FW Clean Up Crew?

Haaileybop

Haaileybop

Member
So I have a 3 gallon FW tank with a ton of live plants in it and my beloved beta fish Alpha. This tank has been running for around two months now. I added a heater two weeks ago and slowly raised the temp, my poor beta almost died from it. So I did two 50% water changes and got rid of the heater. Now Alpha is all perked up! Even though Alpha is back to his normal active self, the plants, tank, and sand now have a ton of algae on it. Now I have been scrubbing the glass with one of those magnet cleaners, however I am not sure what to do about the sand and plants. One of the plants has started to die and I am sure its from all the algae on it.

Now my question are is there a FW cleanup crew? If so will I be finding snails all over my desk? Or is there some other way to clean my plants and sand in my tank?
 
B

BigFish11

Member
I havent had too much experience with freshwater tanks, but i did work at a fish store for a while so i can tell you what i learned there. 3 gallons for a beta fish might be too large for the fish. Correct me if i am wrong, but from what i remember beta come from Vietman, where they live in rice patties, when they dry up the bata is confined to a small little hole, thus why they are so terratorial. Again, i have done no reserch on this so i might be wrong, this is just what i heard, but it makes sense. As for alge, the best thing that i remember for alge for small tanks are a fish called otocicles( i have no idea how to spell it) but they are small alge eaters that are great. Hope that helps, also Beta's do not need heaters
 
Haaileybop

Haaileybop

Member
Yeah I am concerned about the alge I dont want it to take over the tank and kill all my plants :(. As for the tank size beta's prefer 3 to 10 gallons and the ideal temperature is 80 degrees, and my current water temp pre-heater was 67 degrees.

If your interested here is some information about beta fish:
Beta Fish Care
 
D

DaveK

Well-Known Member
As pointed out by others you need to work on why you have algae in the first place.

With planted tanks, algae control is more of a balancing act. You need a certain amount of nutrients and light for the plants, but not enough to cause algae issues. A lot depends upon the species of algae to be controlled. Often a 4 day black out will stop a lot of algae. To do this cover the tank with a blanket, and keep it totally dark for 4 days. (No peaking). The fish and plants will come through this just fine. Here is a link to a site about FW algae control in planted tanks (offsite) - Aquarium Algae ID (updated May6th '10 Surface Skum)

It's also very easy to over do lighting on FW planted tanks, especially if your use to dealing with lighting on a reef system.

You don't mention what species of plants you have. It's often a good idea to have at least some plants the can grow quickly and compete with algal for nutrients.

As for clean up crews, I'm not a big fan of snails in FW planted tanks. The problem is that unless controlled, you end up with a mess of them and many of the common ones do a lot of plant damage.

There are a few species of fish that are good at eating algae. Oto cats are just about ideal, and stay small. See this link about them (offsite) - www.otocinclus.com - Home of the Dwarf Suckermouth Catfishes One downside is that they can sometimes be a bit difficult to locate at your LFS. Pleco are good at eating algae, but would quickly grow too large for your tank. Avoid them.
 
KARussell88

KARussell88

Member
How long are you lights on?
What kind of lights?
whats your feeding schedule?
Whats your water change schedule?
is you tank near a window?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top