A Sister's Impulse Buy

[MagPie]

If she has live plants she still wouldn't need it on all the time. It's pretty easy to tell if it is blue green algae. It can be pulled off in sheets and stinks like a swamp. She probably just has a normal algae. More plants would help too

Well, there is always going to be algae but with a bowl I wouldn't worry about it too much. It doesn't sound like it gets a lot of light.

[Nameless]

O.o Uh oh. It can be pulled off in sheets. And it does... Well stink. I don't know about swampy. My town gets very swampy and it doesn't smell like that.

[MagPie]

Well mine smelled like a swamp XD haha. Hmmm sounds like she might have it. Fish don't eat it and it doesn't go away by itself. It's a bacteria that grows like crazy when the nitrates are low or zero. I just got rid of it in my tank. I would pull it out and pull it out and it would still grow back. Mine didn't look very blueish either. There's a couple of different ways to get rid of it. I dosed my tank with Maracyn for five days and I haven't had it since. Of course you'd have to correct the main issue of low nitrates, which I've been adding ferts since.

Let me tell you, that stuff killed off several of my plants. I've read it releases toxins which harms fish and plants. But I didn't notice any ill effects on the fish, just the plants got smothered.

Feel free to pm me if you have any more questions

[Nameless]

Really? Killed the plants? Well it as been growing all over them, but none of them are dieing. And she has had it for a while now. I'll tell her to get as much of it out as she can tomorrow, and I'll look up this maracyn stuff. But why would it grow with low Nitrates? I thought it was good to have low nitrates.

Meh, I'll PM this to you as well, so you don't have to respond here.

For anyone else reading, do you know how to properly make a DIY sponge filter? I just want to make sure I did it right. I got a prefilter sponge (two), an airator thing with the clear tubing stuff, an air stone, and I am holding the prefilter onto the tubing with a rubber band.

But this thing keeps making big bubbles. I thought that air passing through both an airstone and a sponge would break it up, but it comes out in big bubbles.

Also, how on earth does blowing air into a sponge create a filter? You'd think that all you were doing was pushing air through a sponge and into the water. But this somehow draws particles into the sponge? I don't get it!

[MagPie]

Yeah it only killed a few the really hardy ones like the anubias made it out ok. But once I got rid of it all the plants are much happier! My anubias nana just gave me 4 new leaves in the last week Anyway answered your PM

[Nameless]

Oh, so my sister came home and the light is on for a bit. I think I'll tell her to keep it on for a max of five hours a day. There is still algae, but not nearly as much.