What Is This White Stuff Floating.....

[M.G.]

What is this white stuff floating on the surface of my tank? I went away on a vacation for 10 days and it was there when I returned. Did a water test before I changed 50% of the water. 36 hours later the white stuff is back.

Sorry for the picture quality, but it was very hard to get a picture of it that actually showed the stuff. It is a film like covering, that breaks apart into tiny chunks when agitated. (As in doing a water change.) As you can see, it has reformed into a solid mass. The left side of the tank is the same, it covers the entire surface. The Neon Tetras in the tank do not seem to be bothered by it yet.

Ideas, suggestions and clues all welcome

 

[divegirl]

Mouldy food??

 

[M.G.]

Bleh

The neighbor fed the fish. I ignored the warnings of those in the forum about just this. The neighbor has fish, but I am assuming he overfed them if your guess is correct.

I went out and got a shrimp net to skim the surface. I will do another 50% water change and also swap out the media in the filter while leaving the old media in the tank for a few days. Hope it helps.

On a bright note, the fish seem healthy and active.....

The things that were different over the last 14 days;
1) No water change. I usually do a 30-50% each week.
2) Heat wave in the city. Tank temp was warmer by a few degrees. From avg 75 to around 79 when I came home.
3) The neighbor fed the fish.

By the way, his (the neighbor's) tank looks like this

 

[Leeore]

Bleh

The neighbor fed the fish. I ignored the warnings of those in the forum about just this. The neighbor has fish, but I am assuming he overfed them if your guess is correct.

I went out and got a shrimp net to skim the surface. I will do another 50% water change and also swap out the media in the filter while leaving the old media in the tank for a few days. Hope it helps.

On a bright note, the fish seem healthy and active.....

The things that were different over the last 14 days;
1) No water change. I usually do a 30-50% each week.
2) Heat wave in the city. Tank temp was warmer by a few degrees. From avg 75 to around 79 when I came home.
3) The neighbor fed the fish.

By the way, his (the neighbor's) tank looks like this

Eep that's one scary lookin tank. Does he even want fish

 

[M.G.]

Eep that's one scary lookin tank. Does he even want fish

Strangely, he has 7 Danios, 1 SAE, 1 albino Cory (?) and a few bottom feeders in that tank. I imagine the algae eaters are happy. As for the rest, no idea.

 

[waterdrop]

Its possible that a neighbor who keeps fish, even one seemingly only vaguely interested, as it seems here, could be "developed" (lol) into a valuable asset for you! Don't know your own energy and desire for this but you could consider offering yourself as a "saturday tank cleanup day helper" (really you'd be showing how) and help the person to a major cleanup of the tank. For it to be effective you might have to ensure that there were supplies (gravel cleaning siphon, buckets, razor scraper and sponges for working algae off the sides, possibly some replacement media for some carbon in the filter... etc.) but then you could scrap down the algae prior to the water change gravel clean and perhaps rid the tank of some of the algae, rotting plants, whatever. Beyond this, if the person's interest picked up and you were able to share doing this a few times you might eventually have a valuable friend who would be willing to do somewhat more complicated things on your tank when you were gone, in addition to just feeding your fish and feeding then in the right way since that would have been one of the things learned. (I can sure make up a rosy scenerio, can't I )

~~waterdrop~~

 

[M.G.]

...(I can sure make up a rosy scenerio, can't I )

~~waterdrop~~

Thanks for that Waterdrop, and my apologies for ignoring your advice, which then put me into my current predicament.

So, taking your advice, I went over this morning and had a cup of coffee with him. Gazing nonchalantly at his tank I said, "You know, I could test that water for you, maybe figure out if it is a healthy place for your fish." He said ok, so off I went for the kit.

pH - 6.8
NH3/NH4 - 0
NO2 - 0
NO3 - ~150

I know nothing about planted tanks, so the next conversation will be about how to get that down. Perhaps you are correct Waterdrop. Perhaps soon I will have a minion, or, if you prefer, a squire.

 

[waterdrop]

Ah yes, your description of things fits right in with the picture in your sig, lol. I like the sound of your approach, very much on the extreme casual side, which should work great! Besides, its kinda fun having a real person to talk to and share the stuff with, so that's another reason the effort might be worth it...

 

[M.G.]

The floating white film on the surface is just not going away.

I have tossed out the shrimp net method of skimming as I think I add back to the tank 50% of what I remove. I have now been using a glass measuring cup which I slowly sink into the water until it draws in the surface water around it. Doing this until I have managed to get most of the stuff removes about 20% of the water, so that is a 20% water change daily. This is the second day of doing this. The film reappears by the end of the day.

I am beginning to consider more drastic measures. Protein skimming? UV sterilization? Any thoughts on these? My first tank, so I am clueless about this hardware.

 

[VespertineStar]

I've had this crap since day one on all 3 of my tanks regardless of how clean or new they are. Increasing surface movement should make it go away.

 

[M.G.]

I've had this crap since day one on all 3 of my tanks regardless of how clean or new they are. Increasing surface movement should make it go away.

Thanks Tautitan. Still not sure what it is, but I will get some thing to agitate the surface more. That Tetra Whisper Internal does not do much surface agitation. Perhaps just a pump and airstone? Pump and powerhead? Jeez, more equipment, heh.

Out of curiosity I did a water test a few minutes ago. Not sure what this stuff is eating.

pH - 6.6
NH3/NH4 - 0 ppm
NO2 - 0 ppm
NO3 - 0 ppm

Pretty clean water at this point with all those water changes....

 

[VespertineStar]

0PPM for NO3? Did you shake that second bottle really hard? lol. Mine has always been an oily sort of film like yours that broke up when the surface was agitated a bit. I moved my filter a bit closer to the surface and added an airstone which seems to keep it away. It could just be something that's in the food, how much do you feed the fish at a time and how often?

 

[M.G.]

Yep, I shake the tube real good for a full minute. Or I hand it to my daughter, crank up some ABBA and have her rock out for a minute. Either way it gets mixed well.

I think the low reading is due to all the water changes recently. I feed the 8 Neon Tetras once a day, as much as they can eat in 3 minutes. The neighbor who was watching my tank? Well, who knows how much he fed them though I did give him specific instructions.

I just ran out and got an air pump and airstone. It is bubbling away in the tank now as you can see, though the Tetras appear to be seriously freaked out by it. Need to go back and get a few smaller stones, tube, etc and move the bubbling to the corners. That is my old media floating around, Tetras are a bit angry about that too I imagine.

 

[mbsqw1d]

When I was cycling my tank before I got my very first fish I had a layer of that 'white scum' , it also had a rainbow/oily effect to it. The agitation of the water surface (from an air stone or raising the filter outlet) does prevent it, but then isn't that 'stuff' just being mixed in the water???
This leads me onto my question about protein skimmers if I may.. has anyone used one for say, a 125Ltr tank? Do they clean the water effectively, and would that 'scum' still appear after using one?

Well.. I've thoroughly enjoyed writing my very first post on here! Hope I've not done anything wrong!

 

[M.G.]

...protein skimmers if I may.. has anyone used one ... would that 'scum' still appear after using one...

...Hope I've not done anything wrong!...

Hello mbsqw. No, no wrong doing, especially as had brought up the question of Protein Skimming earlier. The surface agitation solution was the easiest and cheapest. Be interested to hear a response, as I had the same thought: the surface agitation did not rid the tank of the substance, just effectively mixed it within the water column. Which leads back to the question, what is it and is it preventable? Non-organic oily substance, a by product of the food? Organic bloom of some kind triggered by what?

As a side note, your user name, what is it? I assume SQW is Square Wave, but MB stumps me. Message Board? Master Bedroom? Mario Brothers? Magnetic Bearing? Miami Beach? Mana Break???