Hello All!
This is my first post here at AA, so I am going to make it a good one.
I have a 55-gallon fish tank with 5 Turqoise Discus right now. The tank is almost a year old. I have had continued problems with brown algae for the past 3 months. I am not new to aquarium keeping nor the demands of taking care of demanding fish.
I do weekly water changes (about 15-20%) and do a gravel clean monthly. I feed either brine shrimp or blood worms once daily. Lighting is left on about 8-10 hrs.
I've done a descent amount of research concerning my algae build-up and have narrowed down the cause to either my pH down (API), the fact that I am using tap water (conditioned of course) or the fact that I do not have live plants nor high intensity lighting (which I do not think is as big a factor as the first two). I do not have any bottom feeders (which I know I need, but just recently purchased a sick tank so I will be adding a few Otocinclus soon).
I am interested in turning this tank into a planted tank at some point and know that I will probably need a CO2 injector and higher intensity lighting (and possibly RO filtration).
I am trying to strengthen my grasp on water chemistry (particularly the relation between pH, hardness, phosphates, and CO2.) I know the nitrogen cycle and that isn't really a concern of mine because I keep up with my water changes regularly.
Any advice?
This is my first post here at AA, so I am going to make it a good one.
I have a 55-gallon fish tank with 5 Turqoise Discus right now. The tank is almost a year old. I have had continued problems with brown algae for the past 3 months. I am not new to aquarium keeping nor the demands of taking care of demanding fish.
I do weekly water changes (about 15-20%) and do a gravel clean monthly. I feed either brine shrimp or blood worms once daily. Lighting is left on about 8-10 hrs.
I've done a descent amount of research concerning my algae build-up and have narrowed down the cause to either my pH down (API), the fact that I am using tap water (conditioned of course) or the fact that I do not have live plants nor high intensity lighting (which I do not think is as big a factor as the first two). I do not have any bottom feeders (which I know I need, but just recently purchased a sick tank so I will be adding a few Otocinclus soon).
I am interested in turning this tank into a planted tank at some point and know that I will probably need a CO2 injector and higher intensity lighting (and possibly RO filtration).
I am trying to strengthen my grasp on water chemistry (particularly the relation between pH, hardness, phosphates, and CO2.) I know the nitrogen cycle and that isn't really a concern of mine because I keep up with my water changes regularly.
Any advice?
