Why dose it get worse?

[bobby]

Why is it every time I add phosegaurd or phosphate pads my cyno gets worse it seems to duoble? I found the cause of it in the fist place my ro water i buy has phos in it and ive bought from 3 different places, so I add this stuff and it gets worse. My perameters are amon-0 trites-0 trates-.5 and phos-.5to1. I just cant get it to go down and my open brain is really stressed if i cant get this fixed im going to have to get rid of it. So somebody help!

[d.french]

all my water checks out good but phosphates so i bought my own ro/di unit and started using phosban in a filter bag and sit it in hang on filter and now things are slowly looking better now this weekend i'm going to buy a phosphate reactor if i can find a lfs who has one. do you got real good water flow in your tank old fish food getting caught up in tank can make phosphate problem and cyano outbreak.

[bobby]

I have good flow I think about 550 gph in 2 power heads then I have a filter and skimmer so should be good flow, I was going to buy the ro unit off ebay and heard there not that good and to buy a good one will be 250.00 so sine my tank is only 30gal I have just been buying it from the store

[Bifferwine]

How long do you leave your phosphate pads and phosgard in the tank? If you leave them in for too long, they will release the phosphate back into the water.

Also, if you have any algae (micro or macro) and it dies, it will release all its phosphate back into the water. I also see huge phosphate spikes in my tank when I pluck the hair algae off the rocks, then phosphate levels skyrocket because the algae takes it up from the water, and I just removed all the algae.

So if you are removing algae by hand or it is dying off, that could be the cause of high phosphates too.

[bobby]

I have no macro in the tank but when my base rock gets too much I put what I can in direct flow and what I cant i flip over so it gets no light, also my lfs says to change the pads monthly but i change them bi weekly and have just started to use phosgaurd but the box said it will not release anything back into the water. I have alot of dead algae mostly red hair or slim I'm not to sure but it is dieing off when i put i direct flow.Well I just got back from a fourth place that sells ro and I am so mad I just tested for phos and it reads 1.0 ppm what is the deal i bought the only and last test kit for phos that any of my lfs sells and none of the places test for phos so I dont know if its just my kit or what and dont know how to find out, man im about to explode i just want to get back to were i was with very little algae and a nice looking and healthy tank.

[jhnrb]

Well, lets take a look at the phos problem again.

1. phosphate is at a certain level
2. phosphate pads etc are used to lower phosphates
3. Rocks are turned over to kill algae
4. Phosphate increases.

SO. If you have phosphate increases after installing a phosphate removing filter medium, you simply have more phosphate being introduced or leached into the water collum than the pads, etc are able to pull out. This can be attributed to algae die off, uneaten food. Phosphate does not manufacture itselfin the water collum, it must be introduced to the system. Now the uptake by algae will give you a false buffer until you kill the algae and it releases the phos back into the water collum. Old carbon will leach phos back into the water collum. 10 days max on carbon and do not reuse same carbon. you seem to have addressed water turnover rate but is the cirulation adequate in all parts of the system?. to remove algae you should remove the rock to a tub of aquarium water and deal with it there, add some animals to help with the problem. I seen several posts lately where some of the members are using saltwater acclimated mollies. You might try one or two of those. acclimate slowly and do not use ones strait from freshwater. hope something here helps.

In closing I strongly recommend the following book. It is cheap, very detailed on algae in plain english.

Algae (a problem solver guide) - Julian Sprung - ISBN 1-883693-02-0
WEB SITE - Two Little Fishies Splash Page

[Bifferwine]

I agree with John. When you kill the algae by flipping the rocks over, the dying algae in the tank may be releasing a bunch of phosphate back into your water... I'm having the same problem myself right now, got my nitrates down to 0, now I'm battling phosphates... Tons of hair algae and bryopsis. Take it one day at a time, change things one at a time so if something works, you know what it was.

How much do you feed? Could you be overfeeding? What kind of food do you feed? Flakes are much worse for phosphates than frozen food.

[bobby]

I feed very sparingly I feed the fish 1 time every 3 days and not much at all I see them eating some algae off of the filter, and I feed the corals 1 tsp of DT's phyto every 3 days was once a week but moved it to every 3 days because the open brain started looking bad. I will try that book and try to learn more about algae. I guess the main problem I'm mad about is I think I got a crapy test kit and have no way of finding out untill I order a new one so having to wait and wonder is making me the maddest right now, and thanks for all your help.

[bobby]

Oh ya I will also take my rock out and put it a ten gal and try to ditch the algae there. How long do you acclimate mollys for? I think you drip acclimate them over about 12 hours or so not to sure. Thanks agin for everybodys responses.

[Bifferwine]

With my hair algae, I have ended up doing the same, taking the rocks out one by one and placing them in a separate bucket with saltwater, then I remove the algae with a toothbrush and tweezers. Toothbrushes work well, you might want to try it. Just be sure you take off any mobile animals first, before you move the rocks, snails and crabs hide well.