AndynSarah
Member
My tank is nearing the end of its cycle and today we came home to find brown algae growing all over the place. Is that natural, is it good,bad? Help please.
Andy:strooper:
Andy:strooper:
Brown Algae
- Thread starter AndynSarah
- Start date
AndynSarah
Member
Thanks, got a lil worried at first, didn't wanna go through the entire cycle again, the past week and a half have been long enough.
Thanks again,
Andy
Thanks again,
Andy
AndynSarah
Member
is the brown algae supposed to take over everything in the tank? How long will it last? b/c it is the ugliest then I have ever seen in my life, as far as fish tanks go lol
cee
New member
An over-sized skimmer will help take care of that problem real quick. New tanks go through it due to the nitrates, phosphates, etc. Also, st imporrefugiums can help export the nutrients that microalgaes feed on. Snails are generally good at keeping the diatoms down, so if you don't have any, you might want to consider some. HTH.
Dave
Dave
AndynSarah
Member
Hey guys,
You all are probablly going to get tired of my questions, but now the brown algae is going away/almost gone, and green has started growing and is starting to go away. I am thinknig from what I have heard that this is good, any ideas on how far along my cycle is? Will moving across town and having about 3/4 of the water out of that tank for a while and close to a 50% water change cause it to cycle again?
Thanks
Andy
You all are probablly going to get tired of my questions, but now the brown algae is going away/almost gone, and green has started growing and is starting to go away. I am thinknig from what I have heard that this is good, any ideas on how far along my cycle is? Will moving across town and having about 3/4 of the water out of that tank for a while and close to a 50% water change cause it to cycle again?
Thanks
Andy
philagothos
New member
If possible try keeping everything under water during your move and you should have a minimum cycle. I managed to move to IL with no real cycle by keeping all of my rock in a rubbermaid tub with a powerhead and heater. We got to town late and had to stay the night at a friends house. Even with nearly 48 hours in a tub as part of my move I've had no spike in ammonia, nitrites, or nitrates and my corals seem to be happy.
Good Luck,
-Kevin
Good Luck,
-Kevin
AndynSarah
Member
so the move went well then kevin I am assuming.
Andy
Andy
philagothos
New member
I'll try not to hijack this time, but yea everything has gone well. I still need to find a job, I've got a couple leads and am hoping to be employed in the next week or so. I'm really missing the LFS in Knoxville though, the ones here pale in comparison. If you want anything decent you have to drive 2 hours to Chicago, St. Louis, or Indy. The CIMA members have been quite welcoming though.
Back to the topic: is it your 2.5 or 20 that is at this stage?
-Kevin
Back to the topic: is it your 2.5 or 20 that is at this stage?
-Kevin
AndynSarah
Member
my 20, the 2.5 has cycled out, we believe. although with it looking at it the wrong way could cuse the levels to go funny on it. I tested the 20 today and the amonia was between 0 and .25. and everything else was at 0. Would the waste from the damsels be causing the amonia to read above 0? Could our 20 already be cycled?
Thanks
Andy
Thanks
Andy
Angela Short
New member
I would think disturbing the substraight and doing 50% may throw things out of whack for sure. Do a few smaller water changes every other day leading up to the move day and save the "old" water to replace with instead of new SW for the bacteria or just save all the water in a few buckets and only replace 15-20% like a water change.
I would say the added fish load is where your ammonia is comming from. A tanks bio is only as big as its load requires it to be. This is why they say add 1-2 fish at a time so the bio can catch up and not put a ton of fish in at once. The damsels were the first fish in so naturally your amonia is gonna go up and it will level back out as the bio catches up. How many damsels did you add? I wouldn't wanna burn all my fish capacity in a 20 gallon with them unless they are what you are into. They may terrorize any other fish in a 20 anyways but hopefully you got nice damsels
.
Oh and you are putting in food now and most people overfeed (me included) fish so it can add to the decaying stuff and add ammonia. Feed very sparingly till the amonia is under controll, even every other day wouldn't hurt the fish.
I would say the added fish load is where your ammonia is comming from. A tanks bio is only as big as its load requires it to be. This is why they say add 1-2 fish at a time so the bio can catch up and not put a ton of fish in at once. The damsels were the first fish in so naturally your amonia is gonna go up and it will level back out as the bio catches up. How many damsels did you add? I wouldn't wanna burn all my fish capacity in a 20 gallon with them unless they are what you are into. They may terrorize any other fish in a 20 anyways but hopefully you got nice damsels
.Oh and you are putting in food now and most people overfeed (me included) fish so it can add to the decaying stuff and add ammonia. Feed very sparingly till the amonia is under controll, even every other day wouldn't hurt the fish.
AndynSarah
Member
we bought 2 damsels, one of them died, he just wouldn't eat when we fed him and the other one would eat everything, I was sad it was a dominoe damsel. Do the almost neon blue damsels loose the blue color at night when the lights are off? Ours was white this morning but when we turned the lights on and fed it the blue came back. Didn't know if that was normal or not?
Thanks,
Andy
Thanks,
Andy
AndynSarah
Member
ok, I was scared when I saw it b/c the other damsel had bleached but was totally non-responsive when I netted it in the middle of the day. So I was curious.
Thanks,
Andy
Thanks,
Andy
AndynSarah
Member
I netted it b/c it had already met its demise.
Andy
Andy
