# Cloudy tank



## jeffnc (Oct 30, 2010)

Recently built a 75 gallon cichlid tank, it's cycled and populated and otherwise healthy for a couple months. It started growing brown algae, which died off , then started growing green algae. This was fine with us on the rocks and glass as it looked natural and gave some food for the Pleco. Then it developed a huge algae bloom in the water, probably partly due to the full spectrum LED being on too long during the day. Cut back on the light and added a UV sterilizer which cut back on that problem (unless this is related).

But it now has this cloudiness issue as shown in the photo. It's like a little fog that rolls around. Some days appears worse than other days, or perhaps it's just lighting conditions. The photo seems to accentuate it slightly.

The only other interesting thing that happened was that a few fish developed ich, and it was cleared up in a week or less with a copper solution, after which we did a couple partial water changes. This was a few weeks ago.

We are really looking for crystal clear water like exists in our other 15 gallon tank. The two tanks have the same water supply obviously, but they do get fed a different variety of food. It has standard filtration including Seachem Purigen "water polisher".


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## welok (Jul 20, 2015)

Take a clean, unscented paper towel and dip it into the tank, then immediately take it out. If it changes to brown or green, it's still algae. If not, then it's a bacterial bloom. Feed less and do water changes to clear up bacterial blooms, less light for algae.


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## jeffnc (Oct 30, 2010)

How would bacteria be surviving the UV sterilizer?


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