What causes green fuzz algae?

[plant boy]

Im haveing a green fuzz like algae on all over my aquarium plants in my 60g aquarium.My water paremeters are the following,

Ph 6.8
Ammonia 0 ppms
Nitrite 2.5 ppms
Nitrate 0 ppms

My lights are on for 10 hours a day and the spectrum is 6700 k.The lights intensity is 240 watts.:help:

[leggomypleco]

Is your tank near a window? Or dose sun lite hit the tank?

[Wartorn]

You can cut down the photo period to 8 hours..anything over 8 is usually not recommended.

Also that fuzz algae sounds like a hair algae. Most algae (*not the hybrids) grow when there is ample amount of food.

Tap water contains phosphates and so does many frozen foods to. Phosphates are a fertilizer for algae growth. Your plants and algae are competing for that food source now.. though ugly the benefit is it is reducing your nitrates and phosphates...but there seems to be an abundance.

Marine tank owners try to keep phosphates down to 0 readings since we use Uv lighting.. and you have 6.7k bulbs those are nearly sunlight level on the kelvin scale..

How old are your bulbs? Most bulbs in about a year start to degrade and the spectrum changes and may promote more growth of annoyance algae.

You can hand pull out what you can and try to starve it... IM not sure about this next bit of advice because I do not know or recall if its freshwater safe.

Using phosphate remover would help a lot in starving it out.. and cut your photo times down for a little bit...

The other issue is you do introduce more phosphate via tap water and I dont know if its ok to use RO/DI water with large water changes on freshwater.

I think occasionally if you could do 50% change and use Ro/DI water ..you would impact the amount of nitrates nitrites and phosphates in the tank.

[Wild Turkey]

We cant make a real diagnosis of the cause without a lot more info

Is the tank cycled? You shouldnt have any nitrite readings at all if it is.

Is the tank planted? If the tank is planted then you want to be careful about how much you reduce possible causes, as they are what makes your plants grow as well. Light, nutrients, etc.

Do you do waterchanges? How often?

Is this tank getting any sunlight? indirectly maybe?

What size and depth is the tank?

There is a really good article floating around here by gb about "balance" in the aquarium, i'll see if i can find it, its a great read on this subject.

Personally, i let the green algae grow in my FW tanks. Its looks beautiful (when it thickens up) and helps keep the water clear and provides a grazing food source. As well as using extra nitrates and other nutrients that are in excess in the aquarium. Algae has a lot of benefits, brown algae on the other hand, is just too unsightly for me.

Edit: Here ya go! http://www.aquaticcommunity.com/aquariumforum/showthread.php?t=22361

[PUNISHER VETTE]

I also have it started in my 30g shrimp tank. Only started after i moved it so i'm guessing the amount of sunlight hitting the tank is causing it.

Although i don't mind it that much as it looks the best out of the algaes.

[Wartorn]

I also have it started in my 30g shrimp tank. Only started after i moved it so i'm guessing the amount of sunlight hitting the tank is causing it.

Although i don't mind it that much as it looks the best out of the algaes.

Wild is correct to properly give a good diagnosis on a specific tank problem we do need much more info. My previous post was more general advise and info to help shed some light on algae.

As for your 30g shrimp tank is this fresh or salt? I assume salt because of the lighting.

Marine tank is a whole new ballgame with care when it comes to fresh. Basics are about same but the care is more of a pain when it comes to water and maintenance and stuff.

[Wild Turkey]

Yup wartorn has it right, if the tank is Sw, its a whole nother ballgame. I dont think there is anyone out there that wants even a tiny bit of algae in their reef. Im no Sw expert though. But i would say if its SW it would be better to manually remove the algae immediately, then try to figure out whats causing it.

[Wartorn]

Yup wartorn has it right, if the tank is Sw, its a whole nother ballgame. I dont think there is anyone out there that wants even a tiny bit of algae in their reef. Im no Sw expert though. But i would say if its SW it would be better to manually remove the algae immediately, then try to figure out whats causing it.

Yah Wild... Its a complete nightmare for SW users. The lighting we have promotes algae growth so we are more critical of Nitrates Phosphates being over 0ppm ..

The manual removal is for sure the fastest route to go for immediate fix. And I did look up that using Phosguard in the mesh sock is ok with freshwater.

I am a little concerned with the algae growth because you have plants (original poster). We dont want to strip out too much foods for the plants.. But Phosphate removal is good idea since its fertilizer.... Nitrates will feed the plants and that will always be there due to fish poop thumbs2:

[PUNISHER VETTE]

Wild is correct to properly give a good diagnosis on a specific tank problem we do need much more info. My previous post was more general advise and info to help shed some light on algae.

As for your 30g shrimp tank is this fresh or salt? I assume salt because of the lighting.

Marine tank is a whole new ballgame with care when it comes to fresh. Basics are about same but the care is more of a pain when it comes to water and maintenance and stuff.

it's fresh