[Tonz of fun]

So I have had my tank up and running for about 3 months now. Its a 54g corner tank. I have a 100lb of LR and 60lbs of sand for filtration. I have 5 small fish all under 2 inches in size. For the last week the algea in my tank has been getting out of control. There are two different kinds of algea. One is a hair the other is this green fuzzy algea that can be sucked out during my weekly water changes of 10 percent. My lighting cycle is 10 hours of 4x 24 watt oft5s and 8 hours of 150 WATT MH. I feed once every 2-3 days. I have tested my water and my phosphates and nitrates are 0. Im using Salfiert tests. I also use RO/DI water from home. Im not really sure where this algea could be coming from since there are no phosphates and no nitrates. No green water just tons on the rocks. Any ideas?

[SweeTang22]

i would drop your light cycle for sure. thats a lot of light and my guess is its all the MH. i wouldnt run it for longer then 6 hours because your using t-5s.
i would also shorten the time the t-5s are running. if the t-5s are actinic i would still run them 10hours but if you have white light with them, then i would tune it down. after cutting back on the lighting the hair algae should go down grately. another idea would be to get a lawnmower blenny. dont get him if you have too many fish but he eats a lot of my hair algae. i have yet to have any problems with algae, just the cyano. i would find another test kit just to compare the phosphate test. also test for silicates. silicates is hard to remove from water and some RO/DI units will not remove them due to type of media being used. hope some of these ideas work. good luck!

[Cela Vie]

Glad you brought this up. Do you have an ATO? If so, what container are you using? I'm having the same issue...sort of...couple of spots with green hair algae clumps and I have to scrub my glass on a daily basis due to a green film. This did not start until we went away for three days. Before we left, I set up an ATO with one of my wife's rubbermaid storage totes (18-gallon one just in case). Well, I kept it going until it was almost empty so the algae issue got worse. This morning, I tested the RO/DI water in the reservoir and the TDS was 98!!! Not good when I know my RO/DI unit is producing 0-TDS water. I kept the ATO, but I'm now using a 5-gallon Reef Crystals bucket with the cool twist-on/off lid (made a hole in the very middle for the cable and hose so I can continue to twist it on/off and keep my two-). It's smaller and I hope that fixes my problem. Else, I'm thinking phosphate reactor, but considering I haven't tested for phosphates yet, that has yet to be determined. Have you tested for phosphates yet?

PS: Nice avatar! Is that you? Cause mine is me...mini me! lol

[Tonz of fun]

I never thought about that. I dont have a ato but when i make ro water I put it in a rubbermaid trash can...

[Cela Vie]

check the TDS in that (after it's been in there for a while...). Let me know what you find. It may be my wife's rubbermaid container, but I would be interested in finding out otherwise...

No response on the PS: ? lol

[Tonz of fun]

PS? TDS? I dont know what your reffering too...

[Cela Vie]

Originally Posted by Tonz of fun

PS? TDS? I dont know what your reffering too...

Originally Posted by Cela Vie

PS: Nice avatar! Is that you? Cause mine is me...mini me! lol

That...lol

[Tonz of fun]

I am way lost.

[Cela Vie]

PM sent...

[SweeTang22]

did you test your water to see what it was thats out of control??

[Tonz of fun]

I used 3 different tests everything is 0. Now that doesnt mean that the hair algea isnt grabbing the nitrates and converting before it gets to the tests but I dont know. I havent been home sense Friday at 3 so well see what everything looks like when I get home. I maybe getting a phosban reactor.

[Cela Vie]

Did you test for phosphates? You may want to do that before getting a phosban reactor. I was at the LFS on Sunday because they had a sale and thought about getting a phosban reactor. Instead, I bought a phospahe test which shows zero phosphates...

[Tonz of fun]

I tested phosphates with 2 different tests. All showed 0. But I was thinking that the hair algea was eating up the phosphates before it showed up in my tests. The algea has to be feeding off of something.