Floyd R Turbo
Aquarium Advice Addict
Hoping I could get some input and get some questions answered. I have been on and off with aquariums for about 20 years. Recently got into it again and decided to go with some live plants. Then I got more. Then some died. Then I got more and upgraded my lighting and got more plants. I decided I like the look of the planted tank, now I'm having to learn a lot more. Check out the 55 under my tank pictures.
First thing, I have had a significant amount of algae growth, most of which is on the back glass, and I leave that for the mollies, platies, and swords, they do a pretty good job of keeping it in control. I clean the rest of the glass every 2-3 weeks. The algae seems to be brown and bright green in color, in patches, and started to get some bright green 'sprigs' in some places just recently after I upgraded from 30W of T8 lighting to 64W, so if I follow the 'update on the WPG rule' thinking, I'm at the medium light level, or the 'old' 2 WPG.
This pic is under the old lighting. You can see the blanket of algae. It's not this growth that concerns me, but rather that it seems to be coating my swords and vallisneria like this:
and this
And it seems the only way to get rid of it is to trim the leaves. I got an SAE after just happening to be at the right LFS when they got them, and he devours the leftover stuff on the back glass, but have yet to see if he makes a dent on the plants. Also have a rainbow shark who seems to much on the stuff.
I'm guessing the problem is diatoms, which I just read about in a few places and don't really know that much about them, except it has something to do with silicon in the water and it's pretty much impossible to control. I do get a whiteish haze on the inside of the glass which wpies off with my magnetic glass cleaner, I'm assuming that's the starting stages of growth.
So here's my 'tank profile' (I read I'm supposed to supply this info)
First off, I have a 10g fry tank and due to high tap pH, I use the 55 water for water changes, usually 3 gallons a day, so I'm doing a minimum daily 6% water changes on the 55 (50G effective water).
-55 gallon, fresh, I did have 1 tsp/gal aquarium salt but I've been reducing that through water changes (it was a holistic treatment) it's probably down to 5 or 6 teaspoons total.
-Tank has been setup for almost 2 months, jump started the cycle with a bag of dirty sponge water from LFS, I have not seen Ammonia or Nitrites since week 2 (which was 1/12/9)
-I have 2 4' T8 32W Phillips Natural tri-chromatic 5000K for 64W T8 or equivalent 86W of T12 lighting
-I do not use CO2
-I do not have a phosphate test kit
-pH stabilizes at around 7.2
-Ammonia 0
-Nitrites 0
-Nitrates 10, maybe 15
-KH stays around 3
-GH was at 7 3 weeks ago, now at 3 due to water change frequency (tap GH is 0, KH is 4)
-I just started using Flourish 2 times a week, and I refrigerate it
-I use Prime becuase you hardly use any (awesome)
-tank gets direct sunlight for maybe an hour in the early morning, on side wall in my study and is about 6 feet from window, sun rises and shines right on the tank
Fish stock
5 Platies
3 Mollies
3 Swordtails
2 Guppies
2 Barbs
1 Gouramie
2 Danios
5 Neons
1 Black skirt tetra
1 Red eye tetra
1 Rainbow shark
1 Scissortail rasbora
1 Siamese Algae Eater
2 Amazon Swords
1 Echinodorus Bleheri
1 Echinodorus Rose (I believe)
4 Vallisneria nana (really 3 all together, one is a daughter that I haven't split yet)
2 Wisteria
Bunch of Hornwort
3 Mondo Grass (which I guess isn't even an aquatic plant? Oh well)
You can look at my pics and tell me if I have misidentified any plants. Some pics are older however. The Mondo grass was just added and the anacharis & cabomba are gone.
The algae affecting the plants seems to be the green swords and the vallisneria. Any thoughts?
Also, I'm using a UGF, I know, it's old school, but I never knew they were 'outdated' and would probably still use it if I wasn't going planted.
EDIT: Here are some better pics. Sorry they're fuzzy. I suck at pictures.
First thing, I have had a significant amount of algae growth, most of which is on the back glass, and I leave that for the mollies, platies, and swords, they do a pretty good job of keeping it in control. I clean the rest of the glass every 2-3 weeks. The algae seems to be brown and bright green in color, in patches, and started to get some bright green 'sprigs' in some places just recently after I upgraded from 30W of T8 lighting to 64W, so if I follow the 'update on the WPG rule' thinking, I'm at the medium light level, or the 'old' 2 WPG.
This pic is under the old lighting. You can see the blanket of algae. It's not this growth that concerns me, but rather that it seems to be coating my swords and vallisneria like this:
and this
And it seems the only way to get rid of it is to trim the leaves. I got an SAE after just happening to be at the right LFS when they got them, and he devours the leftover stuff on the back glass, but have yet to see if he makes a dent on the plants. Also have a rainbow shark who seems to much on the stuff.
I'm guessing the problem is diatoms, which I just read about in a few places and don't really know that much about them, except it has something to do with silicon in the water and it's pretty much impossible to control. I do get a whiteish haze on the inside of the glass which wpies off with my magnetic glass cleaner, I'm assuming that's the starting stages of growth.
So here's my 'tank profile' (I read I'm supposed to supply this info)
First off, I have a 10g fry tank and due to high tap pH, I use the 55 water for water changes, usually 3 gallons a day, so I'm doing a minimum daily 6% water changes on the 55 (50G effective water).
-55 gallon, fresh, I did have 1 tsp/gal aquarium salt but I've been reducing that through water changes (it was a holistic treatment) it's probably down to 5 or 6 teaspoons total.
-Tank has been setup for almost 2 months, jump started the cycle with a bag of dirty sponge water from LFS, I have not seen Ammonia or Nitrites since week 2 (which was 1/12/9)
-I have 2 4' T8 32W Phillips Natural tri-chromatic 5000K for 64W T8 or equivalent 86W of T12 lighting
-I do not use CO2
-I do not have a phosphate test kit
-pH stabilizes at around 7.2
-Ammonia 0
-Nitrites 0
-Nitrates 10, maybe 15
-KH stays around 3
-GH was at 7 3 weeks ago, now at 3 due to water change frequency (tap GH is 0, KH is 4)
-I just started using Flourish 2 times a week, and I refrigerate it
-I use Prime becuase you hardly use any (awesome)
-tank gets direct sunlight for maybe an hour in the early morning, on side wall in my study and is about 6 feet from window, sun rises and shines right on the tank
Fish stock
5 Platies
3 Mollies
3 Swordtails
2 Guppies
2 Barbs
1 Gouramie
2 Danios
5 Neons
1 Black skirt tetra
1 Red eye tetra
1 Rainbow shark
1 Scissortail rasbora
1 Siamese Algae Eater
2 Amazon Swords
1 Echinodorus Bleheri
1 Echinodorus Rose (I believe)
4 Vallisneria nana (really 3 all together, one is a daughter that I haven't split yet)
2 Wisteria
Bunch of Hornwort
3 Mondo Grass (which I guess isn't even an aquatic plant? Oh well)
You can look at my pics and tell me if I have misidentified any plants. Some pics are older however. The Mondo grass was just added and the anacharis & cabomba are gone.
The algae affecting the plants seems to be the green swords and the vallisneria. Any thoughts?
Also, I'm using a UGF, I know, it's old school, but I never knew they were 'outdated' and would probably still use it if I wasn't going planted.
EDIT: Here are some better pics. Sorry they're fuzzy. I suck at pictures.