How can i fix my aquarium

[BlacknBlue2]

Yea just play with it a bit, tweak it and go from their. The big thing is that the skimmer is starting to perform better and it will get better within another week or 2.

 

[Sabellafella]

I am running a 55 gallon long aquarium, with a coralife t5 dual light fixture, fluval 306 canister filter, and a single aqueon power head I believe 900gph with no wave maker attached. my tank is riddled with diatoms and green algae all over the glass and sand. been using tap water for my water changes/top off but am reverting back to rodi water. the algae still grows everywhere regardless but the diatoms slow down after using rodi. the green algae is hard to scrape off it's like coralline algae but it's not. not sure what kind of sand I am using nor the levels.

would like to turn this already set up tank around so it looks crystal clear and fish are healthier any help/products I should buy. my stock is currently 1 ocelaris clown, 1 blue tang, 1 green spotted puffer which I converted to salt water, and 1 trigger. the trigger is probably the most aggressive but they fairly get along. I live in Hawaii so I stock wise will be hard due to laws but I will try find legal species if needed like inverts. I do not have a sump on this tank nor anything to hold my fish to make a sump.

all the info I could get/tips is appreciated.

If i were you, id grab another 30 40 pounds of live rock and throw some carbon and gfo in the canister filter

 

[BlacknBlue2]

If i were you, id grab another 30 40 pounds of live rock and throw some carbon and gfo in the canister filter

he already did that part, also his tank is not very wide, so he only has the ability to go upwards

 

[Sabellafella]

Sorryi just read tgrew the thread, yea make sure you use rodi water and you shouldnt run i to issues, try to getyour hands on gfo if you could

 

[Celbrise]

yea i added some carbon already and phosguard which i believe is the same as gfo not sure what the heck it is but it's white and i think works like gfo small pellets in a sack. and yes my tank is narrow i can only build up kind of didnt want to overcrowd with rocks for when the fish get big as they already have some scratched from the rock work. fine tuned the skimmer a little since i saw the foam come up again now i got some micro bubbles in the tank will see how far that gets the foam after tonight might tune it up more if not.

if i want the bubbles to get higher do i add add more water to the skimmer ( tighten air flow ) or am i supposed to loosen it? it is barely to the top of the cup where it comes out not sure if thats because i need to tune it or if it needs more time to break in.

 

[Celbrise]

Sorryi just read tgrew the thread, yea make sure you use rodi water and you shouldnt run i to issues, try to getyour hands on gfo if you could

i don't think anyone here sells gfo but when i get more money i will buy some in bulk online. also is it natural for my base rock to be growing diatoms on them? i usually see this happen when people cycle their tanks but wonder if it ever goes away when parameters are fixed on it's own without scrubbing the rocks

 

[Sabellafella]

i don't think anyone here sells gfo but when i get more money i will buy some in bulk online. also is it natural for my base rock to be growing diatoms on them? i usually see this happen when people cycle their tanks but wonder if it ever goes away when parameters are fixed on it's own without scrubbing the rocks

Its fine you dont have to scrub em if ypu dont want to, sometimes diatoms appear and leave . only thing brown youll have to worry about is dino nd cyano. Im pretty sure if you tighten the screw on a hob skimmer it raises the waterlevel

 

[Sabellafella]

Can you take water from hawaii and do waterchanges? Or is it illegal

 

[BlacknBlue2]

give that screw a turn and see what happens, its all a matter of dialing it in, which can be a pain.

 

[Celbrise]

dialed it foam seemed to rise when i got home. turned it more to allow less air i will see if it starts spilling over more if not i will probably just leave as is until it builds up more scum over the days and try again.

water yes you can take an indefinet amount i believe. in highschool in my marine biology class we literally kept aquariums of salt water fish for a project most people had clown fishes but i went fishing and got a goat fish not sure what kind but it died. you can also take live rock im not sure how much per day but i know you can i've seen people take rocks before. the only thing you cannot take are corals. it is illegal to sell/keep corals here the only time they will allow it is under special circumstances like they are removing the reef in that area for something like oil rig or whatever. i believe we can keep zoa's i know people who've sent them here out of state. you can't even keep the local corals found here which imo is stupid. i think inverts are the same way you literally only see fishes in the stores here unless it is freshwater thats why many people here go freshwater instead of salt

 

[BlacknBlue2]

I knew Hawaii had wierd laws but this is crazy, I also know that a dive shop owner, not sure who it was has ranted and raved about the saltwater hobby and how dangerous it is and that we are destroying the oceans. When in reality we do buy pieces from the ocean, but then grow them out and sell to each other so that we don't have to take awy from the ocean. This is also why you see so may people raising clownfish, and a guy named Chad Vossen in Minnesota is trying to raise Joculator Angels from eggs. All so we don't have to destroy ecosystems.

 

[Celbrise]

yea hawaii is pretty stupid in general LOTS of dumb laws and stupidity seen the salt water store selling feather dusters so i know you can keep though and also they were selling what looked like i think it's called a harlequin crab but it was red and white. i also know we have brittle stars and other crabs and all that even hermit crabs you can probably take from the ocean if you wanted too. i honestly dont see how this hobby could literally endanger the species in the ocean more and more people are trying to promote farm raised fishes and all that in this hobby and also just a few years ago there was a HUGE molasses spill in the ocean that killed hundreds of fish and i believe shrks as well and also a sewage spill in Waikiki that killed one person that i know of and im sure a lot of fish as well so go figure

 

[Celbrise]

just cleaned my filter and did a 20% water change will but i had a question. my rock work fell down and junk polluted the tank i think it's algae since i feed only once a day now and a small amount so that they eat it all. is their any way to fix this so that nothing gets stuck in the rocks. will also post an update on parameters so you can see if anything really changed over the week. fine tuned skimmer again it spilled out even more bubbles this morning but didn't seem like a constant flow it would go up then down then up again

 

[BlacknBlue2]

You could go buy a turkey baster and then just blow the junk off when you see it building up. I use this method since its cheap, does not create a mess and requires almost no thought at all.

 

[BlacknBlue2]

double post

 

[Celbrise]

ahh that makes sense will have to do that if my fish will leave my hand alone. dont want my puffer biting my finger off last time he bit my finger it hurt luckily it is still small but im sure it can take a chunk off. i did water test parameters were not impressive. Ph 8.0 ( lighter color this time so it could of been 7.8 but i was unsure looked closer to 8.0 to me ), ammonia 0.25 ( color was a lighter green but not 0 ), nitrite 0, nitrate 160 ( followed directions which were to add 10 drops, shake, then shake bottle 2 for 30seconds then add 10 drops, shake for 1 minute and let set for 5minutes. it started off dark orange which would be 40 then got to a deep red.) not sure if test for nitrate is bad or what this is with a 20% water change only and cleaning my filter and after adding seachem prime and bacteria.

i was wondering does salinity play a huge role with nitrates? my salinity atm is 1.020 a few days ago it was well above 1.035 just been adding fresh ro/di water

 

[BlacknBlue2]

ok, so your approaching hypo salinity state. This is what fish stores do to get rid of parasites in their tank, so I would bring your salinity back to around 1.024 amd your ph should be around 8-8.3 if your using an API kit you want the test color to be purple. Your nitrates are in need of fixing, get some carbon asap, and then get a nitrate remover. And no salinity does not play a role in nitrate levels, but when you disturbed the rocks that may have done it as well as set off a slight cycle. You need some sort of niytrifying bacteria to reduce those ammonia and nitrate levels fast. Bio-Spira, Microblift, something of that nature.

Wait when you did your water change, you replaced it with fresh saltwater right. Cause if you didn't then that would explain the salinity being low. Always replace your water change water with SW, you can always go lighter on the salt to reduce the salinity.

 

[Celbrise]

i already added carbon to the tank, i have the seachem prime which i believe supposed to help lower nitrates, ph was a little purple/brownish color but it looks to be 8 it's the api test kit, and my salinity was 1.035 maybe last weekend i just did a 50% water change in the middle of the week because of my nitrates. i also have bacteria i bought to help cycle the tank just incase and added that to when i bought it on like tuesday it's called Quick Start by api. is this the same bacteria your talking about and if so should i add more?

 

[Celbrise]

i also forgot to mention i did add 1 base rock to the tank when i got my protein skimmer as well as when i did the water change today i stuck the gravel vac into the sand to disturb it so that could have caused the nitrates to stay the same. usually i don't disturb the sand bed i just vaccum up water and remove it and add new water. diatoms don't seem to be growing on the glass now on the rocks though yea

 

[Watevadog5]

Your on the right track... Keep up with water changes. Your nitrates are very high. Also as stated replace the water you take out with mixed sw. Salinity should be .024 or .025 and want to keep it as stable as possible. One thing I think we all forgot to emphasize was patience ....