# Green Water



## Jimbo (Apr 23, 2013)

I recently rescaped my office cube and pulled most of the plant matter out and made a big mess out of it. It had gotten a lot of algae as I was away for most of the summer. Now I have really green water. I figured it's from the massive nitrate bloom from disturbing and tearing up everything.

I wish I hadn't sold my UV sterilizer as that would have made short work of this. Is there anything else simple that I can do? Is there a cheap little UV sterilizer that I should just grab? Anyone have any ideas? Thanks.

James


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## 2wheelsx2 (Apr 21, 2010)

http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?44887-Green-water-heavily-planted-tank

Edited my post since Tom Barr (Plantbrain) says it best.


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## Jimbo (Apr 23, 2013)

2wheelsx2 said:


> Do some big water changes. If your tank was stable before that should take care of it. Did you remove significant plant mass? If not, the problem should clear up fairly quickly. If you did tear out and discard a whole bunch of plants, you might need that UV sterilizer or to stuff some floating plants in for a while. Turning off the lights for a couple of days would help too.


I took out probably 80% of the plant mass. It was super overgrown and I wanted to clean it up. I might leave the light off for the weekend. The plants and fish should be fine right?


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## 2wheelsx2 (Apr 21, 2010)

The fish don't really need the light and the plants will be fine for a couple of days. Do the big water changes though. You need to get all the nutrients out of the water. You might even have free ammonia since you removed so much mass.


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## jbyoung00008 (May 16, 2011)

Canadian aquatics had some cheaper UV's. They are in Vancouver. Other than that green water is very hard to get rid of. You could buy a daphnia culture. They eat green. Canadian aquatics had them before too. That be the cheapest way


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## shaobo (Apr 21, 2010)

Daphnia would be a good idea only for fishless tanks. 

- Do a few 50% water daily for the next few days.
- Reduce photo-period or light off.
- If you have Seachem Purigen handy, throw them in with your filter meida. 
- Add some floating plants to sucks up the extras.


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## Flear (Dec 8, 2012)

skip water changes they won't do anything for you, ... exersize at best for you hauling water

if you do proper maintenance on your tank, ignore the greenwater, it will crash on it's own in a few days.
actually turn on more light, the phytoplankton turning your water green will speed up and consume even more nutrients from the water column till they crash (everything else will be fine in the tank

at night, make sure you have an air pump turned on, ... would suck to have everything burn through all the O2 and a bunch of dead fish in the morning

a UV sterilizer, yup, damn...

the blackout method does work, but any light getting to the tank undoes your efforts, ... so you can't check to see how things are till you unwrap the tank, ... if it's too soon, then you gotta start over
many swear by this (because then they have done something) but it's finicky.
as others are saying "turn off the lights", ... realistically, you are going to wrap the tank in a blanket or something completely opaque so everything in the tank is in total darkness for the 3 days or so this takes

leaving it alone and waiting for it to crash is the strangest one, you want to do something and this asks you go against your nature and do nothing, ... but it will crash, then you'll have crystal clear water after


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## Jimbo (Apr 23, 2013)

Flear said:


> skip water changes they won't do anything for you, ... exersize at best for you hauling water
> 
> if you do proper maintenance on your tank, ignore the greenwater, it will crash on it's own in a few days.
> actually turn on more light, the phytoplankton turning your water green will speed up and consume even more nutrients from the water column till they crash (everything else will be fine in the tank
> ...


This is what I thought as well. I am just going to let it run it's course. Was never an issue before and when the plants catch up a bit there shouldn't be an issue.


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## Flear (Dec 8, 2012)

i've got the opposite problem, ... i want greenwater

with the presence of greenwater you can increase what you put in the tank, ... clams are a big one, zooplankton live food (k, they won't survive long enough before they get eaten themselves)

then the greenwater crashed (this was after i heard on another forum this will happen- i was hoping it wouldn't)

now i can't get the greenwater started up again in the tank, ... i can add buckets of pea soup thick greenwater and within a few days the water is crystal clear again

imagine my frustration


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## jbyoung00008 (May 16, 2011)

Flear said:


> skip water changes they won't do anything for you, ... exersize at best for you hauling water
> 
> if you do proper maintenance on your tank, ignore the greenwater, it will crash on it's own in a few days.
> actually turn on more light, the phytoplankton turning your water green will speed up and consume even more nutrients from the water column till they crash (everything else will be fine in the tank
> ...


This is the craziest thing I've heard but I always enjoy reading new things. Good on you for trying something totally different and against human nature of just leaving the tank alone. There is no way I could ever do this my need to fix things would go into overload. Jimbo keep us updated on the progress. I'm very interested to hear how this pans out.

As for the Daphnia Shaobo. I've never tried it. With little fish in the tank wouldn't the Daphnia, if enough are added survive long enough to eat the greenwater. Or catch the fish put them in a bucket for a day or 2 with an air pump of course and let the Daphnia go to work


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## Flear (Dec 8, 2012)

dono about adding daphnia, ... it was a suggestion of mine at one time till shot down with "they will be eaten before they can make a significant impact"

the other idea i played with is clams, ... but clams are finicky, ... if the greenwater is too thick you will smother your clams and they will die within a couple days (sadly learned from experience) if there isn't enough the clams will slowly starve to death (i've heard this can take like 6mo.) and this is why clams are more a curiosity in the hobby than anything else, long term success with clams is minimal

i don't live in an area i could get clams from the wild at a moments notice, ... till i do i have nothing to comment on about how many clams can handle how much greenwater, or how thick/dark the greenwater should be as a maximum safe level for clams, ... or anything else in that route 

i just know really thick greenwater (less than 1" visibility) and your clams will die ASAP 

i could dilute things and try again, ... but to buy clams for such an experiment is about the most expensive thing i can imagine 

---

could also consider freshwater sponges, ... but i hear they have a high silica body, so you'd be better doing a ton of research into keeping a diatom culture going

... hardest part about diatoms or greenwater, ... people who try to keep such cultures going frequently crash, against all attempts to keep the cultures going, they crash, 2-3 weeks from what i hear is average, ... i would back that up with my own experience that mirrors that


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## Flear (Dec 8, 2012)

if you ever get into breeding fish, and want live food...

you are going to want greenwater, and zooplankton (rotifers, daphnia & such)
... don't do a search on "freshwater zooplankton", results are 90% marine (even with "freshwater" added to the search criteria)


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## Jimbo (Apr 23, 2013)

Well it's been two weeks and the tank is greener than ever. It's turning into a huge mess and all the plants are starting to die. Does anyone know where I can get a little UV sterilizer? Preferably a HOB on as this is an all-in-one tank. Or does anyone have one that I can rent/borrow for a few days? I'm afraid I am going to lose the whole tank.

Thanks.


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## charles (Apr 21, 2010)

Patrick aka "mykiss" sells small intank UV. UV works so much better than any other method for green water.


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## charles (Apr 21, 2010)

CANADIAN AQUATICS

The UV is there with price... only 2 left...


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## Jimbo (Apr 23, 2013)

Those look like they are inline. I'd have to rig up a pump and some hose to make that work. I think I'm just going to grab one off Amazon. Thanks though.


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## Flear (Dec 8, 2012)

any pictures on how green the water is ?


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## charles (Apr 21, 2010)

Jimbo said:


> Those look like they are inline. I'd have to rig up a pump and some hose to make that work. I think I'm just going to grab one off Amazon. Thanks though.


I thought we had a intank one. Contact Patrick just to make sure. He is in richmond so you can pick it up right away.


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## Reckon (Jul 25, 2012)

Doh. I wasn't sure if you were planning on continuing to keep plants or not. I would've strongly recommended a UV if I knew you were wanting to keep your plants. 

Waiting for green water to die out on its own means waiting for all the nitrates within the water column to be used up. That would mean your plants would starve. Also, allowing green water to die out means things usually get worse before it gets better; when green water gets thick it does block out light. 

Allowing green water to run its course is best for non planted tanks. I hope you manage to find a UV soon. It usually takes at least 56 hours for the UV light to start making a dent in the green water so try to do a 50% water change first to help it out.


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## Flear (Dec 8, 2012)

Reckon, see, that's what i never get to find out , i can add gallons of greenwater (no exaggeration) to my 29 gallon tank, and within a few days the water is crystal clear again, ... 

when i started it, first time, the water was green for a few weeks, i was just going to order a bunch of clams, then the water started getting clear again and i was dissapointed and frustrated.

i don't hear anyone talk about letting the greenwater run it's course, so i have no idea if it's hard on the plants or anything else in the tank, i just know from experience and from others, its' one of those things that happens, you leave it, the greenwater gets thicker, then crashes and clears up, ... after it clears up you cannot get it going again, ... and no one anywhere i asked had any information to offer no matter how much i asked.

but i know it works, end result, i just know it works, other then that i don't know a thing about it ... well aside from the basics (i talked about earlier), it's just a big black hole of information 

experience is great, but without ever having a deeper understanding that experience is usually blind to teaching, i don't know what is going on

i truly am sorry now to everyone i have offered this suggestion to  (to let it run it's course)

i am definitly going to remember to consider the state of the tank (planted or not)


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## Reckon (Jul 25, 2012)

Flear said:


> Reckon, see, that's what i never get to find out , i can add gallons of greenwater (no exaggeration) to my 29 gallon tank, and within a few days the water is crystal clear again, ...
> 
> when i started it, first time, the water was green for a few weeks, i was just going to order a bunch of clams, then the water started getting clear again and i was dissapointed and frustrated.
> 
> ...


Leaving the GW to run its course might very well be a legitimate method for getting rid of green water. Afterall, using willow branches is a common method for dealing with GW and the whole point is simply to take up nitrates within the water column. I wasn't sure either about the goal of the tank hence I didn't comment on your recommendation.

Anyways, I've only experienced green water by one way and that is by the sudden die off of beneficial bacteria (due to adding medication). So I suspect the reason why you can't seem to initiate GW is due to your well cycled tank! A good balance within the tank means your plants are doing well: taking up nutrients and NH4 (which is what algae thrives on) and is out competing green water for nutrients. Green water usually means the tank or body of water is out of balance: too much light, not enough beneficial bacteria, imbalance of nutrients, or that the plants have stopped taking up nutrients and NH4. There must be a better way to feed your clams - will dumping extra frozen daphnia work?


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