[Todd L]

Hello all!

Under the advice of a friend I've been running the actinic and daylight bulbs on my Nova Extreme at the same time.
I started out having the actinic coming on, shutting off when the daylight came on, and then back on again when the daylight shut off. Basically a few hours prior and after daylight.
Since I started this scehdule of both on, I've had an incredible amount of algae growth...on my snail shells...the glass..everywhere! This is to the point I can scrape the glass every day if I wanted to.
Some of it looks more like just a fuzz, but I noticed some of the patches I've left have grown long hair-like threads......is this the hair algae I've read about???

I'm going to shorten my lighting cycle and see how that afects it's growth, but has this happened mainly because of having the actinics on as long as the daytime ones? I've not encountered this before, and nothing else has changed.....so should I go back to my old schedule??

[WILLIAM1]

Your lights should be set up so that your atinics come on and 1 hour later your daylight comes on as well. Then both lights are on until the daylight goes off 1 hour later the atinics go off.

12 hours of atinics and 10 hours of daylight.. they should run at the same time.

[e_baer]

Algae = abundance of bad nutrients. Before you change your lighting schedule back to how it was, it would be helpful to know some of your water parameters, NO2, NO3, phosphates, etc.....everything you normally test for. Also, what kind of lighitng system do you have? (PC, T-5, MH etc.)
What do you feed your fish and how often? How many fish do you have? Do you have a protein skimmer? If so, what kind?

Sorry to ask so many questions, but it is hard to answer your question without these crucial details.

[Todd L]

Thanks for the responses here!

I'll do that with the lighting William...thanks!

e_baer...as far as the parameters of the water, all of the levels have always been good, save for higher nitrates than I want. I took the advice of my LFS and have always used the test-strips. I use a tower filter for my water, and have never had issues. My nitrates now are sitting at about 10ppm. Still higher than optimal, but they've sat even higher until I built the small fuge(?) for the back of my tank...they used to be in the 30 range...and have sat that way for the entire almost 3 years I've had the tank. (I'm not doing coral anytime soon, so I'm not going to obsess about it just yet! lol) They're still testing in the *safe* range...

Anyway....I have to assume phosphates and such are removed through the filter I use....an ion-exchange resin tower? Again, never been an issue for 3 years.
The mechanics of my tank are listed on my post, but I use a modified Seaclone 100, and it's been doing an awesome job so far!
As far as fish....I have a pig of a Clarkii clown, a 6-line Wrasse, a scooter blenny, a skunk cleaner shrimp and a sea slug as well as an emerald crab, a small handful of hermies and about a dozen or so snails, including 4 large ceriths. That's it in a 40g, so I don't think the load is excessive...is it??

I feed them a mix of freeze-dried krill, a tiny amount of flake and some of the frozen types (mysis shrimp, omnivore and carnivore formulas) about 3 possibly 4 times a day, and try to limit it to what they eat in a few minutes. (not all of that is fed to them at the same time....just a sample of overall what they eat). I could feed the clown 15 times a day and I swear he'd gobble every time! what a glutton!!

Anyway...thats about it...
I have a cannister filter I have placed LR rubble in per anorther expert opinion here, kept the carbon section and rinse out the mechanical filtration at least every two weeks.

Scratching my head here! The tank has never needed more than an ocassional cleaning of the glass.....it just seems to coincide with te upgrade to the Nova Extreme's this algae has become more noticeable. I just rinsed out the filter and am going to wait until tomorrow to perhaps bring a sample down to my LFS for a more detailed testing to see what they can see.

Thanks for your thoughts here!

[RyanG]

Todd, it would probably be a good idea to go out and buy real testing kits, Good brands are: Seachem, elos or salifert.

Dip test strips are notoriously bad to go by.

Sources of phosphates (po4):

* Some Internal Reasons
o high fish and/or coral population in the aquarium,
o plant material that dies off and mineralization,
o breakdown of undigested food in feces,
o bacterial die-off and its decomposition and mineralization,
o algal die-off and its decomposition and mineralization,
o any other living material that dies, decomposes,
o fish slime (and coral slime in reef tanks) that decomposes (cfr Thiel)

* Some External Reasons
o Overfeeding and the decay of the food that is not consumed,
o Phosphate in the water you are using,
o Phosphate present in the salt you use to make up water,
o Additives that contain it,
o Carbon that leaches phosphate into the water,
o Calcium hydroxide of low quality used to make limewater,
o Phosphate based chelators in additives (cfr Thiel)
o Phosphates in buffering compounds,
o Using frozen foods and adding the liquid after it thaws, to the tank (cfr Thiel),
o Using low grade calcium carbonate in calcium reactors (cfr Knop)

[Todd L]

Thanks Ryan,

I knew at some point I'd need to get better testing kits....not sure why I was holding off!

Anyway.....went to my LFS and picked up a phosphate kit....I already have a nitrate and ammonia....I only have used them ocassionally.
I tested the phosphate and it's about .5, so yes..... a tad high!! Nitrates test at about 5, which for me at this point sans anything hyper sensitive to nitrates seems acceptable.

I put a phosphate sponge in, and am about to do a water change.

I started talking to the owner of the LFS though. We were trying to figure out why the sudden spike in phosphates, as it was evident to her as well as you guys here that this is the issue.
She seems to think the upgrade in lighting really only sparked what was already there to bloom, and asked me how often I feed the fish.
I'd read somewhere...I thought a few times....that they should be fed often, a few times a day, a little bit at a time. That's what I've been doing! She strongly suggested I feed them maybe once every other day? Once a day at most?
I just assumed I guess they needed several feedings......what do you suggest? Anyone?
I can't believe all this time if she is correct (and I have no reason to doubt her) I've been massively overfeeding??? YOW!!

Thoughts?? was I really that big a bonehead???