Phosphates.........What causes high phos..

[bocfuss]

A relative noob when it comes to fish tanking. I have some friends that have a 150 gallon tank that has been running for a couple years, they have green hair algae like no ones buisness, they are cleaning it all up, but I'm sure it will come back as they have phosphates through the roof. They use city water, it tests 0 with phosphates, I use RO water and have zero phos.. is this the main problem? Where else can high phos come from? They do feed twice a day, but so do I. They have a sump set up and have a nice skimmer and have started to use some anti-phos stuff, but it isn't working very well. Any ideas?

 

[sk8r_dave]

Maybe the phosphates are coming from the food.You can test this by puting the food in some water dissolve it,and test the water.It would help if others chime in.

 

[cgrant]

i found my phos was coming from the food, i purchased a kent phos reactor for ~30 bucks and got some phos guard, so far so good.

 

[aredmon]

Once phos goes up it is up for a while. Cont. tring to pull as much out as possible and do a water change directly after messing with it and continue running phosphate removers and it will eventualy go away. Tell them they may even want to try emerald crabs who are great for taking care of hair algea. Mine do. Also adding micro algea such as cheto help to remove phosphates.

 

[cgrant]

i caught my phos before it got too bad, i didnt have hair algae yet. I tested it and got a reading of 1, been running the phos reactor for about 2 weeks now and its back down to undetectable level with the test kit.
I did also do a 50 gallon water change (210 tank)
Really all i can tell you is it worked for me.
What is your phos test reading?
Edit: I just re-read this post and realised they are using city water, i would bet thats the main problem!

 

[aredmon]

Yes city water can cause hair algea without phosphates. City water can contain nutrients added into it that will cause the algea to grow. But continue to remove the phosphates and tell them to try ro water for all other water changes.

 

[bocfuss]

Thanks everyone.