What's going on???

[sharelove]

Hi, I've got some wild things starting to grow!! I'm very excited and I wish I knew what I was doing...Wink

I'm including a couple of photos so you all can see and let me know what it is I've got going here... The fish (I've only just got 6 chromis) are floating about and my cleanup crew for a now, consists of 5 hermits and 5 snails.

I'd lilke to know what it is that has just appeared on the glass. I don't think it will come through in the pics, so I'll explain: it's like there's a bunch of little green feathers attaching themselves to the front glass. Is this normal? Is it something to be excited about? I've got a lot of rust colored stuff starting, on the live rock, and by the looks of it, staight onto the sand! Once again, is this all good?

Thanks for your input as always!
peace,
marc

i've tried to upload the photos but this system won't accept them. What should I do? I've resized them to be within the limits imposed and still it says I"ve exceeded them...??

[scuglass]

try to host them on image shack or photobucket and then link them to here. sounds like alge.

hope this helps

[mr_alberta]

What you are experiencing is "new tank syndrome." Sounds like algea on the glass and diatoms on the rock/sand. Your cleanup crew could use some beefing up as well.

What size is your tank?

[Beverly]

I assume you cured your rock in your display tank. If this is the case, you have all kinds of nutrients in the water from the curing process which are, and will in the future be, causing you all kinds of nuisance algae. If you have used treated tapwater in the system, nutrients in the tapwater are likely compounding the algae problems.

First, clean the glass. Get in the habit of cleaning the glass at least once a week, preferably before weekly water changes of at least 15% of your total water volume.

Second, right away, do two 50% water changes to reduce nutrient levels. Use RO water for these large water changes as well as for weekly water changes and for top up purposes.

Third, if you have any mechanical filtration in your system, clean the filter media throroughly in outgoing changewater. Clean filter media weekly, as well.

Fourth, add snails to your tank. Some say to go with one snail per gal, but I generally think that's too many snails. I use about one snail per 3-4 gal quite well. Sorry, I can't advise you which snails are best for the algae problems you're having. Hopefully others with experience in this area will help you out.

Providing more information about your tank - such as how long it's been set up, size of tank, if sump/skimmer are used, if tap or RO is used, if you cured your rock in your display tank - would be helpful so we can help figure out the cause of the algae problems so you can reduce them.

[robzilla]

hey marc, i've noticed in one of your posts that you live in nelson, i work in nelson daily.
send me an email/pm and i can try to help you out some

rob