My water is green again

[DawnMarie81]

I just did a 50% water change in my tank on Sunday, and already my water has turned green, it wasnt even this bad befoe i changed it.  I checked the chemicals, and they are all fine, the ammonia was just basely above 0, same as the nitrite level.  The ph was about 7.6 or so.  OUr CO2 bubble maker thing has been finally working good, and i thought we had it under control until our water started to get green again.  How do i fix this?  I don't want to have to get rid of the plants.

[NjOyRiD]

buy yourself a nice Vortex Ditatom filter

http://www.bigalsonline.ca/BigAlsCA/ctl3664/cp17899/si1320422/cl0/vortexfreedomdiatomfilter

and if you wanna see what it can do, this is a great exemple:

http://ovas.ca/index.php?topic=19202.msg138640#msg138640

good luck

[Montrealguy]

I may be coming into the story late, but where is your tank? I try to culture green water, and can't. I've seen it in tanks at school where the goldfish bioload was extreme and there was direct sunlight. You have a low number of fish for a tank that size, so the bioload isn't a likely culprit. If you're lightly planted with co2, maybe that would be a problem, but there's still an underlying cause. It's probably light.
Another question is if you're on a well for your water source.
I wouldn't buy a diatom, as that treats the symptom (and it's not cheap).

[sas]

How old would your tank setup be?
If it's a new setup I would think 50% water change might be a tad on the large size?
When I first started in this hobby, it took me 3 months to cycle my first tank . I had no "dirty" media, but only did 25% water changes when the water parameters suggested it. The green water did finally go and the water stayed clear after that.
Hope that helps.

[fishycanuck]

You say "again', but I don't know the story of the first time.
Many times, unwanted green water can be clarified with "less"
-less light
-less food
-less heat

Your fish will do fine without food for several days. I'm not a plant expert so can't advise you on the least amount of light but surely a day or two in the dark wouldn't hurt?
A lower temp - depends on what fish you have.

I'd be happy to give you some seed material if this is a new setup.

[sdivell]

Are you still using fertizilzer in that tank?
What temp are you keeping the tank at?  Heater set at? and what does your thermometre say it is in the tank?

are your lights on a timer now? how long are they on for?
is it getting direct sunlight? if it is.. go buy some blinds

[Nerine]

are you going to the meeting??? LOL I am trying to get green water...hahaha I'll take a couple cups

[charlie]

In most instances,green water blooms when ammonia & bright lights are present, it maybe worth your while to check for these 2  ( from your initial  post , it would appear that you have one - ammonia )

[DawnMarie81]

Ha ha Nerine, no I don't go to meetings, I live in Manitoba, I'm just in this group because there is nothing like this for my area, and everyone here seems great.

Wow, thanks for the replies guys.

It was a sad morning today, one of my gold gouramis got stuck to the water filter during the night and died   

Now, to answer everyones questions...

The tank is a couple months old now, and had gone through one algae bloom before, but that was due to me leaving one of the lights on while we went away for the weekend.

There is no direct sunlight, or even any real indirect sunlight now that the season has changed and the sun is already going down by the time it gets to that side of the house.  I do not have a timer for the lights since I work at home and can turn them on and off myself, they are on for about 8 hours a day, sometimes less.

I tested the water again today, and the nitrite was 0, and the ammonia was 0.6.  I still do not really understand how the ph level work, and what is suppose to be good for ph high level and ph low level since i got both in my testing kit.  My ph low kit was about 7.6 and ph high test was about 8.6, but like i said, i do not know what they mean or what the numbers should be.  The GH and KH tests were as follows : GH says that my water is soft/slightly hard, with the range of 60, and the KH says that i am in the middle of the 20-80mg (50mg), which goes along with the soft water, and i THINK that means my water is too acidic?

The temp is always at 79 degrees, and the heater is set at 80 degrees, and i feed the fish once a day, 5 days a week.  I no longer put fertalizre in the tanks, and my plants are still growing like crazy, a couple are already reaching the top of the water.

OK, so 50% was a little much?  The water was turnng green before I did the change, but not nearly as bad as it now after I changed it.  So i should maybe do 25% a day or so until the water is normal again?   

[sdivell]

First to help with the green water - here is an article on the net that I found thats pretty straight forward.

http://www.fishlore.com/CloudyWater.htm

Now some ammonia and no nitrite has raised my eyebrow a bit..

Ammonia breaks down turns into nitrite...

nitrite breaks down turns into nitrate....

nitrate is taken up by plants and water changes.


Do you have a nitrate test kit?  if not...get one, as you may have a large amount of nitrate in your tank or even your tap water that you don't know about.

Doing water changes is never a bad thing, but without any ammonia spikes and no ferts you dont need to change 50% of the water... doing 10-20% changes once a week is fine.

the gh, kh, and ph is something I've never worried about on my tank so I can't help you as to what your readings means... its all goble-dee-gook to me