Is this some kind of algae?

[juggler]

Hi, a few days ago I noticed some kind of greenish powder on the surface of my 4ft tank. Covering maybe 60% of the surface. No smell.



It caused my fish to go to the surface in the morning like lack of O2. No major losses except one Cardinal Tetra.
Currently I am using DIY CO2 which I run it through a reactor non-stop. It has not cause problems before.

What could it be? Anyway to remove it? Thanks.

[Simon]

skimmer?

[juggler]

No skimmer - sigh. Only Swordtail who use to eat the surface scum but now don't touch this thing.
Actually my tank hard to use a skimmer because of the plastic hood, everytime will need to remove hood if I want to adjust.

[Simon]

koah fong, perharps u can use a paper towel..

[kelstorm]

my pair of black mollies does the job everytime.. just dun over feed them...[]

[juggler]

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On 5/13/2002 12:45:45 PM

my pair of black mollies does the job everytime.. just dun over feed them...[]
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But it is not an oily film on the surface, some kind of green, powdery stuff. I tried using a net to scoop them off but a few days later it is on the surface again.

[coryfav]

is that algae? scary...[:0]

kelv, do the mollys actually help clean the surface? even oily-looking stuff?

guys/gals, livebearers are "hard water" fish, right? can live in tetra/cory environment?

[hwchoy]

flor, livebearer ala guppies and platies are true longkang fish. they'll live in anything liquid

[YES]

hmm... never see b4.. could this green stuffs released from the plants itself?..

[kelstorm]

Flor, my black mollies does that everyday at night..[]

[DEA]

i got this a long time ago
when i didn't change water for like close to a few months (ok, ok, i noe)
the thing will form a film over the water and it appears to produce something which the fish absolutely hate
i scooped off as much as i could and changed water
no issues after that

[juggler]

Last night, I DIY a skimmer using a spare powerhead and left it running till morning. It got rid of the film of greenish stuff. Hope it stays away. It had claim the lives of 5 Harlequins and a Ram.

[juggler]

One more casualty - an Oto.
Anyway, the below is the skimmer I made using an old Rena powerhead and some household parts. Seem to do the job.

[sherchoo]

Koah Fong,

hmmm... very clever indeed.

[kelstorm]

Koah Fong.. u are very ingenius.. u should go for young entreprenurial award.. hehehe[]

[juggler]

This surface scum seem to be coming back weekly now. If I didn't skim it off, some fish get sick and die. Last few days 2 casualties - 1 cardinal and a apisto.

It seem to be concentrated at a corner above my E. bleheri which has some leaves growing out of the water. The water is quite stagnant over there as the spray bar is not that long to circulate that region.

I wonder how it originates?

[wks]

juggler, try post this algae problem and attach the picture at Aquatic Plants Mailing List (forum). See whether the Amercian hobbyists can help u.

[DEA]

i would suggest you clean out your filter
the one and only time i got this was when there was a lot of decomposing crap inside my eheim

[bclee]

Just a thought... I think it is not the green scum causing your fish to die but rather the water condition that cause the scum killed the fishes.

Why don't you test your water? Maybe NH3 or NO2?

How of often you do water change?

BC

[juggler]

DEA: Actually I cleaned the filter last month after the first outbreak of the algae. And before that was 4 months ago.

And I change 50% water every week or fortnight. Nothing unusual happen like this since the tank was set up 2 years ago.