How can doing what you should do MAKE IT WORSE ?

its all in the water, you mentioned that you buy ro/di water, where? homedepot? read whats in it, phosphates which equals algae. dominicks sells ro/di water that is cheap by the gallon, just go in with your own jug. imop stay with ro/di, just be carefull where you buy it.

 

Well, you probably should not being doing water changes during the cycling process. You need the water to build up beneficial bacterium....When you do your water change you are interrupting the process. Are you vacuming the sand bed?

 

you should do water changes through the cycling process, if the ammonia gets over 1 ppm its detrimental. the ann cycle happens regardless, and always happens, feeding for example, just in smaller quantities. all a cycling process is letting the rock that had the oceans full of water get used to the limited amount of water in the aquarium. the trick is to keep what is alive on the rock. the beneficial bacteria is in the rock.

no offense baxter

 

Hmm, it's been a month for me and I have had some people recommend water changes. As long as my NH4 and NO2 are at proper levels, I won't mess with the water change. Lots of people have gone years with no water changes at all. Every tank is different!

But during the cycle process?? that is a new one I've NEVER heard someone tell me to change my water while the tank is cycling unless I want to delay the cycle from finishing.
Of course, if you have lots of critters you want to keep alive and don't care how long it takes to cycle--on with the H20 changes!

 

This is typical new tank syndrome. There is nothing wrong. You'll just have to wait it out. But keep with the RO

 

I've always heard/done no water changes during cycling. You delay the cycling process by doing water changes.

 

His cycle is over he is just now experiencing the normal algae blooms that follow the cycle

J

 

if your ammonia goes over 1 ppm there is a high probability of killing the stuff you desire to keep alive. im not saying to do water changes all the time, just when the ammonia is over 1 ppm. this wont delay the cycling time. i had a system with over 400 gallons that just started cycling and did 3 water changes in one day to keep it under, and the tank finished cycling soon after. ammonia spikes then nitrite then nitrate but ammonia will kill if it gets to hi, the others will also kill but at a higher amount.

the algae is part of the normal cycling process, that will soon end also. phosphates, nitrates and silicates feed algae and ro/di is an excellent water source. skimming with media to lower the above will also help.

 

Nothing in this hobby that is good comes quickly. The most important tool is patience. To get rid of hair algae continue with the water changes. See if you have a phosphate problem and if so add a phosban reactor. Consider slightly lowering your light period. Manually remove as much of the algae as you can.

 

It's going to take awhile before all the silica is out of your tank. A few water changes isn't going to stop it. When I first got my BC29 I used half R/O saltwater and half tap water. I battled algae for 3-4 months after making the full time change to R/O.