Is GHA related to a new tank?

[Alysiak00]

i just moved over from a 20gal to a 45 gal. I now have a fluval 305 (for up to a 70gal) and it seems to atleast be filtering out a heck of a lot of crap lol. The question i have is the tank has only been set up for about 2 months and i'm starting to get a GHA outbreak. I put some new carbon in the filter along with some chemi-pure and have ramped up my water changes. still though the GHA still seems to be growing. so my initial question is no matter how much i work at it, is the GHA still gonna grow because its new??? thanks in advance everyone

[droberts]

hows your water test out? how long do you run your lights? and are you running gfo?

[N8thanExpl0sion]

You are going to get it...

Keep an eye on your phosphates and your NO3/NO4 These levels will dictate how much you get and how long you put up with it. Put phosphate removing materials in your Fluval, carbon at this point has no real purpose, what you will need to be removing is not done with carbon.

Best thing to do is to use 2-3 baskets of BIO (rings, hexs or porus stones) and one with Phosphate remover. If you want you could go and get chem-pure elete but it is costly. Since your compatments are seperated you will need to buy two and at 20$ a piece it is a bit expensive.

Oh and only use two of the corse pads not the four and forget the polishing pads as well. If you have too much floss or pads and you dont rinse them every week your canster filter turns into a Nitrate factory...

DO NOT rinse them with tap water, use distiled or RO. Dont rinse the BIO except once a month and again not with Tap.

I have experienced this first hand and I can say that it is not rumor or hear-say.. It works fine as a mechanical filter, but using one will require more maintenance.

[Alysiak00]

right now i have a three chamber setup in the fluval. im running 2 trays of bio stones, 1 back chemi pure elite, and 3 bags of carbon, also have all four sponges in. should i run to the store and pick up another bag of chemi pure along with taking out two of the sponges?

also the lights are on from 12-10pm

and i'm also going to be picking up some gfo soon

[droberts]

when i used to run my light 10 hrs i started getting gha so i cut it back to an 8 hr cycle and it seemed to help me and adding gfo

[Alysiak00]

no way! sweet, i'm gonna cut my lights back. Can you explain how you had your light schedule...for example
actinincs on 12-4
main lights 3-7
actinics 6-8

[Stroob]

Sounds like you are having a little new tank syndrome. Unless something is way out of whack compared to your previous setup. Should go away in time.

My lights run on this cycle:
11a-11p T5 supp
1p-9p MH

[Alysiak00]

that seems like a really long photo period but i do agree with nts

[Stroob]

My T5 are pretty weak and dont put out much light for growth. The 8 hours of MH are the growing light time. I have them go out when the other half goes to bed. Extending the T5 till 11 give me time to feed, water change, test water, clean glass, etc.

[stingythingy45]

Did you also add new rock when you made the change?
Sometimes phosphates can leach from rock and cause algae blooms for a while.
Personally,I wouldn't run a Fluval on a saltwater tanks.I just get a good quality skimmer and run that.

[AUreef10]

What are your phosphate levels

[zachfishman]

My tank had a GHA outbreak it's second month after being setup. One month and a few snails later and it's completely gone.

[Alysiak00]

okay cool. phosphates are at zero (probly masked from the gha), yes i did add more rock but it was only out of water for about 3 seconds lol. i do understand that crap can leach out so i did ponder that around for a bit lol.

[droberts]

i run my vho set up for 8 hrs all on cuz i cant separate the actinic and super actinics until i rewire my hood and my t-5 tank runs actinics for an hour before the daylights come on and an hour after so its 8 hrs for daylights and 10 for arctics the other thing could be flow. when you added more live rock did you start getting higher phos,nitrate,nitrite readings? i have read that some alges can actually feed off of nitrate and nitrite when there is no phos in the system. i would remove as much as you can with a brush with the flow off and do a water change so you can suck up the stuff that you brush off the rocks i know that it helped me a lot and if you cant get it under control head out to captain larry's aquariums and pick up a sea hare. you can always feed the sea hare after it cleans up your tank

[Alysiak00]

i never heard about them sucking up nitrates and tris but i guess it makes sense. i'll probably go get a sea hare im just worried about it dying and then cursing my tank lol you know.