green water

^ Yup, like I asked in your other thread last night what were the test kits you had?
In testing for possible causes for algea, check nitrates, phosphates, and silicates.
You should also get some alk, ph, ca, and mag test kits too, along with a refractometer to measure your salinity. You'll have that water cleared up in no time once you pinpoint your source of the problem (water params, lights...).
And if not, you can try to bribe LUNA into coming over to help!

 

I also forgot to mention that I discovered water from the Florida aquifer contains a lot of phosphorus...

So I am figuring the phosphorus combined with the window blinds being open probably caused the algae problem.

I will try to get a test kit tomorrow. Is a refractometer the same thing as a hydrometer? I have a hydrometer and the specific gravity is 1.022.

 

A hydrometer is a mechanical swingarm. They are supposed to be calibrated, but sometimes they aren't accurate w/ air bubbles getting on the surface of the swingarm.
A good calibrated refractometer will provide more accurate reading and most even adjust for temperature.

As a temp fix until you get an rodi unit (check out www.buckeyefieldsupply.com or airwaterice),
you can pick up some phosphate remover media at the lfs. Put it in a nylon sock and place it by your skimmer outlet or somewhere where the water will be forced to flow through it in your sump.

 

I did have a problem with air bubbles getting on my swing arm. I noticed that was throwing off my readings at first. I developed a technique so I didn't get bubbles on it.

I have a self leveling hydrometer, like so:



and I have found that if I just stick the thing in the water and pull it back out there will be air bubbles on the swing arm. Instead I have found that if I push it into the water slowly and fill it using the self leveling portion there are no air bubbles.

 

keep those blinds closed and your $ in your wallet for a month!

 

Your green water is due to a massive algae bloom and the bloom is due to the large amount of natural light. I personally had to deal with this issue just about a month ago. Took 5 days of running lights for 5 hours a day and making sure NO natural light was getting to the tank at all.

I also did a 1/2 water change (about 15gallons) .. I took my corals out but kept my fish in. Soon as the algae bloom was over, water was crystal clear and everything is in check now.

Good luck, and don't get suckered into buying stuff to solve this issue. Yes, a uv-steralizer will take care of this in the future ---- but keeping your eye on the lighting will too.

P.S. I also dosed a lil vodka in the tank during the algae bloom... But I don't suggest doing that until you fully understand what your doing. Drinking vodka is one thing, but feeding it to your fish and corals is another.

good luck!
-fritts

 

Ok this has me bothered. Every one on this thread says keep lights off and buy this and that. Well I just don't get it. We are dealing with a salt water tank. Most of the items we put in it are sun loving things, but yet all I hear is sun is bad and shut the lights off. I think there has to be a better way of dealing with this algae bloom then to thorw a bunch of garbage at it. I found that when dealing with salt water tank slow is the only gear to drive in. I have yet to see one test paramiter on this whole thread. If the person is ever going to want to have corals he is going to have to reporduce the sun. In the algae blooms that I have had I let nature take its corse. Leave the lights On and let the bloom do its thing. You start to kill algae then you will have spikes in other areas like Nitrates. Before you know it you have a billion chems in the bottom of your tank and your fish are so dosed up they jones for fix every day.
Phosphates and silicates are what feed the algae and once you know how to take care of what algae feeds on then your water will clear up. You can even use that nasty hair algae as a cleaner. once your tank starts growing it (yes I know that this is a pain but) just remove the algae and the phosphates and silicates with be removed with it. You might have to scrub your rocks about twice a month but soon it will all be gone. Next try not to put those phosphates back in your tank. That is why most of us use R/O water. your LFS should cary this. Get some new plastic buckets and water jugs and pick some up for water changes and such. If you get crazy you can even buy a unit that makes this.
The last thing I will beef about is buy at least one book on salt water and read it from front to back. First book I bought was the complete book of the Marine Aquarium by vincent B. Hargreaves I picked that up at local book store for 20 bucks. That book has given me more info then any one person has or could. I know there are a lot better books but that was the first one I have used.
That is all I have to say and will look forward to seeing how your tank comes out and what you will do.

 

I never burn lights until the very end of the cycle and I let nature run her course in a 12 week span. But there are 100's of different ways to cycle a tank. I was taught this way and it has worked for me and quite a few tanks that I have set up. But I also use base rock.

 

in my past experience there are more things then just algae blooms that will turn water green you first have to determine why the water is green.his tank is only 3 to 4 weeks old and he bleached the rocks if you look at his thread pictures there is no algae on the rocks or substrate that I can see.(I could be wrong) you may not want it to run its course if it is something toxic, but with that said I still agree you have to test the parameters before you can decide the best coarse of action.

 

The other thing is bleaching of the rock I have never heard of such a thing. Thought this might be toxic. And I do agree there are 100 ways to make a cake but I just like to take things as natural as possible. We definatly need some parameters to make better judgements too.