brown algae on glass

[Cozen89]

is this a problem or a bad sign?

[fefo23]

May be protein algae becouse of food, thats my small opinion

[drummereef]

How old is the tank? Do you use RO/DI water?

[Cozen89]

I bought an established 30 gallon tank but upgraded it to a 50. I transfered all the LR, added some more, transfered the live sand, but added some more. Added a fuge with chaeto and have been running this for 2-3 weeks or so. The light I had up until yesterday was too small and only a PC. I now have t5 HO's. The brown algae is just starting to form on the glass and a little on the sand surface. It's not in clumps or anything yet, just light layer.

I do not use RO/DI water, but tomorrow I was going to go buy 10 gallons of fresh sea water from my LFS to do a water change. And will plan on doing this every other week or so.

[Cozen89]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9719810#post9719810 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by fefo23
May be protein algae becouse of food, thats my small opinion

Am I feeding too much? I do a small amount of pellets at around 1 pm and a small amount of mysis around 8 pm.

[drummereef]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9719852#post9719852 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Cozen89
I bought an established 30 gallon tank but upgraded it to a 50. I transfered all the LR, added some more, transfered the live sand, but added some more. Added a fuge with chaeto and have been running this for 2-3 weeks or so. The light I had up until yesterday was too small and only a PC. I now have t5 HO's. The brown algae is just starting to form on the glass and a little on the sand surface. It's not in clumps or anything yet, just light layer.

I do not use RO/DI water, but tomorrow I was going to go buy 10 gallons of fresh sea water from my LFS to do a water change. And will plan on doing this every other week or so.


Sounds like diatoms. The tank probably had a mini-cycle and is now experiencing a diatom bloom. It should go away on its own. I'd suggest looking into an RO/DI unit though. It's going to save you money and headaches as you progress. Topping off with RO/DI is also preferred. www.thefilterguys.biz have a great unit for 160 bucks. ;)

[supertech3]

sounds like your new lights are putting out enough now to grow the film algae on the sand. it will go away with time when your snails eat on it, the glass sides just use a mag float or scrub of some sort

[Cozen89]

thanks for the feedback guys, was just making sure I wasn't doing something wrong or if it was a bad break out. Thanks.

[Azial]

In this young of a tank it's Diatoms