algae problem

Question
Hello I am a new fish owner and i don't know what i should do my algae is growing to fast for me to handle i had some baby plecos but my fish at them,they are semi aggerive fish, and one more thing what should my pH, gH, and kH be?

Answer
Hi Paulina,
There are many types of algae such as brown algae, red algae, green algae, and many forms that algae can take such as appearing as a thin or thick sheet across rocks and other surfaces, as stringy strands similar to moss or even free-floating in the water clouding the tank up into a very sickly-looking "pea-soup"

*~In my experience your pH, gh, and KH level are not hardly as important as your ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate level--these are the things that affect your fish the most since they basically translate to fish waste/pollution.

Your pH, gH, and KH level depends on what type of fish you are planning to keep. But even then, your local petstore's water is very likely the same as your water so the fish there are already fully-adapted to it and there is no need to worry.

~In general though a pH from 6.0-8.0 is fine for a large majority of fish, most of the time the average source/tap water is within that range its best to leave your water as is without adjusting it which can do more harm than good to the fish. This goes the same for your gh and kH levels. Unless your fish are suffering and the problem turns out to be an unstable pH level (due to a too low buffering level also known as your kH level) that's pretty much the only time I'd intervene with the water and in that sort of case you'd need to add a buffer to keep the pH from fluctuating dangerously. But otherwise, your water is usually perfectly fine.~

The basics to remember with algae problems are that in order for things to get out of hand. Something is out of balance in the tank. Algae thrives on two main factors-- light and nutrients. If either or both of those are in excessive, the algae will explode in numbers.

It's common for aquariums with algae problems to simply have too much pollutants in the water feeding the algal bloom and if the main triggers were taken care of, the algae will be starved of what its been thriving on and go away, often faster than you'd expect.

Plecos and other algae eaters are OK but they are just treatments for the symptoms and its much better to attack the real cause.

If you could check your nitrate level that is a great indicator of how polluted your aquarium is. Nitrates should ideally be kept around 20 and its much better if it can be lower than that all the time.

I'd recommend you start doing daily 30-50% water changes with gravel vacuuming until things get improve.

Lighting is a big factor too. Try to make sure your aquarium gets no more than 10-12 hours of florescent light a day. You can even cut it to just turning the light on when you feed them as long as they aren't in complete darkness the rest of the time.

With these steps taken you should be well in your way to a healthy balanced aquarium with few, if any algae problems.

Best of luck and I hope this helps!
Karen~