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Re: green water



>Oh, green water woes.
>My 40g tank has been problem free for a long time;
>crystal clear and healthy.
>I went on vacation and came back to find it full of pea
>green soup, yuk.

>Problem is, I have tried all of the remedies seen on the
>web and I still have green, cloudy water, albeit a little
>bit less green.

I had *exactly* the same thing happen in my 20 gallon tank, although it was
still unstable from my having recently increased the lighting.  Massive water
changes didn't help much, etc.  The turning point for me was taking the
cartridge out of my external filter and stuffing the filter box with very fine
polyester floss.  (Pillow batting, actually) It doesn't filter the algae very
efficiently, but it seems to remove it faster than it reproduces.  I took the
floss out and rinsed it in hot water every day for a while, and just vacuumed
the substrate instead of big water changes.  The "green water" is gone now,
although the water is still just a little cloudy and won't clear.  I added 1/4
tsp of alum to floculate the particles and that may have helped a little, or
maybe I just imagined that it helped.  I don't know if this is the same algae,
or suspended clay, or bacteria, or...  But the floss doesn't get green
anymore.  The local water company doesn't test for phosphates; so if there are
any phosphates present in the fresh water, the daily 50% change could have
been feeding the remaining algae instead of starving it.

I'm gonna get a Vortex D1 filter to clear it up the rest of the way.  It's
about time for a new toy anyway :-)

Good luck, and best regards,
bob