Brown stuff on glass

I am wondering what this stuff is. Ever since I took my filter media out and started just running the filter for water movement, my nitrates have come way down to about 10-20 (from 40-60). But now I keep getting this brown stuff on the back of the glass and sometimes on the front. It almost looks like the diatoms I first got way back when my tank cycled. Is this normal? All of my parameters are great! My skimmer is working well and all my fish are happy! Oh yeah, after I do my water change I do put a new carbon pad in my filter for a few days just to help clear up any gunk. If this stuff is normal, should I just keep using my magnet cleaner to get rid of it? Thanks.

I wish I could take a picture, but it does not show up on a pic.

It's algae. Sorry . How often do you have to scrape off the glass? Even in a tank with really good water parameters the glass needs to be scraped off at least once a week.

What do you have for a cleaner crew, specifically snails? Astraea snails are the best for cleaning off glass. Get yourself a handful of those, and they'll take care of it for you. My guess would be, for a 29 gallon tank, around 10 astraeas.

You might also want to run some sort of phosphate removal media in your filter for the time being. Stuff like RowaPhos, PhosBan and PhosGuard will help out greatly. You just run it in a bag, same as you would carbon.

Biff,
So is the phosphate harmful to my fish?

I forgot to answer your questions. I scrape the glass every other day. For cleaner crew I have several little hermits, 2 peppermint shrimp (those are obviously not helping clean the glass), a couple of snails that were hitchhikers and are pyramid shaped, and 5 or 6 cerith snails. I am going to the LFS tomorrow and see if I can get some of those astraea snails and some phosphate removal. Thanks!!

Yeah get a lot more snails. That should do the trick for you! Cerith snails don't do much for the glass either. But astraeas are your best bet.

Phosphate at low levels won't harm anything, it will just fuel algae growth.

You might want to do a search on your hitch hiking snails to.So can be real bad for a reef tank.

yeah, some of them will even eat your corals.

you mentioned having a carbon pad. they are less effective as compared to a media bag filled with carbon. You get so much more than the weak sheets or prepackaged carbon things. One mexican turbo will also help to clean the glass.

-Dr Marco

yep, a little algae is going to there even in a perfectly healthy tank. just add a little more cleanup crew.

Thanks guys!!!