My tank suffers/suffered from rapid algae growth. Perhaps because there is too much food or detritus in the water/substrate. Perhaps for other reasons. Maybe the conditions are just perfect for growth. The cycle went like this. Day one, just after a water change. Everything looks good, very slight haze on glass in morning. I get home from work and the slight haze has turned into a green hue. I go to bed, wake up day 2. The green hue has turned into a thin film. I go to work, and come home the film has turned into a thick coat of green algae. I clean the glass, do another small water change and go to bed. Cycle repeats. My 2 black snails died during this process. I let them decompose/get eaten instead of removing them from the water. This sounds like a bad idea but I monitored the water conditions almost daily and everything was fine. Small bugs were seen on the dead snails.
I bought a Bi-Color Blenny to try help eat some of the algae. His name became Bender. He really enjoys the porous rock in the tank. He rests on and in it frequently, swimming from cave to cave. He eats his share of algae, but its not enough. Around this point I noticed a lot of 'bugs' in the water. Eventually after going through a lot of salt and some power head reconfiguring; we tried to put my friends Sea Hare into the tank to clean it up. The Hare was shrinking and starving in her really clean tank. A few days later it died, expelling his internal shell through his back. We were both very sad over the loss.
Amongst all this happening, I decided it as time for another fish. This time a tiny False Percula came home with me. Her name is Leela. She is a lovely little creature that swims around and plays in the powerhead wash. Her and Bender get along very well. Seeming to play with each other a little. And swim around with each other too. When Bender first was put into the tank he would stay back from the big liverock, only going into it for a few seconds. It turns out the hitch hiker crab that was in there, was nipping at him and chasing him out. Eventually I caught the crab and put it into another smaller tank. They can get big and viscous. Crabs are very strong. Since then Bender has called the large rock home.
Back to the algae problem. I decided to try leaving the lights off for a couple days. This had 2 effects: the 'bug' population sky rocketed. They now were on every surface in the tank. Sand rocks glass snails everything. Keep in mind these little critters, are VERY little. some of them you can only see as a tiny brown dot moving around. Others are a little larger and white, you can see them on the glass, and swimming. There are a few much larger ones as well, which I assume eat all the other ones. Every now and then I see Leela chasing and eating bugs. Cute. The second effect it had was to almost curb my algae problem. The tiny bugs took care of the rest. Since the bug clean up crew came, I have had the lights on pretty frequently with the timer. And the algae bloom has not really returned. Only a light haze now.
In amongst all of this I have been trying to build an out of tank algae scrubber. What it does is efficiently grow algae on a screen which you circulate your tanks water over. This algae is given lots of light and lots of water flow. It basically takes all the bad stuff out of the water and returns clean water. The algae uses the bad stuff in your water to grow. So all you have to do, instead of water changes. Is just scrape the algae off the screen and throw it away once a week. I have had various amounts of success building this device. A lot of issues have come up and been fixed in the process. Right now the hurdle is water flow. My pump doesn't move the amount of water I would like it to, to function properly. This gives me a much smaller working are for the algae screen.
When I bought the yellow sponge it came from a tank with a lot of algae in it, including red slime. I got a very good price on it, or did I? There was red slime algae on the sponge. So when i brought it home I cleaned it off with a toothbrush a bit. It has not really grown a lot since then but it has grown.This morning there were bubbles forming on it, oxygen I assume. After work today I noticed a significant increase in the amount of slime on it. And the slime had grown right over the gas bubbles from the morning. Something has to be done. So i took the tube off my smaller vacuum and used it to suck as much of the slime off as I could. I got a lot of it. I also got the sand it was infecting. I am a bit worried about the slime taking over my tank. My friend told me to put some red slime remover in the tank. I have been pretty against stuff like that but it might be time. Before it is too late.
Some new things seen living in the tank, before unnoticed. I now have between 3-6 good sized bristle worms living in tank. Some leafy red algae. A few more tube worms, none the same as the last. And some small tube things are growing. I am pretty sure they are animal. I have observed them open up and contract. One is a maroony red, it seems to be growing. And the other is white.
Your tank is really amazing for its size. Not even just for its size. It is just good in and of itself. Like you.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the red slime remover is a good idea. It is a bit expensive, but it does the trick. Buy the smallest package possible, because your tank will likely only need one dose - two at most.
Thanks for the update, by the way. I always enjoy what you have to say. The way you say things is so different than how I would say things, and it makes me smile.
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