brown algae crazy growth?

[davidmaguirre]

I've had my tank set up for about 3 years and I still am having a brownish algae taking over my tank I've got a fluval fx5 ,remora pro skimmer, 125 lbs live rock which all the brown algae is growing. I introduced purple coraline about 2 years ago and I used to use tap water but a month ago I switched to ro water I do weekly water changes have about 30 Mexican algae eating crabs and 10 fish.. I also changed my bulbs about a month ago what's going on? Its not going away??? Nitrates are about 0 please help me!?

 

[Purevil21]

Did you switch to a new type of lighting when you changed the bulbs, are you running the lights more then you usually do? Could you post some pics?

 

[Purevil21]

Also, how big is the tank?

 

[davidmaguirre]

The tank is 125 gallon sorry for not mentioning that lol and I got new light bulbs of the same kind.2 10,000 k and two actinics

 

[tyspot1000]

How long do you keep the bulbs on?

 

[davidmaguirre]

9 hours a day I have finger leathers and pulsing xenias

 

[Purevil21]

9 hours is a little much, light contributes to algae growth. The lights really only need to run 5-6 hours a day to keep water conditions stable. But I doubt its the only cause, is the sun in direct sunlight?

 

[davidmaguirre]

No its not in direct sunlight..

 

[Purevil21]

What are you testing your nitrates with?

 

[davidmaguirre]

The strips

 

[Purevil21]

You need to get a good testing kit, the strips are frequently off. As are the API test kits, as I have learned (They don't print manufacture dates, so most the time your getting old chemicals). My API kit is never right. When I first started I used the strips, and I lost some fish. Upon going to my LFS, I discovered I had high nitrites. Take some water to your LFS, they almost always check water for free.

 

[Purevil21]

How often are you feeding your fish?

 

[tyspot1000]

Strips are highly inaccurate giving you false readings everytime, I would recommend getting a liquid test kit to test with (more accurate.)

 

[Purevil21]

If you have that much algae there is almost certainly nitrates present.

 

[davidmaguirre]

The thing is I have been going to the lfs every week to see what they have in stock and they test my water and they just tested it last Tuesday and they told me I have very low nitrates? I feed them every 3 days.

 

[Purevil21]

That is puzzling, is the algae growing anywhere in particular? Rocks, sand, glass or is it just everywhere?

 

[davidmaguirre]

I know.. no one can tell me wuts going on.. the rocks and parts of the glass that the rocks touch its basically on the rocks and like every 2 or 3 days u can see it start to form on the sand is take a pic but the lights are off and the moon lights are dim... I shift the sand around when nesecery

 

[Purevil21]

Yeah, shifting the sand isn't eliminating it though. Your just burying it in the substrate. You have me puzzled, I had a brown algae problem awhile back. Nitrates were rising, I cut the lights back to 5 hours a day, cut feeding to twice a week and did a 20% water change immediately. Nitrates were back at 0 in a week, never went up again.

 

[Purevil21]

How much water are you changing weekly?

 

[davidmaguirre]

25%