What Could Have Killed My Bacteria?

[waterdrop]

Once you get fish we generally recommend a weekly clean of the tank associated with the gravel clean that takes the water out for your weekly water change. You can pull out all fake plants and ornaments and clean them with a brush under tap water (just don't ever use tap water on your filter media of course!) Glass clean beforehand also helps any algae off the glass to perhaps be sucked out the siphon along with other debris from gravel cleaning.

Once cycling is over the algae won't have all that excess ammonia to feed on. If you have no live plants though you might consider not lighting the tank when you are not there. That won't bother the fish, although I wouldn't like the idea as much if the tank were in a room with no windows or something.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Schmill]

Ok, I'm at the point when Ammonia gets processed in about 14 hours. Nitrites still do not drop much in 14+ hours.
However, I have a question about brown algae... I recall fishless cycling guide had a note that you will end up with it by the end of the cycle but nothing about what to do with it...

What I have now is a complete algae infestation! It's everywhere - on plastic plants, glass, stones, even on sand... The thing is I have light turned on during the day and turn it off for the night. What do you guys do with these brown algae during or after fishless cycle? Clean everything after water change prior adding fish?


Thanks!

Do you have live plants in the tank right now? If not and you are doing a fishless cycle don't put the light on
If you do have plants, how long at you leaving the light on each day? I believe the recommendation is for only 8-9hours per day.

 

[rabbut]

Brown algea is one of two types "slime" cynobacteria algea or "spotty" diatoms. Cyno can be cleared with additional flow and more oxygenation. You can't do much about diatoms, as they are typically feeding of the silicates leached by the new tanks silicone... With either, just wipe away and keep up waterchanges

 

[mnemonik23]

I do have live Java Moss and I was leaving light for 14-15h per day
Just bought a light controller and set light for 8 hours per day with 2h on and 1h off intervals.

So, before I end my cycle and prior adding fish I will clean all plastic plants and probably stones too. I do clean my glass with algae magnet though, but it grows fast...

 

[Miss Wiggle]

no surprise then, java moss is very hardy and will grow with even minimum light, turn it down to 6 hrs a day, clean the algae and you'll see a big difference in how quickly it grows back.

 

[mnemonik23]

no surprise then, java moss is very hardy and will grow with even minimum light, turn it down to 6 hrs a day, clean the algae and you'll see a big difference in how quickly it grows back.

Will do, thanks! But what about the algae that all over the gravel and sand? How do I clean that?