Bubbles/foam on top of water.

[CoryWM]

Let me preface this by saying my water parameters are in line, tested with 2 different kits, one being only a few days old now.

Nitrates <20
Nitrites 0
Ammonia 0

Water additives Prime only.
Food Floating hikari cichlid gold.

305 gallons of water. Custom built wet dry that sits above the tank. It seems that whenever I replace the "white filter pad" I get some bubbles/foam on the top of my water near the back and sides of the aquarium.

I've been using walmart quilt batting. Making sure to only use stuff that doesn't have flame retardant etc.

I'm now doing about a 50% water change and am taking out the white pad lair to see if the bubbles return. This has been an ongoing problem for probably 6 months. The fish seem to be fine, but only this tank out of 50 in my fish room have this "problem".

I'm wondering if anyone has any suggestions on what it could be. Or if they've had the same problem with the quilt batting.

Tank is bare bottom and currently has no decor at all now. To further eliminate suspects. And yes the tank has been bare bottom for years. So no ammonia spike from that or anything.

Just trying to get to the bottom of a slight annoyance.

P.S. I use the same batting at work on a 250gallon and on my grandmothers 75 gallon with no bubbles to seen at either one

 

[jsehlms]

Strange. I take it you don't have a skimmer to pull off this crud from the water? I'd be interested to see if removing the filter pad makes this go away.

 

[CoryWM]

Yeah, I'm gonna run it a week without the pad and see if that makes a difference. That's an interesting idea about the surface skimming. As my aquarium has a huge surface area. 6'x5' for surface area. That is something neither of the other two tanks have.

I do have a Koralia 8 and koralia 4 pointed at the surface for agitation. Although nothing is "skimming" off the top. I'm not quite sure how I'd incorporate that either.

 

[J.Lake]

My pond also gets this foam. I skim it myself but it comes back like 7 days later. I have a heavy bio load and do heavy wcs. The wcs seem to help it but it comes back.

 

[CoryWM]

My pond also gets this foam. I skim it myself but it comes back like 7 days later. I have a heavy bio load and do heavy wcs. The wcs seem to help it but it comes back.

I assume you're not using Walmart quilt batting?

I think I need to figure out a DIY surface skimmer. I think first I need to figure out how this is working. Proteins build up on the surface, which allows bubbles to stay. Will simply pulling water from the top of the water and running it through the bio break down those proteins?