algae, mold or what....

[kaeiffert]

Hi all... My first post here. Hopefully not the last. I'm not sure if this is a beginner question or not, if I'm in the wrong place perhaps a mod will move this for me.

History:

I've had a 25gal freshwater community tank for just under a year. I recently had a filter problem that I didnt catch in time, and lost a most of my tank. I cleaned it up but I missed on of the fish that decayed under a rock I had in the tank.

When I discovered the decayed fish it had a white grey cloud of what I am calling "mold" around it... I pulled the deat fish and didn't think much about it, but in a few days I had that same "mold" appearing all around the tank. I decided to do a total tank cleaning.

I saved a couple of gallons of the old tank water, pulled the 3 remaining fish to a fish bowl and completely cleaed the tank and changed out all the gravel.

The tank is now back up and running, the three fish have been thriving in it again for a few days now, but the "mold" is returning on bits of uneaten food, and an algae tab I had in there for my clown pleco. I cleaned it up again.....


Question:

What is this "mold"? Is it dangerous? How do I get rid of it?

I want to start getting new fish again, bit I don't want to do anything to I figure out what is going on in my tank.

 

[Shaunna]

The mold sounds like something I was getting in my new tank tho I didn't have a decayed fish in there. It turned out I was overfeeding and it was just fungus growths. This could be the same thing as it is all rotting material, however, you will probably go back through a minicycle since you replaced all the gravel and stuff.

 

[FroggyFox]

Yep its just a fungus...just take out the pieces when you see them. If there is uneaten food you are feeding too much. Try lessening your feeding to every other day or 1/2 of what you're feeding now (if you feed more than once a day, make it once a day in a smaller portion) and maybe tell us some more about your tank? What three fish do you still have? What kind of filter do you have?

How did you "clean" the gravel and did you also "clean" the filter? A lot of your good bacteria (that turns ammonia to nitrites and nitrites to nitrates) lives in/on your filter and tank decorations and gravel...so if you have a test kit the best thing to do is probably monitor the levels of ammonia and nitrite in your tank for a couple of weeks after the big cleaning. Do your water changes like normal (35% a week +/-) and if there isnt any ammonia or nitrite spike after awhile then I'd say you'd be fine to start adding fish in slowly.

 

[geekrockgirl85]

ah, yes. mystery fuzz. it seems to be a companion of new tank syndrome.

as shaunna said, it usually is just decaying food. (EDIT:froggy pretty much covered everything, but since i already bothered to type it out... ) do more frequent water changes if you can, vacuum up any fungusy things or food that goes uneaten, feed less each day or switch to every other day.

and yes, there is a chance that you spiked a mini-cycle with such a thorough cleaning. if you haven't invested in ammonia and nitrite test kits, i would suggest that you do so before you add any more fish (and avoid the dip strips if you can... they're notoriously inaccurate). or if you've got the test kits, check to make sure that you've got zero ammonia and nitrite. that way you can make sure that you're not spiking and that your bacteria can handle the increased bioload of new fish.

 

[kaeiffert]

I replaced the graval rather than clean it...

I have a test kit and all test are normal.

The three fish currently in there are:

Pictus Catfish
Clown Pleco
Some sort of red tetra... hehe sorry forgot its name.

When I scrubbed down the tank I did not clean the filter, and I kept 2 gallons of old tank water just so that the restart time would be minimized.... besides the fungus everything seems to be doing well... I'll start adding soem fish back.

while I have you guys... How do you feel about frogs.

My wife saw one of the dwarf african frogs at Petco the other day. Anything I should know about them?

 

[FroggyFox]

ohh sorry I didn't read good enough on the replacing gravel thing. How long ago did you do all of this (replacing gravel etc)? If its been a week I'd say you're good to go...

ADF's are cute...anything you want to know about them you can find here: http://www.myfishtank.net/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=23215 Leopardess wrote a great article about them.

 

[Shaunna]

I like them. One of the critters I am concidering in my 29 gallon. ( I consider everyhting for that tank... I had an ich outbreak a while back, wiped out practically my whole tank. Now for 3 months I have been to scared to add anything else to it!! One of these days Iw ill restock it.. will be planting it first though) So, I say go for it. Go to the other aquatic creatires forum on here and find Leopardess' article on them. Very informative. Tell you everyhting you need to know about them.


Edit... Froggy beat me to it!

 

[kaeiffert]

ohh sorry I didn't read good enough on the replacing gravel thing. How long ago did you do all of this (replacing gravel etc)? If its been a week I'd say you're good to go...

ADF's are cute...anything you want to know about them you can find here: http://www.myfishtank.net/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=23215 Leopardess wrote a great article about them.

It was Tuesday that I did the whole tank scrub down. And thanks for the link on the frogs. You guys rock.