Green water causes and fixes?

[PUNISHER VETTE]

So i've got some green water in my somewhat newly established 30g planted shrimp tank.

There are a few variables i have that could be leading to this but need to decide which one is the problem.

1. i've got 130w of lighting on for 8ish hours a day. This is because i've got the 260w light that i had on my 110g on it now with only 2 of 4 lights on.
I can't really turn off the lights but what i can do is have 65w on for a certain amount of time and 130w on for a shorter time.

2. The room the tanks in gets day light, but the tank never gets direct sunlight. I've also covered the back of the tank(the side closest to the window) with a black cloth background in order to help reduce any sunlight getting to the tank.

3. There's only shrimp in this tank so excess waste isn't the problem but i have been dosing fertilizers(Seachem flourish, excel, iron) on a every other day basis.


I can
1. reduce the lighting,
2. try and eliminate as much sunlight getting to the tank as possible.
3. do more water changes and fertilize less.

should i do a blackout of the tank?

[Dave66]

It's the sunlight, Punisher. It doesn't matter if it's indirect or right on the tank, the nutrient level in aquariums is high enough to feed floating algae. Until you either move the tank or paint the window black you'll always have the green water. It won't matter if you do a blackout or reduce the lighting.

If you can't move the tank or truly block the sunlight from reaching your tank, you can either buy a diatom filter, which would be just a stop-gap method since they can't be run constantly, or an inline UV sterilizer, which can.

How old are your light bulbs, Punisher? If they are T8s you should switch them out every six months. Power Compacts every eight.

Dave

[PUNISHER VETTE]

It's the sunlight, Punisher. It doesn't matter if it's indirect or right on the tank, the nutrient level in aquariums is high enough to feed floating algae. Until you either move the tank or paint the window black you'll always have the green water. It won't matter if you do a blackout or reduce the lighting.

If you can't move the tank or truly block the sunlight from reaching your tank, you can either buy a diatom filter, which would be just a stop-gap method since they can't be run constantly, or an inline UV sterilizer, which can.

How old are your light bulbs, Punisher? If they are T8s you should switch them out every six months. Power Compacts every eight.

Dave


They're power compacts and only a few months old. 3-4ish.

There's a south facing sliding door that has a good supply of indirect light during most of the day. It's got a white shade that i've had at 1/2 drawn forever. I can at least put it at fully closed but since it's white and thin so it'll still light up but it might help some. I've been meaning to install some nicer and darker blinds so maybe i'll look into that.

The tanks at the foot of my bed(but it wasn't when this photo was taken.)
http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e289/tparkhi2/House/IMG_0463.jpg

[Zilla]

Why are you using ferts every other day?

If the tank gets indirect sunlight, are you leaving the lights on while the sun is out or are you turning them on at night? If the tank is getting sunlight plus 8 hours of tank light, that's way too much of a photo period but one can't blame the entire problem on lighting regardless of what form it comes in.

Why can't the lights be turned off?

Have you tested for phosphates? What does your iron parameters look like?

Is there any water movement? Are there stagnant areas in the tank where the algae is prone to collecting?

What are you feeding the shrimp? Are you sure there's no gunk on the bottom of the tank or hidden amongst plants and such? Yeah shrimp are scavengers of sorts, but that doesn't mean the tank shouldn't be cleaned.

Algae has to feed off of something. It just doesn't magically appear because a tank gets sunlight whether it's direct, indirect, filtered, ect. Before you make yourself crazy and make the tank more like a cave, I'd look into what is really causing the problem.

[PUNISHER VETTE]

Why are you using ferts every other day?

If the tank gets indirect sunlight, are you leaving the lights on while the sun is out or are you turning them on at night? If the tank is getting sunlight plus 8 hours of tank light, that's way too much of a photo period but one can't blame the entire problem on lighting regardless of what form it comes in.

Why can't the lights be turned off?

Have you tested for phosphates? What does your iron parameters look like?

Is there any water movement? Are there stagnant areas in the tank where the algae is prone to collecting?

What are you feeding the shrimp? Are you sure there's no gunk on the bottom of the tank or hidden amongst plants and such? Yeah shrimp are scavengers of sorts, but that doesn't mean the tank shouldn't be cleaned.

Algae has to feed off of something. It just doesn't magically appear because a tank gets sunlight whether it's direct, indirect, filtered, ect. Before you make yourself crazy and make the tank more like a cave, I'd look into what is really causing the problem.


I've got a TON of plants so i've been dosing every other day. I noticed my amazon sword showing some deficiency signs so i started dosing more often(i think it was lack of iron). Maybe i've been dosing too much though..

Lights are on only when the sun is up. No extended photo period there.

This light is meant for a larger tank. I can only turn on 2 or 4 lights at a time. But what i can do is unplug 1 light from each set. Then only 1 can be on for a certain amount of time then have the other come on for a short time to double up for a little. This would help reduce the overload of light the tank might be getting since 130w is 4+ wpg.

I do have a phosphate tester but haven't use it. I guess if i'm not too lazy i'll run some tests tomorrow and see if anything is out of whack.

There is a large powerhead with an aerator on all the time. Plenty of movement and oxygen for the shrimp. No filter however. I've been doing water changes at least once a week but i haven't been doing gravel vac's as there are so many plants and tiny shrimp that get in the way. But the gravel doesn't look too dirty yet. Next time i'll try and vac a bit more and see if there's an excess of buildup.

I just drop in an algae pellet every few days when the shrimp look hungry. Usually they're all over it and it's gone fairly quickly.

[Zilla]

Do you have a turkey baster? If you're worried about sucking up shrimp with a vac, try using a turkey baster around the base of plants and any other places around that tank that may be inhabited by critters that you don't want to remove or are afraid of removing.

Turkey basters are really cheap. If you have a Dollar Store ( or something like it) near by, it might be worth the buck or two if for no other reason than to make yourself feel better about cleaning.

My tank gets filtered sunlight, so I stagger the amount of time I use tank lights. I turn them on for a couple of hours first thing in the morning, then leave them off until later in the afternoon. Total photo period ranges anywhere from 8-10 hours depending on what the weather is like.

It sounds like you've got a handle on everything else other than possibly OD'ing the tank with ferts, so maybe you need to cut back on those. Water testing will tell you if there is any excess as plants don't need huge amounts of ferts anyway.

You didn't mention water changes, but those will help as well. If you OD on ferts, a water change will help dilute them as long as you don't dose again right after the water change that is. ;)

[PUNISHER VETTE]

tested a few things today but not everything.

Phosphates and ammonia are 0 to minimal.
couldn't test nitrates as i messed up my kit by not shaking it well enough for a long time. Now it's useless.

pH is up around 8.0 which i'm pretty sure it's always been high.

The water looks more cloudy today then green. Does that change matters any?

I've been doing water changes more often trying to stay ahead of this thing. I even put a sheet up on my door/window to block as much light as i can to make sure that isn't the problem.

I switched my lights from my newer 6700k to my old 12000k in hopes that they aren't as powerful anymore and less light might help.

[Zilla]

I'm just putting this on here. I could very well be completely off base though...

What types of plants do you have in your tank? I thought you said you had Swords, but what else is in there?

If you have essentially a low light tank in terms of plants, I wonder if it's possible to harm the plants with too much light? Much like a low light plant outside that fries in the sun because it gets too much heat.

[PUNISHER VETTE]

I'm just putting this on here. I could very well be completely off base though...

What types of plants do you have in your tank? I thought you said you had Swords, but what else is in there?

If you have essentially a low light tank in terms of plants, I wonder if it's possible to harm the plants with too much light? Much like a low light plant outside that fries in the sun because it gets too much heat.
http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e289/tparkhi2/30%20gallon%20Tank/IMG_2615bestmaybe.jpg

swords, vals, hygrophila, chain swords, moss...

[Zilla]

How's your tank doing?

Personally I'd consider your tank a low light tank which are slow growing. Too much light and ferts could cause lots of problems.

[PUNISHER VETTE]

The water is still switching from green to white/hazy. It's hard to tell what color it actually is. Some days it looks more white while others it's definitely greenish.

I've had the sun light eliminated for a few days now but haven't seen much improvement but plan on giving it a few more.

I think tonight i'll set up another timer so i only have 1 light on for say 6hours and 2 on for 2hours. Or maybe i can just try 1 and see what happens.

the plants seem to be growing okay. my amazon sword is still showing signs of a deficiency. I'll post up a picture later to figure out what. Tips of the leaves are dying off.

My frogbit is also growing in(floating plant) so that should help to block some of the excess light from the tank.

I'm also looking into adding a small sponge to my power head for some filtration. Right now there is only the powerhead moving water so not much is happening.

[Zilla]

Do you have any ammonia in your tank?

Are all the leaves having this problem? It looks like you have a few that are near the top. Is it possible that they are being burned by the light?

Is there new growth coming from the bottom? If there is new growth, the browning leaf tips would suggest that there is something else going on.