12 gal Nano cube

[Andylee]

Hi all! I have a Problem with the surface of the water in my tank. It has a haze over the surface and it is green (algae?). I have been doing weekly water changes and the green comes back. I have my lights on for about 10 hrs/day. Is this causing the problem?

Here is what I think you might want to know about my tank:

The Ultimate 12 gal Biotope Nano Cube
24 watt combo light
Spectrum bulb
3 stage filtration-sponge filter, charcoal activated carbon and bioballs
Flip Top Canopy

1 blennie
1 turbo snail
6 astrea snails
1 hermit crab
6 lbs. of live rock
Kenya tree coral
button polyps
mushroom polyps

I hope that you can help this very new person to saltwater!!!
Thanks in advance!,
Anida.

 

[Andylee]

Anybody??? Please?

 

[Chisel]

What are you using for flow?

 

[Chisel]

Nevermind. Just saw the filter. Is it disrupting the surface enough? Also, what are you using to test your water.

 

[tyspot1000]

Like said above, do you have enough surface agitation? Ive heard doing water changes with green algae only feeds it, but I could be wrong.

 

[Andylee]

Thank you for answering my post.
Here are my test readings:

PH 7.8
Ammonia 0
Nitrate 0
Nitrite 0
Salinity 1.021. (low ?)

 

[Andylee]

Also, i have the water flowing across the surface.
Anida

 

[Chisel]

Andylee..

Your salinity seems a tad low. If you could at least bring it up to .023, that would be a normal salinity level. Your other parameters look good. Again, a few more questions.

What are you using to test your water?

Liquid or strip test?

When was your last water change? (i know you said weekly but want to make sure)

How much do you change out?

What type of water are you using? Tap? RO? RO/DI?

When was the last time you cleaned your filter and media?

How often are you feeding and how much?

Also, how old is the bulb?

 

[0o.Kelsey.o0]

The 10 hours is not needed and would make the algae grow more. Keep up with the weekly water changes but make sure to use RO water...tap water has alot of junk in it that would likely make the algae grow. What kind of algae is this? Green hair algae?? If the surface has a haze over it then it is possible that their is not enough current...does the surface look calm other than the slight water movement?

There is a page with 10 steps to get algae to go down somewhere...i will see if i can find it and post it for you...or if anyone else knows of it feel free to post it please

Also i would take the kenya tree out of the nano. I just had two baseball size clumps that i returned to my LFS since they had started to spread. They will take over the tank very quickly (specially a nano). They drop their arms which will then float around the tank and attach to everything.

 

[0o.Kelsey.o0]

hmm i cant find it right now and am going to be late for school. I will try to find it later tonight if no one has posted it yet

 

[0o.Kelsey.o0]

actually just found a few that melosa58 posted on one of my old threads

FantasyReef Databases-Viewing item "10 Step Plan for Nuisance Algae Control"

Another view on Algae control - helpful tips

Algae control in salt water tanks

The first one is the 10 step one i was talking about

 

[Andylee]

It is just a green haze over the RO water. I change out 2 gal 1week ago today. I clean the filter @ every water change. I use only RO water, never tap. I test the water with the test tubes and the drops of solution.
I feed the blennie and crab a few tiny pellets of food just 1x/day.
I am beginning to believe that there is not enough water movement. I will try to see what I can do about this.
To remove the Kenya Tree coral, do I just pick it off the LR? I can see where a few new ones have started.
Thanks, again, all of you for your help!!

 

[Andylee]

Thank you so much, Kelsy!

 

[Andylee]

One more question (sorry), but how often are you supposed to change the light bulbs?
Thanks,
Anida

 

[0o.Kelsey.o0]

Well it sounds like you are doing a good job taking care of the tank! Just cut back on the lighting a few hours maybe and also when you clean your filter you should be cleaning it in the old water from the tank to keep all the beneficial bacteria alive (you might be doing this already just thought I'd mention it)

As for the kenya tree, you can just pull it off the LR at its root if you want or you can try to break off a chunk of the rock it is on. I had my two larger pieces of kenya tree on small rocks so i just brought the whole thing into the LFS. I then pulled off the new smaller pieces that had attached to my larger pieces of rock and threw them out. The odd time i didn't get all of the root and it tried to grow back but i would just pull it off again.

Lights I'd replace at least every year. They say to replace MH every 6 months though so possibly sooner? I'm not too sure on that.

 

[Andylee]

Yep!!! That's all it took was to create more movement on the surface of the water!!!
Thanks everyone!