allge bloom

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Flame

Small Fish
#1
Aug 21, 2005
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Oklahoma, USA
#1
algae bloom

Ok

I got a major alge bloom the past two days. Did a 10% water change tonight and began looking for the source of the problem. The basic water test are

PH=8.4, NH3=0, NO2=0,NO3=5.0.
So I picked up a Calcium, KH, and Phospate test.

Calcium was a little low. 300 ppm
KH was running 200 ppm
Phospahte 1 ppm

Looks like Phosphate may be causing my problem but some of the other water specs are off. Any suggetions how to proceed. I was buying my DI water, however starting this past week I strated using a new RO/DI unit. Tested the water from the unit and no phophate=0

The only thing in the 50gal tank is live rock, and 3 Inches of fine grain sand. Only thing that happened the power head came off the glass and made a major sand storm in the tank. Skimmer is pulling off about 2 cups of green stuff a day.

Thanks to all
 

Last edited:
KahluaZzZ

KahluaZzZ

Superstar Fish
#2
Jun 12, 2004
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#2
2 cups...this is huge. You have elevated concentrations of phos.
Silicates and phosphates can be, in part, removed by a safe and wonderful product called Rowaphos + change more water volume.
Nitrates are low, but don't wait 2 much..
 

RockingCricket

RockingCricket

Large Fish
#3
Jul 29, 2005
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Sunny Cali & Rainy England
#3
What kind of algae? Brown hair like (diatom) algae?
If PO4 was introduced through your old water supply, and your new supply contains none, the problem will burn itself out in a short amount of time as the diatoms use up the available PO4.
For asthetics you could manually blow the diatoms off your rocks and substrate with a powerhead, so that the particles are in suspension and can then removed by your filter.
Also, there are silica and phosphate removal bags which you could add to your filter to speed up the process.
 

KahluaZzZ

KahluaZzZ

Superstar Fish
#8
Jun 12, 2004
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#8
well maybe you got lucky or i didn't...

Flame if you don't have a sump, maybe you should think about setting one up with chaetomorpha or caulerpa....those will thrive in your system.
How old is your tank ? What light do you have ? Also what salinity ..
 

W

wayne

Elite Fish
#12
Oct 22, 2002
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#12
For a new system that's awfully high for phosphate ....

Rowaphos for that.

And you'll just have to wait for the diatoms to disappear
 

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