green water & filtration

[percyb]

My tank has clear water but with a definite green tinge. I tried reducing light and adding a UV filter but still no impact.
Only thing not regular about my tank is that 1) I used pond soil from garden centre for substrate, which i am sure has got more biomatter in it that the expensive ADA stuff, 2) I do water changes from the pond water in the garden, which is slightly green, as the tap water regularly killed my fish if I did more than 25% water change.

So has anyone tried a tap water filter used to clean drinking water? I was thinking i could adapt it so that the water passed through the filter from the pump. I know it will slow the water down, but i have 2 external filters so i think thats ok.

or any other ideas?

[Guppendler]

Why don't treat your tap water with anti chlorine? Just wondering

[Urban Aquaria]

As you already mentioned, i guess the main cause is indeed using existing green water from your pond combined with excess organic nutrients in the pond soil. Its basically like continuously introducing phytoplankton cultures into the tank while trying to remove it, just becomes a never-ending battle as the tank can never fully be rid of it.

Are you using a good quality declorinator solution to treat the tap water before using it to do water changes in your tank? If not, then that could be why the fishes have issues with the water changes.

If you are referring to using those bolt-on tap filters that are commonly advertised to clean the tap water, they may trap some of the larger impurities and absorb excess minerals/metals or chemicals, but are usually not efficient enough to remove existing green water phytoplankton.

I guess the best solution would be to not use pond water anymore, and get the fishes in your tank to gradually adapt to treated tap water instead, that would greatly reduce all the unnecessary hassle of constantly fighting against the green water issue. Also do more water changes to flush out all the excess nutrients from the tank and add more fast growing plants to soak up the light and nutrients.

For green water issues, its usually all about competition for light and nutrients, if there are lots of fast growing plants that can outcompete the phytoplankton, it'll starve them out. I've even seen ponds where green water clear up at the same time when thread algae take over (the pond water become crystal clear, but tons of thread algae everywhere), a good example of one type of algae out-competing another.

[percyb]

I stopped using the tap water & dechlorinator mix as was expensive and seems like putting way too much chemicals in tank vs rainwater. Also was a bit hit and miss as could not dechlorinate before I put in tank (using hose directly into tank) so was some losses every time.

I read that using DE from a pool filter also scrubbed the water and removed the green - has anyone had any success with this?

Thanks

[mUAr_cHEe]

I've even seen ponds where green water clear up at the same time when thread algae take over (the pond water become crystal clear, but tons of thread algae everywhere), a good example of one type of algae out-competing another.

Oh yah hor! Idol is idol. I have seen this before in my dad's pond.