brown algae. help?

[tmdavies]

hello i have a 60 litre (13 gallon tank) with 3 common goldfish (small) and one butterfly pleco. My tank is planted with 2 live plants Cabomba Caroliniana and Echinodorus Paniculatus Emerse and christmas moss.
My filter is a marina slim filter 15 (which i dont think is great). My ammonia is around 0.50 i am getting a bigger tank soon and this should sort it out(hopefully) my nitrates are 5. i remove 20 litres of water twice a week and vacuum the gravel twice a week.
brown algae is starting to grow all over my tank can anyone help me?
I dont know a lot about algae.

 

[TraceyB4602]

First off I hate to say this but those goldfish need a bigger tank. With 3 goldfish you need a 50 gallon tank. They are dirty fish. One goldfish needs 30g. Your filter is to small you should have a filter that filters double. That is probably why you have ammonia and nitrate.

As for the algae, is your tank near the sun? How long do you keep your light on in your tank?

 

[Fishkeeper26]

How long has the tank been established?

 

[mommytron]

the brown algae is probably diatoms. they almost always show up in new tanks. they should eventually go away.

actually, if those are comet goldies, they should really be in a pond (or a VERY large tank, 125g min. they get enormous). if they are the fancies, 30g minimum for one, plus an additional 10g for each additional fish. as tracey stated they are very messy fish and have a huge bioload for their size (pee and poo a lot). 13gallons is way too small for any kind of goldfish.

did you cycle your tank prior to adding fish? your ammonia should be at 0ppm. it's highly toxic to fish. what is your nitrite level? nitrite is toxic as well. both should be kept at 0ppm. do water changes as much as you need to to keep ammonia and nitrites as close to 0ppm as possible. try not to vacuum the gravel if your tank is unestablished, that's where a lot of bacteria will grow, and you need that beneficial bacteria to cycle your tank.

 

[tmdavies]

tank has been established about 2 months maybe a little less. I did mention in my original message that i was upgrading to a bigger tank soon 55 gallon.

 

[Fishkeeper26]

It's probably just from your tank me relatively newly set up