2 Gravel Or Not 2 Gravel?

[fishman1981]

1 day i cleaned out my 55g completely cleaned the gravel and all then i remember seeing tanks with out gravel which i kinda liked the look, So i tried it just to come home 3 days later to a Green tank .

that same day i cleaned it out again and still saw the green water so i dumped it all again and put the rocks back in.

My question is why did my tank water turn green? was it because i need the gravel to catch all the bacteria and crap?

Well i put the gravel back in and the water is crytal clear so everything is back to normal.

 

[Curiosity101]

What type of filter do you use?

And algae bloom (water looks like pea soup), is often caused by an ammonia spike. Sometimes this ammonia spike is undetectable but it is still often the trigger.
So it seems to be indicating you actually have quite a bit of bacteria in the gravel, as you only had the bloom after removing the gravel.

You could try taking out the gravel a section at a time. Ie from left to right. Remove the left most quarter of gravel, then work your way along.
If there is a bit of bacteria in the gravel, then doing to process gradually will give your filter the chance to catch up.
This should avoid another algae bloom. But still give you the bare bottomed tank you want.

 

[fishman1981]

im running a Marineland 125 bio wheel good for 75 gallons in a 55 paid $10 for it and it kicks @$$.