brown stuff on my plant leaves?

delfisherman · Jul 31, 2013

I have a zoo med dual t5 with a flora max and sun max bulb in it with it on 3 hours in the morning and 5 at night when i get home. I dose liquid ferts once a week and daily liquid carbon. I have brown algae i think growing on my leaves and i clean the leaves when i clean my tank. Could it be that since my tank is only two months old running that it isnt completely stabilized yet? all my fish are doing great and i don't mind scrubbing the leaves but hope they will get better in time.

Rivercats · Aug 1, 2013

Without a picture I can't say for sure but with the tank being fairly new you most likely have diatoms. Diatoms are self limiting and once they use all the excess silicates in your water they will die out. Only run lighting 6 hours to keep growth down and you can always add a couple nerite snails as they love diatoms and can't reproduce in freshwater aquariums.