fishymama

I have a 55 gal. natural tank that I set up just over 2 weeks ago with help from my brother and fellow member, rohape. Substrate is 1.2in soil covered with 1.5in gravel. I have several different types of plants. Lighting is two 40watt cool white fluorescent bulbs and approximately 1 hour of direct sunlight in late afternoon/early evening. My levels are: ammonia 0, nitrate 20, nitrite 0.5, GH 150, KH 180, pH 7.8. The last week or so, the tank has developed some kind of cobweb like growth on the sides of the tank. It is made up of very fine fibers that sway in the light current from my powerhead and like I said, looks kind of like cobwebs. I have only seen it on the sides of the tank, not on plants, driftwood, etc. Does anyone have any idea what this is or have any of you had similar stuff? Not sure what it is. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

dwalstad

If its green, its algae. If not, it may be a fungus or fungus-like bacteria (Actinomycetes). It probably is a combination of both.

Since the tank is only two weeks old, you can expect all kinds of strange things. Whatever... now is a good time to remove excess nutrients generated by new soil and alien growth (so common to new tanks). The goal is to reduce excessive water nutrients and to promote rooted plant growth. I would turn off the powerhead, scrape the glass, and remove the stuff (whatever it is) with a hose or siphon.

fishymama

Thanks for the advice. I was wondering if I should try to scrape it off or just leave it to see if it resolved on its own. So I will give that a try and hope it doesn't come back.

furballi

Quite common if you did not treat your wood by boiling it for at least 30 minutes. Some of these fungus and/or bacteria can kill fish. Two 40 W bulbs without a good reflector will probably be insufficient to grow plants except for anubias, java fern, or equivalent low-light species.

Per another post, if this stuff is white/milky, then it is not algae! There's no easy way to kill that stuff without the use of antibiotic in the water. You may be able to starve it, but it will probably come back with the addition of aquatic critters.

fishymama

Thanks for the info. The stuff is more of a light green, so I'm hoping it's just algae since I think that would be easier to deal with. The plants have been doing quite well, actually, with the two 40 watt bulbs and the sunlight. Especially the bacopa, wisteria, ludwigia, the coontail I have floating on the top, and some other plant which I'm not sure of the name. They have all grown quite a bit in just 2 weeks.

furballi

You may want to do a 80 to 90% water change after manually removing as much of that stuff from the tank. Continue to change 50% of the water 2x per week.

Direct sunlight can wreck havoc to the tank because the light intensity is so strong. Most beginner aquarists will have a hard time controlling algae if sunlight is added to the tank.

ianmoede

Pretty tough to tell whats going on in the photo. Perhaps you could put something white in there for scale and color contrast? We can help you better that way.

rohape

I would just suggest waiting things out, clean as much as you can. As dwalstad suggested removing as much excess nutrients from your water column.
Your plants will catch up and start to take care of business. They're just small little babies, soon they'll be full grown gobblers.