dano_15 said:
It would be better to now a few more specifics on your water chemistry (your pH, KH, GH, amonia, nitrites, nitrate, ect. levels, water additives like ph buffers & what not) & tank load (number of fish) before I hazard a guess... but I do you probably have an elevated nitrate or phospate problem. It also could be due to too many watts per gallon (should be about 2-3 watts per gallon). However I will assume you have the light situation under control and I'll concentrate more on the other issues that could be causing this.
First of all you need to know what you are getting out of the tap before a really effective means of control can be done. For example, my tap water changed a lot a few months ago.... GH & KH is higher now along with 30ppm of nitrates as opposed to approx. 10ppm nitrates prior to this. Check you tap water first... and if it's high in levels of nitrates and phospates, then you are probably going to have to do like I am - getting an RO/DI unit.
Next test the tank... if the tank levels of nitrates & phosphates are elevated then frequent water changes can help (25% to 50% every other day for a week) or using a nitrate or phosphate sponge in your filter media can bring these down... but in order to really control it you have to find the cause. If you have a large bio load on the tank (lots of fishies) then you might want to consider taking a few back to the lfs. Also, you may want to consider using a UV sterilizer to kill the algae spores in the water.
In the end game - it's all going to depend on you being able to test the water to see what imbalance exists and then taking what steps you can (and what your budget can afford) to control/cure the problem. I feel ya, cause I'm going through a similar situation with brown algae. My RO/DI unit, UV sterilizer, and testing stuff are on their way to the house right now to be used for my new tank - which I just picked up today
.
Best of luck
Mark K...
/www.tropica.dk
