Algae Bloom

[soulFish]

My tanks water is a bit on the cloudy side, the amonia is down the fish look great, eating good, looking good colors. But I'm now noticing alot of brown Algae starting to grow on the rocks. I've been doing regular water changes, but the Algae still keeps spreading. Whats hte best way to curb the growth of it? Ideally I don't want to add chemicals to my tank. The fish are good so to me this is just a looks thing.

- ideas?

 

[WyldFya]

You should try the search function. This topic has come up a few times recently. Brown algae is a diatom algae, that is a sign of one of two things.
1) Lack of light intensity
2) Excess of silicates

My first recommendation to do is up the lighting in the tank, but this is if you are in control of the nutrients in the tank, so as not to get an outbreak of other types of alga. The second option is to add a diatom filter, and scrub the algae off the rocks.

 

[soulFish]

Thanks I did the search and found out a few things. My tank has been set up for about 3 months, but the algae just started. SO I have to believe this is due to the sand. The sand I have was from an established tank, and it was originally boiled to remove salt. So I guess it may be leaching. Since it's natural crushed rocks and a sand mix from the NorCal coast.

So the tank is my 90gal Dat tank. Super aggressive fish. So if I get an algae eater I guess it'll have to be a monster. I've been changing about 30% 2x's a week and I'll keep that up to hopefully level it out. So I guess I need a filter pad that can go in my Canister to remove the "diatoms"?

The tanks seems to get alot of light to me, it's one 48" TruColor coral light for both plants and corals. But the tank also get about 1hr of natural light due to a window.

So this is what I should do?
1. Filter the diatoms, but what material do you recomend for a Rena XP3?
2. Find a Monster Algae eater - and kind?
3. Keep doing the water changes to remove the excess silicates.

Just curious what about UV sterilizers?
Also anacharis plants were mentioned. Any negative effects from adding them? The guys said it competes with the Diatoms for nutriets

 

[WyldFya]

I wouldn't bother adding an algae eater. I also wouldn't add any plants as your lighting isn't strong enough for anything but the lowest light levels. A UV sterilizer is only good for floating single celled alga, ex. green water. A diatom filter is a filter that uses diatomaceous earth. Water changes are not going to do it to fix your problem here. Your light has very little in the way of lumen output compared to many lights available on the market. My guess is that being how short your tank has been up, this is just part of your new tank syndrome.