Algea/bacteria

Question
"Hey, my tank finally completed its cycle I'm so excited! But i was looking at
my tank today and their is a bunch of stuff growing all over the place. I don't
know what is algea what is bacteria and what is good or bad in my tank! on my
airrock (I added to my tank because of medication i was using earlier for ich)
the tube around my air rock anyway has a brownish growth on it. I don't know if
this is the good bacteria sense it is only growing on the airrocks tube which is
where there is alot of oxegyn for the bacteria to grow, or is the growth a sort
of algea I should get rid of? Also there is some sort of white slimy stuff
growing around my filter, the part that sucks up their air and goes into the
filter. There are also stringing offfwhitish stuff on the part of my filter that empties the water out. I don't know what good bacteria looks like or bad growth. I don't want
to mess with anything becuase it took my so long and so much work to keep my
fish alive during the beggining of the cycle (all my fish had something and one
even died of fin rot) i don't want to mess up the cycle again. So if you could
help me maybe on the sorts of bacteria and or algea i should be on the look out
for and what i shouldn't clean. Also, i don't know if its my filters fault or what but for about two weeks now I've been using a syphon to clean out the gravel and ever since i've put the carbon filter back into the filter (i took it out for the meds) there seems to be a lot more fish poo or some sort of wierd stringy substance all over the place. I clean my rocks every day! My tank was cycling so i made sure it was clean. Is there something wrong with my carbon filter? Is it the algea or stuff, but some does look like poo, its so wierd. I'm sorry for all these questions, i've just tried so hard this month to keep my my little fish alive and it seems so hard! I added a pleco and i heard they were messy. is it because the poo alot? Is it my pleco maybe? THANKYOU"


Answer
Pleco's are waste producers, but he is probably not to blame.    Sounds like you have a brown algae bloom.  It is very common in newly established tanks.  To get rid of the algae you now have, you can do any of the following:

Use silicate adsorbing resin in the filter
Increase the lighting
Clean everything.  Be careful though as over cleaning your gravel and filter can upset your cycle.
Buy some Otto Cats.  They are small fish with a bit appetite for brown algae (you will need more then one if you have a tank larger then 10g.)

Once it is gone it is a good idea to keep the increased lighting and maintain weekly water changes (10-25%) to prevent another outbreak.

It's a really tough algae to deal with.  I had a nasty outbreak in my 33g and it took my months to get all of it.  Since I have upgraded my lighting it hasn't come back.