alge ?

[onabudget]

hello and thanks for your time , i curently have a 44g pent setup with about 80 lbs of lr a cpr bakpak2r a emperor 280 a 250 watt pfo hqi setupit seems to be doing fine other than my button poylps are not looking so welland my alge went from brown to green and then went back to brown againbut i was wandering if my alge turned back brown because i changed my filter in my emperor280 because i notice it didnt turn til i did that do i even suppoed to run a filter pad or just the media?and next ? is what is some good test kit strips that i can get to use because i get tired of the drops and mixing?

 

[Blown 346]

I would use filter pads in the filter since they will filter out debris and uneaten food etc. As for the algae, is this a newly setup tank, like a few month's wise? If so the algae is all normal and will go away as the tank ages and matures and becomes more stabile.
If you changed your lighting to something more intense than algae can form from that as well.
You have to kepp good husbandry, like normal scheduled water changes, watch how much and often you feed, 2 to 3 minutes and there should be no food visible in the tank.
Having a good sized skimmer that can handle the tanks load will also cut algae problems down, as well as it has to be tuned properly.

As for test kits the easy dip strip test's are quick but they arent that accurate. I use te mixing type, and they seem to be dead on accurate. I use Hagen tests, I would get a test for each of the following.

Ammonia
Nitrite
Nitrate
P.H.
Hardness
Calcium
Phosphate

 

[bertoni]

Personally, I wouldn't run anything in the filter except perhaps some carbon. It's a personal choice, though. If you want to run filter pads, I'd recommend cleaning them frequently.

 

[onabudget]

thanks for the info