EDRob44

Hello again everybody,

I think I may have mentioned this in another post, but I'm not sure. Please don't yell at me too much if I'm repeating myself. I tend to do that...

Anywho, I started my 10 gal tank about 5 months ago, and being the noob that I am I was overfeeding my fish. I've done some research and learned some lessons since then. I developed a lot of green algae in my tank, but I seem to have in under control now (it's not going away, but there isn't really any new stuff growing). Before I go and destroy my tank from mis-cleaning it, I figured I would ask you guys first. My substrate and 2 decorations have a pretty good covering of green algae. Is it ok to scrub off the decorations, and then do a water change with a gravel cleaner? That's what I planned on, but I wanted to make sure I'm not going to send my tank into a mini cycle or something.

Thanks again for your help,
~ROb

Lucy

WHAT!!! <----yelling at you. lol j/k sorry.

It should die off if you decrease the amount of light it gets.
Cleaning your decorations shouldn't be a problem. Getting it off the gravel might be...does it come up when you use the vacuum?

pinkfloydpuffer

I would take out the decorations to clean them, so all the dead algae doesn't end up floating around. Then you can deal with the rest in the tank.

EDRob44

I did decrease the light to 13 hours on and 11 off, and that seemed to help. Should I go even less until the algae dies down? There's no real direct light on it, so I know that isn't a factor.
Some comes off sometimes when I vacuum. The water in the bucket is usually at least a little green.

pinkfloydpuffer

If you don't have live plants in there you could go 6 hrs or less.

EDRob44

I do have one medium size live plant in there. I'm guessing if I go that low, it would starve the plant? Should I go down to about 8 hours a day? If so, how long do you think I will need to stay on that pattern to kill of the algae?

pinkfloydpuffer

I'd say go down to at least 10, if not 8. You should be ok in a planted keeping it on 10-12 hours a day all the time.

EDRob44

Cool. I will do that and get back to you guys with the progress later

pinkfloydpuffer

soldieroffortune1974

I would cut the light back to 8 hours a day,and reduce feeding the fish to 3 times a week (the fish wont starve,don't worry) Change the water 25% every other day (24 hours after feeding,don't feed the same day you change the water) to help reduce the nitrates the algae is feeding on.You should see a large decrease in the 1st week without bothering to clean the decorations.

jdhef

If you do clean your decorations outside the tank, as recommended, make sure to do it in a bucket of used tank water. You don't want to kill off the benifical bacteria that is growing on the decorations by washing with tap water.

Plecolover12

Well, I would say that you should introduce scavengers to your tank. Like the bristlenose pleco. It will only stay five inches and will eat algae when there is. You can feed it vegetables as well!

EDRob44

I do have a common plecos in their right now, but he won't eat the green algae. (FYI: I know he will get too big for my tank. I have already found a new home for him. I plan on getting a few ottos though)
Thanks!

capekate

Hi ED,
I just added the link below to another thread but thought you may find it very useful. It id's the algae, why it is there and what helps (fish) to get rid of it.
Hope it helps..
http://www.plantgeek.net/article_viewer.php?id=9

EDRob44

Cool, thanks for the article. It's good to actually see what the ottos look like so I can get the right one. I'm starting not to trust the guys at my LFS so much

capekate

your welcome!