Help with ugly green water

I can only echo what @Go-Big said in his first post... A UV sterilizer will most definitely help, and as Go-Big has said, certain members (@Slojo) would be against this.

I had a problem with green water about a year ago. I did huge water changes weekly, and sometimes twice weekly, and had the same problem... it kept coming back. In my opinion, green water falls into the same nuisance category as Black Beard Algae, and even Staghorn algae... a huge pain in the a$$ to get rid of. I battled with it for over 2 months before finally resorting to using a UV sterilizer. From my experience, you can't really put green water down to poor water quality, or excess nutrients in the water. (When you are doing 75-85% water changes every week to get rid of algae in a low fish stocked, fairly heavy planted tank- this can be very disheartening!) The sunlight may be contributing to the problem, however my tank never gets direct sunlight.

A number of members on the forum have had huge success with a 4 day blackout. 99.9% of algae will die after 3 days of absolutely no sunlight, or any light at all, which is why I always recommend a 4 day blackout... which is simply placing heavy blankets over the entire tank, and making it pitch black in the tank for 4 days. Don't worry about the fish, they will most certainly survive this. (I have done it numerous times). And generally the plants should survive as well. (The more difficult plants might take a knock though).

My 2 month battle with green water was eventually won by taking some drastic measures. I did a 85% water change, purchased a cheap UV sterilizer, and did a 4 day blackout. After the 4 days, I did another 50% water change, and left the sterilizer in the tank for another 2 weeks. Since then, I have never had a green water algae problem. The UV sterilizer I purchased was a cheap R250.00 kit bought from a LPS. Basically the unit sits in the tank. At the bottom of the unit is an air stone, which gets attached to your air pump. This causes the water to move through the UV light which is encased in the unit. It was only rated for a 100litre tank, and guaranteed success in 3 days. Obviously because my tank was 300litres, I left the sterilizer in for 3 weeks.

The UV sterilizer now sits in my box of goodies to be used only and if needed again... and in a year, I've never needed it. So whilst I agree with Slojo that it may not be a necessity to add to your filtering system permanently, I do NOT agree with him that it is not a useful item to have in your box of tricks. Green water algae is an extremely difficult algae to get rid of. I have heard of people completely draining their tanks, sterilizing their entire tank, substrate, filters and plants with bleech etc, and 2 months later the algae is back.

Once you have sorted out the problem, you then need to look at the source of the problem. 9/10 times the problem was introduced to your tank through new plants, fish, ornaments etc... however you may need to look at your lighting, photo-period, and filtering.

Regards

 

Kalid - Willows are listed as an invasive weed. Not allowed to make cuttings, transport, plant etc without permits.

{Mod edit} Line deleted

 

True like the plastic plants.:bigsmile:
But for the price @Zoom paid and short periods to solve an issue i might use it as well.Just not as a permanent add on to my Aquarium.

p.s. How did it affect your bacteria in the filter @Zoom?

 

I would never use it as a permanent "feature" in my filtering process. Let's face it, we're trying to mimic the wild, and I don't see many UV sterilizers attached to the dams and lakes where we got a lot of our fish from.

I actually do not see how a UV sterilizer can have any effect on your filter bacteria, but I may be wrong here. The logic is that the WATER passes over the light, and the light then kills off any algae or other nasties you trying to kill... this would mean that the bacteria in your filter would need to leave their colony in the filter, become water bourn, and then pass over the UV to get killed. My logic is that you have millions and millions of bacteria in your filter, and if even HALF of them dislodged off the filter and went through the UV and got killed... you would have a slightly bigger problem to solve than loosing half your bacteria... your problem would be WHY half your bacteria left your filter in the first place.

 

@Nadeem your post just triggered an observation I made before I did my 3 tank compare on algae. I once added a good deal of lime to a tank that never had an algae issue and shortly after that had some serious algae issues - I think I am going to rekindle that 3 tank compare at some stage and put the theory to the test - excessive lime (calcium) could aid algae somehow? I suspect that the beach sand and coral could be contributing, but I have no proof - let me go do some ggling.

Later Ferdie

 

guys i have a UV in my canister and i heard that the life of the bulb is about six months and after that it's not as effective...

so i use it when i observe that my water is a tinge greener and with in two hours i can visibly see the difference and i put it off...

so i agree with Zoom as we're replicating nature (somewhat cos tanks aren't really natural) AND use the gadget where its a blessing rather than a curse...also if you can't naturally control your habitat, control in unnaturally considering the wellbeing of your fish(dont want to upset anyone but i just know what its like when you want whats best for your fish, which is why the thread was started)...

so to replace that light in my canister (after research) would almost cost the canister, so i use th UV sparingly and its worth it...
fire

 

Hi Nadeem,

Have you sorted out this green water?

UV light probably takes out more than what you really want it to in your case it would be a temporary fix unless you ran it all the time. I think your best bet is to use a refugium containing daphnia in your tank, the daphnia eat the green water algae but unfortunately fish eat daphnia... this is why you must create a small refuge for this to work.

On another note: If you've still got the problem and stay pretty close to Goodwood in the Western Cape could you spare me a few litres of this green water? It is a useful food for fry that only really take time to create (unfortunately my fry are already fry and need food in the next day or two).

Tried to send a private message but am not allowed as I'm too new to the forum.

Thanks
Hope to hear from you soon.

 

thanks so much to everybody for all the great info, really appreciate it.
like i said, my tank catches lots of sunlight because it is standing in a recess on a balcony, i have however sketched a little "shader" that is going to made from wood and shade cloth, in the meantime, i block out the sum with some towels and plastic.
been doing water changes daily and the water lightens up a litle bit, but still stays green, fish are all healthy and happy so no problem there, so im trying to get rid of it without the uv sterilizer.

hey zoom, thank you for the blackout idea, im definitely going to do a 4 day blackout, see how that works.

hey jack stone, no problem at all man, i hate the green water, you can have it all, lol. i live in goodwood too.

 

Hi Nadeem,

If your tank is outside and gets direct sunlight the water can get very hot, so just keep an eye on the temperature as well.