Why Is My Water Brown???

[porcelaindoll]

I've never had this problem before. yesterday i came home from work and noticed that my water had turned a dark brown. so i did a 50% water change and it cleared up. then i come come today and it's exactly the same. the only thing that has changed recently with my aquarium is that I upgraded my lighting to about 3-4 watts per gallon but that was like 2-3 weeks ago.
what is causing this????

this tank has been set up for 2 years.
ammonia=0
nitrite=0
nitrate=15
ph 8.2
temp 78

 

[melosu58]

What is in your tank? Fish and/or corals? Is there alot of diatoms in the tank causing the water to look brown.

 

[Kurt_Nelson]

Is this the tank that was medicated? You posted a few days back a question about mixing medications ...

 

[porcelaindoll]

yes, it was medicated. i was just remembering i had some red slime on my live rock and I scraped it off with a toothbrush. maybe that caused a bacterial bloom causing my water to turn brown???

 

[porcelaindoll]

no brown algae in the tank. just brown water. i was told to use a phosphate remover to clear it up.....

 

[Kurt_Nelson]

yes, it was medicated. i was just remembering i had some red slime on my live rock and I scraped it off with a toothbrush. maybe that caused a bacterial bloom causing my water to turn brown???

What did you medicate it with? I know Maracyn will turn the water a nice shade of green. There's a good chance whatever medication you used is fouling the water.

You also could be seeing a diatom bloom from the new increased lighting level.

 

[Devilishturtles]

Also what kind of phosphate remover are you using and where is it located?

 

[roka64]

I'm thinking the same a Kurt. When I upgraded my lights I had various algea blooms. On the other hand, If you are using Phosban in a phosban reactor, if the flow through there is too much, it will break up the phosban and get into your tank. Another thing on phosban, rinse it before you put it in, there are tons of little particles the need to be rinsed out.

 

[porcelaindoll]

yeah, so......does anyone else know what could have caused my water to turn brown. it still hasn't cleared up yet.

 

[porcelaindoll]

I did use maracyn to medicate and have many times before, that has never happened.

 

[roka64]

Have you tried running carbon?