green algae on glass every day.....

[stuffer]

I have a 55 reef with 265w PC's. set up for 2 years now. it sits 90 deg to a window about 5 feet away. it gets indirect sunlight. Every day I have to scrape green powder like algae from the glass. if I let it go for any longer than that, it becomes harder to remove with the magnet cleaner. I mean I have to this every day after work just so I can see clearly into the tank. some days are better than others but it's getting old. anybody else go through this? :?

 

[Marc118]

Do you have a cleaning crew?

 

[roka64]

How long are you running your lights? What kind of critters do you have, how often/what do you feed?

 

[afilter]

Check you PO4 levels. Mine where slightly elevated (over1) and I was getting the same thing along with some hair algae. I started using a PO4 sponge and the glass stays clear much longer.

Cleanup crew will help, but not control it alone.

 

[Jermz79]

I have the same thing and trust me .... you could pack your tank full of snails and they wouldn't dent it, actually they only make little circular tracks in it and never really get it off.

I've checked my PO4 levels and mine are reading under 1, I only feed every other day and very light because I only have a clown and a Gramma. I feed frozen Mysis, Reef Mix and every now and then some Cyclo-peeze.

I've gotten so used to cleaning it everyday that it doesn't bother me anymore ... not as much as the dang MicroBubbles from my HOB filter anyway!!!

Do you run a skimmer? I've been told that if you get a skimmer it will clear your water and any thin film algea off the glass, but I don't know how true that is!
All I know is I'm watching for a good one (HOB of course) to become available and I'm getting it.

 

[stuffer]

I will have to get a PO4 test kit. I run lights 12 hrs rotating moon lights, actinics, daylight. I have about 6 large snails, (2 LARGE turbo, 4 trocheus) 20 or so crabs. I feed light for the amount of fish I have. (8). I run the AquaC remorah pro skimmer. (Ebay 120.00 w/mag 5). I have no other bad algae other than that. I have a 10 gal refugium w/chaeto and LR and LS. 14W PC lights run 24/7. Carbon, Purigen in the sump. I try to clean it in the morning when everything is retracted and the moon lights are the only ones on. I dose iodine 1 time a week. and artemia fry 2 times a week. everything in the tank is doing really well. from the fish to all the 8 corals and 2 BTA's. (was 1 and it split)

 

[lando]

Actually, this type of algae is pretty normal in a tank. I have to clean the glass on my aquariums 2-3 times/week to get rid of it.

I dose iodine 1 time a week

Is there a reason for this? Dosing iodine can be especially dangerous to a tank and most of the time it is not needed. Regular water changes will keep trace elements, including iodine, at proper levels. If you coontinue to use it I strong suggest you get an iodine test kit if you do not already have one.

 

[stuffer]

esplane dangerous. please.

 

[afilter]

Do not dose anything you are not testing for. I use to dose based on LFS advice. What I found out once I aquired the proper test kits was that everything is in the salt mix if you keep up on PWC.

Dosing without testing can lead to levels which can be toxic to some species of fish and corals.

 

[lando]

Every system will process iodine at a different rate. By adding it without knowing what your current level is, you can get an unhealthy accumulation of it. In small amounts idoine is thought to benefit soft corals, anemoens and shrimp (aids in molting). As a dietarty suppliment it is also thought to add in the treatment of HLLI disease in tangs, but there is not much evidence for this. Best practice is to skip the suppliments and rely on regular water changes to replensih any depleted trace elements.

 

[stuffer]

doesn't skimming remove iodine? I understand what you are saying about don't add anything you can't test for. it only stands to reason. I don't dose much. when I went to a shop in florida, the guy there showed me the sups he adds to his tanks and his tanks are extremly healthy. we run the same approx equipment except for the MH lighting. which I plane to add within the next 6 mo. he stated that for every 100 watts of light you use, the corals will respond 20% better. light, light, light. to a point of cooking temperature I would imagine without having to use a chiller which is more added expence. I find my scarlet cleaner shrimp molts about 2 times a month with the addition. the softies are well extended. the leathers are growing at a good pace. my green goni has excellent extention as well.

 

[seaham358]

doesn't skimming remove iodine?

never heard of that before.. No is my answer..

Like others have said that algae is normal in tanks and getting 1000 snails and crabs will not help with this type of algae.
how old are your bulbs? I recently got a New"used" PC light for my 55 and I never had cyno and had little algae on the glass until I added the PC light. Now I have a ton of algae on the glass daily and I am just getting over the biggest Cyno out break I have ever had. My guess is the bulbs are older in the light then what I was told so I will be getting new bulbs soon.

 

[stuffer]

Another of the additives that increases both the oxidation and the redox potential of your tank's water is Iodine, usually available in the potassium iodine form. It is used for a totally different purpose however. Iodine is needed by all living things and especially by macro-algae. It is removed rapidly from the reef tank by protein skimming and ozone, as pointed out again, recently, by Moe (1989).

Because it is a required nutrient some hobbyists add it as supplement, which is fine and should be done on a regular basis. The danger resides in the fact that one can overdose rather easily on iodine and make the redox potential rise too fast. Follow the instructions on the bottle that it comes in carefully

 

[melosu58]

Well anyway, I thought that was some dog gone good info Lando.

 

[abnmojo]

Good info here in this thread.

I would not dose unless you test, and yes, skimmers will remove trace elements from the water. The more powerful the skimmer, the more they can remove. The good that they do, however, in removing disolved organics far outweights the bad by removing trace elements and you should be doing PWC anyway which fixes this problem.

Maybe, in very heavily stocked systems dosing would be needed, but then again, I would not do it without a test kit.

The sunlight has caused me this problem in the past. WAY back in the day when I was running a 55 with perfecto lights I got a huge green algae problem when I moved my tank too close to a window. I figured it was the house window because the algae grew the most heavily on the single pane of glass facing that window. I got the same problem from a 39gallon mirror back tank once, the mirror on the back of the tank grew algae from perfecto lights like a lab culture. If I forgot to clean it once a week it blocked the light from the mirror, the algae died off, and the tank crashed. Now that mirror back is a fresh water tank.

I would test your tank for everything possible that could cause algae issues, make sure nothing is out of wack first, just so that you don't do something dumb and make it worse by mistake.

If all checks out ok, I would guess that you are just going to have to scrape a lot. Some snails do a better job than others at getting algae off the glass. I like cearth (sp?) snails the best for this. No amount of snails will ever get it all, however. Part of the fun of keeping these things i guess.

 

[AMANIQU77]

Phophates most likely.

I clean the "powder green" algae forming at the front of my tank every other day. It's just part of it. Unless ofcourse you have an intricate and expensive setup. Then you will have to start tweeking and demand more performance.

Other than that, your tank sounds perfectly healthy.