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What Gives? Algea Coming Back
Hello all,
I have been battling a long war with the brown algae. It is diatoms and cyano. I thought it was getting better, but it seems to be on the offensive today. I have followed all the steps in the 10 steps process, but no luck.
I just dont get it? My phosphates are showing zero now after I added clearmax to my canister. My nitrates are also zero. (Have been for some time).
I feed a pinch of food to my fish every other day. I only keep the lights on 7hours now. ( I have alot of coral and one crocea clam).
The only thing that I can think of is that my lights are bad. I recently added an IceCap ballast and 4 new URI VHO t5 bulbs. This gives a total of 160W over my 20g tank. The thing gets very hot since the bulbs are being driven so hard, and the fixture is a totally enclosed design with no room for cooling fans. I do blow a fan over and under the fixture to cool it. Could my bulbs be getting so hot that their color is shifting to a wavelenght that favors algae growth?
I refuse to use any chemicals to treat with, as I just dont trust them. I will be adding a mini refugium soon to help battle this problem. Any other ideas that may be slipping past me? I literally watched as my tank doubled in algea today! It just took 5 hours to cover my sand again and some rocks as well as a few corals! Its like its demon possessed?
Matt
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