The Puffer Forum

Since the setup of my F8 tank I am having major slime algae problem and it just seems to not be going away, it is covering most objects and now is starting to cover the substrate. I mechanically remove it as best I can but a week later it's always back. I have read that it can be a result of low nitrates but I don't wanna raise those as puffers are sensitive to them. Anyone have any suggestions for me please?

nitrates- 20
ph - 8.2
amm - 0
nitrites - 0

I perform weekly 50% wc's and only feed them once every other day.

Raise the nitrate. A temporary increase won't harm your puffer. Only long term high nitrates will.

Ok cause with my planted tanks I do happen to have a big container of KN03
1. For a 40g tank any idea on how much powder I should add?
2. What level of nitrate should I be trying to get to? 40ppm?
3. Once at that level how long should I leave it at that level?


My concern is that, my nitrates rose to around 60ppm before and the puffs stop eating and their bellies turned dark.

I think 40 should be good. I'd say leave it there for around a month, but I'm not entirely sure, so it might be best to wait for someone with experience raising nitrate to remove algae.
I've never had a puffer stop eating from nitrate. Maybe it was something else too?

I had checked everything when I had that problem and everything else was all good.

Would RO water help this?

Probablly...

Have you tested for phosphates? The amout of phosphate combined with nitrates is the important part here. Here's a ratio table about this:


The reason why adding nitrates can help, is that it changes the amount compared to phosphate.

BTW, my best trick against them, is turning off the lights for a week. But without doing anything else about it, it's always a chance of them coming back.

I have no idea why that pic doesn't come up in the message, but try this link instead.

I agree with Troender. I've had a similar problem where it was all over the place in my tank. I was told to turn off the lights and it really helped, evrything disapeared. It did come back, but it's more under control. When it first happened I added some plants and it never came back where the plants are. Right now there's only some bits on my bog wood left. I didn't know about low nitrates though and my nitrates are always close to zero! I'll try a 25% WC weekly instead of 50% and monitor the nitrates see if I can get rid of the last bit of those bacterias!
Good luck with yours! By the way, I realised that it was more effective when you cover the glass with a towel so daylight doesn't come in neither.

Is it slime algae, or brown dust looking stuff? Our tank used to have tons of brown stuff, then it just disappeared one day.

It is most definitely slime algae. I will have to check the phosphates out, I am pretty sure I have a test kit for that

Red Legged Hermit Crabs will eat cyanobacteria.

yunachin wrote:Red Legged Hermit Crabs will eat cyanobacteria.

So do applesnails too. But in a puffer tank it's a bad idea. Or a bad idea for us. The puffer, on the other hand, would love the idea!

I know this thread has not been active for a while, but I thought I'd share my experience with this Redfield ratio...
My algae problem didn't go away and I couldn't get rid of it, even after puting the fish in a new tank with the old filter. They probably traveled with the filter and colonized the new tank.

So I bought a phosphate buffer (my tap water has phosphate in it) anf KNO3 and maintained No3 at 7 and Phosphate at 3 for a month... Perfect ratio if we beleive Redfield. What happened?
The bluegreen algae grew stronger to the point where in 1 week it would cover everything in the tank (I could actualy lift sheets of slime off the bog wood and the gravel) AND my fish got sick with fin rot probably due to higher levels of nitrates (they were used to next to zero) and stress and all (see thread "fin rot on DP" in hospital forum for details).

So... really it hasn't worked out for me, I guess bluegreen algae are here to stay in my tank!