General Aquaria Discussion • Algae Assistance

[lawdog68]

In my 55 gal aquarium, I am getting this green type algae covering my sand and shells. This tank hold 7 Noelamprologus Similis, with about 50 shells in tank. I noticed the green stuff covering a corner of the aquarium and slowly creeping across aquarium. I cover the sand up to try and smother it out, I did a black out for 4 days, even treated tank with algae clean out product.... Kind lost at this point on how to rid any suggestions will be greatly appreciated....

[DJRansome]

It looks like blue green algae or slime algae which is not algae at all by cyanobacteria.

First figure out why you have it. Are those live plants? If they are not doing extremely well they can leak fluids into the water and nourishe the cyanobacteria. Remove the plants or shape them up so they are thriving. For me I removed my plants.

Then it looks like things are just starting, so physically remove the slime and it should not come back.

If you have a hard time getting it gone, you can treat the tank with erythromycin. That can damage your biofilter, so better if you remove the cause and get it to go away naturally.

[lawdog68]

Thanks for the response, and yes those were live plants, so I just removed them and removed the slime as well. I will get it a few days and see how it does before I move on to erythromycin......

Thanks......