Did I Accidently Kill My Fish With Phosphate Remover?

[andythefish]

I recently developed a problem with some pretty explosive growth of brown algae in my tank. I later established that I have too much Phosphate in the water. Therefore to counter the growth I bought a bottle of Sera Phosvec, which is used to remove the phosphate in water, and hopefully starve and kill off the brown algae.
Unfortunately, after a few applications and following the instructions, three days later one of my tiger barbs went belly up. All fish were perfectly healthy beforehand, but out of the 4 tiger barbs one died, and I'm trying to determine if the Sera Phosvec was the cause? M

Does anyone know if adding anti-Phosphate products into your tropical fish tank is dangerous? Anyone with some experience and advice?
Is there a better way to kill off brown algae without killing my fish? To help resolve the problem in a more natural way I've planted extra plants, and hope they will start to consume the phosphate. I'm doing 10% weekly water change and vacuuming the gravel at the same time. y nitrate and nitrite levels appear unaffected by my application of this product.

 

[erk628]

I recently developed a problem with some pretty explosive growth of brown algae in my tank. I later established that I have too much Phosphate in the water. Therefore to counter the growth I bought a bottle of Sera Phosvec, which is used to remove the phosphate in water, and hopefully starve and kill off the brown algae.
Unfortunately, after a few applications and following the instructions, three days later one of my tiger barbs went belly up. All fish were perfectly healthy beforehand, but out of the 4 tiger barbs one died, and I'm trying to determine if the Sera Phosvec was the cause? M

Does anyone know if adding anti-Phosphate products into your tropical fish tank is dangerous? Anyone with some experience and advice?
Is there a better way to kill off brown algae without killing my fish? To help resolve the problem in a more natural way I've planted extra plants, and hope they will start to consume the phosphate. I'm doing 10% weekly water change and vacuuming the gravel at the same time. y nitrate and nitrite levels appear unaffected by my application of this product.

From what I've read on here brown algae is usally caused by ammonia so you need to test for that. If you do have ammonia in your tank then you need to be doing massive water changes ever day at least 50 percent or more depending on how much ammonia is in the water. My guess is ammonia is what caused the death and brown algae. If you do have ammonnia besides the water changes you need to determine what caused the ammonia spike.

 

[Truck]

Brown algae can also be caused by ammonia that is undetectable on your kit.

 

[andythefish]

From what I've read on here brown algae is usally caused by ammonia so you need to test for that. If you do have ammonia in your tank then you need to be doing massive water changes ever day at least 50 percent or more depending on how much ammonia is in the water. My guess is ammonia is what caused the death and brown algae. If you do have ammonnia besides the water changes you need to determine what caused the ammonia spike.

Brown algae can also be caused by ammonia that is undetectable on your kit.

Sound advice, I'll double check ammonia.