Bubblez!

This hairy algae plant is growing everywhere in my tank, its like an actual plant. I have 9 fish in my tank, cold water fish. I have had it for about a year. I clean the filter and wipe the sides of the tank once a fortnight and do a water change and clean the things in it and gravel etc, every 4 weeks. I have fake plants. Not real ones. Just plastic ones. I have the aquarium light on for about 9-11 hrs overnight. Every night. And I feed my algae eaters some food not very often, perhaps once every 2-3 weeks and feed my other fish (white cloud minows and danios) approx 5 flakes every night. Recently in the last few weeks I have had this wierd plant grow on the things in it and it is now trapped in the filter and I can't get it out! How can I get it out and where do I put it. How can I stop it from growing. What is it. Please help all help appreciated thanks.

katetnies

what kind of algae eaters do you have? if they are chinese algae eaters they only do their job when they are smaller. once they get bigger they stop eating algae and will become territorial, attacking other fish and eating their body slime.
how many gallons is your tank? what kind of filter do you have?

Bubblez!

My algae eaters are english, my tank is 35 litres and I dont know what my filter type is sorry.

katetnies

what kind of fish do you have? if theres no heater in your tank that could be why there is so much algae. if i remember correctly green algae grows faster in cold temperatures. i know that in hot temperaters and agrivated water situations algae turns red cuz it doesnt like the environment. i would try adding more movement to the water. maybe an airstone.
as for your english algae eater, i havent heard of them. for algae pleco's are hardy algae eaters but they need a bigger tank. you could try cory catfish

Jonah

Could you post a picture of your algae eaters?

Chinese Algae Eaters is a type of fish and a picture will clarify what you really have.

Stradius011

You should reduce the amount of lighting on the tank. Do u have direct sunlight on your aquarium? Do you turn ur tank lights on only the night? And you should clean out ur tank every week to help get rid of the algae.

agabr123

could you post a picture of the algae and the algae eaters?

welcome to fishlore

Bubblez!

Hi Everyone,
Thankyou for all your replies so far. Just to say I am not very good with fish breeds so sorry about that.
Sorry but I am unable to get pictures of my tank and algae eaters at this moment but should be able to in the next few days.
I found out that my algae eatrers are chinese algae eaters. The algae that is growing is like moss. My old filter has a plastic pipe thing wjhere the water is filtered and comes out the holes, but the algae plant grew in the holes and blocked it, and I couldn't remove it as it is stuck. But luckily I have another filter which I changed to last night. The algae is a lot like the algae in the picture I found on google, it is a much darker green though and is growing up like a plant. I remove this as much as possible everyday.
My tank is on the other side of the room and is far away from the window but is in line with it, and the light is only on at night.
I have an idea that may be able to get rid of this algae growing. Over the next two weeks I will take the note of the progress of the tank, and see if the algae plant grows back. Im going to do a water change once a week, and wipe down the sides as soon as they start getting dirty and I will clean the filter every few days. If I see any of the algae plant growing back I will remove it straight away. I will also not have the light on and reduce the amount of food I feed my fish, I will only feed them every other day. Hopefully this will work. Please tell me if any of this is a bad idea and I will rethink.
I also use a gravel vacum cleaner to clean the gravel and do a water change.
Thanks. All advice appreciated.
Beth.
Algae Plant Pic From Google



Also a few days ago I spotted small snail is my tank but didn't remove it snd now can't find it. Not long ago (august 08) I had a family of snails in my tank do you think it has been there all this time. Should I remove it?

agabr123

sounds like a good idea to me, you can feed your fish daily but only put in the amount that they can eat in a minute, just put in a little bit of food and see how quickly it's gone. if it's gone in 30 seconds you can put in a little more

Bubblez!

Thanks for the idea but Im gonna see how myn goes first

krismoore888

as katetnies said the chinese algae eaters are not very effective when they get larger, also they get extremly aggressive

cerianthus

If snail have not caused any visible catastrophe, would leave it in, You may even have few or lot more if trumpet which may have come with live plants or water from fish bag.

As far as pic, seems pic of s/walgae which I am trying to grow as many varieties as possible intentionally. If your algae are greener and thougher, maybe beard/brush algae. Not easy to pull off.
Dont know much about your tank but look into siamese algae eater or japanese shrimps (cant remember the scientific name but it is avail) which may provide good lawnmowing service for free, that is if and when compatible with your fish.

krismoore888

japanese shrimps are also known as amano shrimps

Bubblez!

Thanks but I got a new filter and have been cleaning it much more often. Thanks for all your help.