Green Water - Please Help

[mattsilvester]

Hi All,

I am writing on behalf of a friend. Having kept fish for over 20 years, I have been keeping marines exclusively for the 11 years. A neighbour has bought an aquarium recently ( a few months ago) and is having terrible trouble with green water, and he has asked me for some advice.

He would seem to be doing everything right - not over feeding, not over stocked, he does water changes, etc.
2 weeks ago I advised him that there is something obviously out of balance in his system. In the absence of anything obvious I thought perhaps maybe he was trying a bit too hard, and seeing as his fish are in general good health, I said let the lights truned off for 2 weeks, and generally let the system alone to settle........ this seems to have had little or no effect.

The tank is located in a room with no external windows, so its not sun light. It is located next to an LCD / Plasma Screen tv - but I don't think that is the cause?

I am reluctant to advise him to use an algacide, preferring to determine what has caused the problem to avoid future re occurance. Can anyone advise on what steps he should take next?

Many thanks,

Matt

 

[Aphotic Phoenix]

[URL="http/www.theplantedtank.co.uk/algae.htm"]http/www.theplantedtank.co.uk/algae.htm[/URL] has a pretty good breakdown of what causes certain types of algae, and possible fixes.

My guess is that your friend had a small ammonia spike early on triggering the algae, and hasn't been able to get rid of it because the stuff is hard to clear. Multiple people have mentioned that sometimes UV or a diatom filter is the only way to get rid of it, but I have no personal experience with this particular algae type so I cannot really attest for one method over another.

 

[aaronnorth]

80% water change
3 day blackout (cover tank so no light enters, dont feed the fish)
80% water change

and that usually clears it.

to prevent it then try and stop ammnoia spikes.

keep tank and filters clean and free of waste
keep up with general maintenance
dont overfeed
try not to disturn the substrate too much

 

[mattsilvester]

Thanks for the repies everyone...... I will correlate the replies and recommend a strategy to him to see if it wins the day.

 

[alan3513]

Agree with Aaron, I followed his advice when i had great water and after the three days, and the large water change the green water was gone. Thankfully after two months it hasn't come back.