infusoria bloom.
2. the cloud will disappear from the bottom of the class up until it's all gone. That's dissolved air bubbles from your filter/s.
3. it'll settle from the top down and that's sediment, normally from the substrate.
I know you've said your readings are spot on but would you mind actually stating what they are please?