fishy.family Posted November 6, 2006 Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 We moved house recently and cant seem to get my tank up and running properly again. Our 90litre tank has been running for about 5 weeks now with just 2 gourami and the amonia and nitrate is zero. I have an awful brown gunge on everything and dont know what to do with it. We set up my sons 60litre tank at the same time and his is crystal clear. It is not being hit by the sun directly and I have the light on about 10hrs a day. I would really appreciate your advise. OOH I also have a blue-green almost plastic looking gunge growing in there too. :oops: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caryl Posted November 6, 2006 Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 Sounds like cyano, a bacterial gunge. This can be triggered by an inbalance of nutrients etc in the tank (as a result of the move) or be introduced with a plant. How many plants in there? Lots of plants will use up the nutrients and starve the cyano. Also, cover the tank in a blanket for 3 or 4 days as this may kill it off. As a last resort, erythromycin will kill it. This is a prescription only medicine so you need a friendly chemist or Dr to give you a tablet or 2. These pills are usually 400mg each. It as been suggested 400mg/100L. Someone else said 250mg/100L. I seem to remember using 4 pills in my 280L tank which was probably overkill but I didn’t know the dosage at that point and it certainly worked without harming the filters or fish. People worry about it killing the bacteria in the filters but I kept my filters running the whole time and noticed no difference. I was told the bacteria in the filters is the wrong sort and is unaffected by the erythromycin. Something to do with gram -ve and gram +ve bacteria. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishy.family Posted November 6, 2006 Author Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 thanks for that, i will put in more plants. Actually i used to have loads of plants and never had a problem with it so that figures. What about the green plasticy looking one? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alanmin4304 Posted November 6, 2006 Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 The gram positive or negative relates to a reaction to a stain by the bacteria. If the bug reacts (becomes stained) it is gram positive. With humans gram negatives tend to be in the gut and positives on the skin. Antibiotics and disinfectants tend to work on one or the other better. This is an aside as I know little about blue green algae except that it is not an algae and can also be red. I understand it is also a nitrogen fixer. Have a good day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caryl Posted November 6, 2006 Report Share Posted November 6, 2006 Both are the same thing fishy.family. I have also sent you a PM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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