Help !?

My tank is a couple months old now and Ive had no problems. The tank cycled and all my levels are at 0. I have 2 clownfish, Lawnmower Blenny and dozen or so blue legs. I started having this green algae growing is a lot of places. My lights are also new (2x 250W HQI, 4x 65W PC) and Im running a Eheim 2229 with 2x Korila #3's. My light schedule is Pc's on at 10pm off at 7pm, HQI's on 11am off at 6pm. I am also getting ready to order the following from reefcleaners :
80 Dwarf Ceriths
9 Nassarius
10 Limpets
1 Chitons
25 Florida Ceriths
22 Blue Leg Hermits
1 five pack of mangrove seeds
1 chaeto
My question is : Is this normal ? What can I do to fix this ?
Thanks in advance ;D

 

New tanks go through algae phases. If all your parameters are at 0 than you are in trouble! No Ca, Mg etc? (it's a joke.) It looks like you have a real nice case of green hair algae. If you have enough, your parameters, nitrate and phosphate mainly will give a false negative because the algae consumes it as fast as it is produced. Try cutting back your feedings. The lawnmower blenny should be having a great time.

 

I feed them 2 times a day a small and i mean small pinch of food. Thanks for the info.

 

Guitar man is 100% correct even though you may show no phospates or nitrates with your test kits algae requires phosphates/nitrates to grow so it uses your phosphates to live. As it lives and dies those phosphates can reenter your system. So no matter what your test kit shows you have algae you have phosphates and or nitrates if you have algae. New tanks will go through several different types of algae blooms within the first 6 months or so. They will come and go sometimes quickly. If you start to see that hair algae continue to spread you might remove those rocks and brush it off with a tooth brush then return the rocks to your tank. It can take over a tank. High flow helps stop it from growing.

 

Hi Strainedsky - this hair or beard algea - if allowed to go unchecked will eventually have you pulling your own hair out -

there must be nutrients Phosphate/ Nitrate in your tank - that your test kits are not showing

what filter medium are you using
how deep is your sand bed?

sometimes problems like this are caused by having improper bacteria species balance -
you may have adequate species in your system to deal with Amonnia and Nitrite - but not enough of the species that convert nitrates ( you may or may not be aware of the bio plastic ball debate - where users of systems having these in, found when they threw them away - their nitrate levels came down - because these plastic filter mediums offer a great place to live for oxgygen consuming bacteria - which is not the right enviroment for the bacteria species that convert Nitrate )

manual removal as suggested by reefnut is a good 1st step, get as much as you can out on a regular basis - coupled with isolating the problem ( dodgy test kit, incorrect ratio of nitrifying bacteria species ) and them make the required adjustments

If the rock is tuffa - which it looks like - the algae grows in the pores - which makes complete removal by hand of with tooth brush difficult - although it will improve the appearance of your tank

but you do need to get to to route cause , if you want to end the problem




Steve

 

First cut down to feeding once a day. It looks like the algae should be easy to pull out by hand. Try not to let any algae float away when removing. If it is possible pull the rock out and scrub it in tankwater then put back.
Adam

 

Will that cause my tank to recycle ? And my sand bed is about 2.5" deep or so . Thanks for the advice guys. ;D

 

Well I got my clean up crew Friday from reefcleaners. The only thing I can say is WOW. My tank is 98% spotless.