Help, well advice would be great!

[imrandome1]

Okay so in my 45 gallon tank i have 3 fish, so its not really over stocked, i have live plants and 2.x30 watt Nutri grow plant lamp on for 10 hours, anyway my water is soooo cloudy i dont now why? its really strange is been running for about a months (not including cycling) and has always been slightly cloudy, but in the past week its go so bad i cant even see to the other side!! i have a Jewel internal filter ( that i hate) and a fluval 405 external filter, ive been doing water changes and nothing ive added carbon so now all the Tetraplant stuff i put in there has gone to waste, and yet its still cloudy, i washed the gravel b 4 i put it in there, so what am i doing wrong???

My other tank is fine!
i have added a pic, because im bored
Ph 7.6
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
nitrate 20

temp 84f cant lower it grrrr

Any suggestion would be great! thanks

 

[JustOneMore20]

The nitrates are a little high, to only have 3 fish. How many times a day do you feed them? How much water do you change at a time?

Usually cloudy water (white-colored cloud) is a bacterial bloom, but they are normally in new tanks. They usually go away on their own though.

How often do you add the plant fertilizer?

 

[IceH2O]

Is it a green or white cloudiness? From the pic it looks green but could just be a reflection. Put some in a glass and hold it to a piece of paper and tell us what color it is.

Green is algae and means you have to many nutrients for your plant mass. A low light tank usually doesn't need much in the way of ferts. Maybe you're adding to much TetraPlant.

White is bacterial but your parameters look to good to be that.

 

[tropicfishman]

sounds like overfeedings

 

[imrandome1]

I cant really tell in the glass, but i think its white, as for fertilizer i added as much as i should, a cording to the bottle and the reason for the nitrates is because my tap water has 20 and i change 15% x2 a week!

I feed them once a day, if that ( im underfeeding if anything )

 

[JustOneMore20]

my tap water has 20

Wow. I see.

How often do you feed the fish?

 

[imrandome1]

yeah its because of were i live, lots of farming and my water is from a chalk filtered spring so fresh lol but with nitrates, even though that many is not really gd for u, i think lol

I feed them once a day, if that ( im underfeeding if anything )

 

[lovemybarbs]

how much natural light does the tank get? Is it close to a window?

 

[imrandome1]

it gets natural light but not direct sunlight and not as much as my other tank and yets thats clear.?

 

[lovemybarbs]

well mine didn't have direct either, but I got algae bloom. I don't know why the other didn't get it. It took a fish death for mine to flare up.

I would suggest a black out to see if it clears it up. It only took three days for mine to clear up.

 

[imrandome1]

Will do, will the plants be okay?

 

[lovemybarbs]

I don't have live.

Anyone here ever do a black out with live plants????

I'm sure they will be fine, but let's check with the others.

 

[imrandome1]

but let's check with the others.

good plan, btw thanks for the help, O my this is turning into a plant topic, hmm il add a question to keep it general lol, errm i got a new external filter, therefore i have 2 running, how long do i need to wait until i can turn of the internal one off? there much better lol,