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Since the winter I have been having blue green algae issues in my tank. I tired erythromycn and that made it go away but it came back. I covered the tank in a blanket and shut the lights out for a week and that made it go away but it came back (much cheaper than erythromycn too). Obviously I am treating a symptom and not the cause. I have been doing weekly 30%-40%water changes with gravel syphoning for over a month. And still by the third or fourth day the BGA is back. I have not been keeping track of nitrate levels.

I have been wondering if my tank is overstocked. The tank is a 40 gal breeder style. It houses 6 T. Aureus the largest (2) are maybe 4". The middle (2) are maybe 3" and the small (2) are under an 1". Also in the tank are (2) Hypselecara Temporalis one is 6+" and one is 4". The tank has mostly plastic plants with (3) medium sized java ferns which are doing fairly. The tank has (2) 30W flourecent lights (on for 12 hours daily) which are both over a year old..(maybe that is the issue)

I am really thinking I need to trim down my stock any advice?

Oh I forgot to mention I have (2) Aquaclear 200s on the tank. I clean (1) filter at each water change (just rinse the sponges in the water I syphoned out and return to the filter). The filters each have (2) pieces of sponge media (no carbon). Periodically I have added some filer floss in with the sponges but for the past couple of months I have not added any. I used to run carbon as well.

6 sm-med cichlids
in a 40 gallon is NOT overstocked.

However 60 watts of light
on for 12 hours a day
on only a 40 gallon tank
with only a couple of Java fern
may be alot of the problem.
You may be over-lit for the conditions.

The cichlids you mention don't eat plants
so you might want to add some
sword plants &/or onion bulb plants.
This will use up some of the light energy.

Also, the main thing
is that your source water
probably has phosphate in it.
There are "phosphate sponges" available (we have a couple jars in stock),
or you can use R.O. water (which we sell),
or you can use our tap water (free)
which has only a small ammount of phosphate.

The least expensive thing to try is fewer hours of light
& more plants...also farlowella cats & wide mouth plecos
might help.

Malawi Mbuna cichlids will eat blue-green algae if they are under-fed.

Ned,

How much phosphate is too much?

My city water supply reports for total phosphate:

Average in Distribution System: 1.01 ppm
Range in Distribution System: 0.27-1.72 ppm

I too have been having algae problems... blue green in some tanks, string algae in others.

FWIW: The city appears to be adding phosphates to the system:
"Corrosion Control with blended phosphate corrosion inhibitor to make the water less corrosive so that lead and
copper found in household plumbing and iron found in water mains does not dissolve into the water."

Thanks.

yeh...
it's kind of a problem...
I had a long talk with Town of Medway Water Dept. Manager.
Other town water departments may use similar methods.
I was surprised to learn they very rarely use chlorine,
the main two additives they use are phosphate with calcium.
The 2 are harmless to people and pets
and when combined they form a ceramic like coating on the inside of copper pipes preventing the metal from corroding (copper is very dangerous in high levels.)
We get very little green slime algae in the store freshwater tanks(but we have a million snails & plecos & Malawi cichlids.)
We do get Red slime algae in the Marine tanks that don't have
snails and hermit crabs
& we also get Red slime in the marine tanks that don't get
Reverse Osmosis water.

I would start with more scavengers, see if that helps.

Thanks for the help Ned.

I have been leary about trying plecos or other algae eater since the aureum used to breed in the tank and I was afraid they would stop. However since the Chocolate has gotten so big they have stopped doing that. I might try lowering the lights and finding out more about phosphate sponges.

Is my cleaning scehdule too aggressive?