This is a reason not to clean your glass...

[hedge_fund]

When I first started with shrimp I used to keep all my glass clean just for aesthetic reasons but now I leave it alone....the only glass that gets cleaned is the front. I also leave the lights on longer so algae grows. For some reason I am not getting algae anywhere but the glass which is perfect since the shrimp are constantly picking at it. My moss is growing perfectly as well.

I highly encourage you to leave the glass alone and let the algae / biofilm develop since it's very beneficial to the shrimp.

Check out my green field and random shrimp picking at it.







Moss still grows healthy even with a ton of light...

[Soothing Shrimp]

Very nice and green. I do the same. Limpet trails in the third pic? ( I hate those buggers. heh)

[greenman857]

Yeah in the tank where i have shrimp and seed shrimp, where I clean the glass and then miss spots i find the seed shrimp and shrimp congregating on the spots that aren't cleaned. But you've got to have some spots where you can watch the shrimp too!

[sayurasem]

Yup this what I do too.

[Sluuuder]

Beautiful shrimp cant wait to get started with shrimp again!

[Kinection]

I can never get algae on my glass, probably because
the shrimp make barely any bio-load and I'm overfiltering
by x3.

[PuddlesAqua]

Algae comes from excess light, not lack of filtration.

[l8nite]

My tank looked like that. Then I put 2 striped nerites in. Now it's crystal clear again.
Fat Snails 1, Algae 0.

[MsNemoShrimp]

Originally Posted by hedge_fund

When I first started with shrimp I used to keep all my glass clean just for aesthetic reasons but now I leave it alone....the only glass that gets cleaned is the front. I also leave the lights on longer so algae grows. For some reason I am not getting algae anywhere but the glass which is perfect since the shrimp are constantly picking at it. My moss is growing perfectly as well.

I highly encourage you to leave the glass alone and let the algae / biofilm develop since it's very beneficial to the shrimp.

Hi Kamil! Really enjoy these images. I could only dreamed of having tanks like that back when. If I left my lights on more than 10 hours hair algae would form. So what is the secret to lots of lighting and no algae. I assume its lots of low light and far from the water surface?

About how many hours per day you would leave the light on, is it one period of extended lighting to broken down to a couple cycles of about 4-6 hours each? How long did it take to get from fresh clear glass to that thick in algae?

[Hardstuff]

I disagree about algae does not come from under filtering. Amano himself states that if a tank with heavy plant bio mass is under filtered algae will be a problem. I run my lights 12 hours a day or more & algae is not a problem for me at all. I do run twin canisters on a this tank which is only 10 gallons. The water stays very clear & the plants are doing well. I had many early tank problems that were so bad I al most packed it in , until I added a second canister. Now my fish & shrimp are healthy . I would always consiter good flow & filtration & important part of planted tanks being balanced. I use to think less was best. That being said I do get a little algae only on the glass.

[AVN]

I can't feed my baby shrimp any foods because they only eat off the walls.

[MsNemoShrimp]

Originally Posted by Hardstuff

I disagree about algae does not come from under filtering. Amano himself states that if a tank with heavy plant bio mass is under filtered algae will be a problem. I run my lights 12 hours a day or more & algae is not a problem for me at all. I do run twin canisters on a this tank which is only 10 gallons. The water stays very clear & the plants are doing well. I had many early tank problems that were so bad I al most packed it in , until I added a second canister. Now my fish & shrimp are healthy . I would always consiter good flow & filtration & important part of planted tanks being balanced. I use to think less was best. That being said I do get a little algae only on the glass.

Is your light a medium light or low light? 12 hours is a lot, I am curious to know how you could do it successfully without running into hair algae and such?

[danielt]

Light has less to do with algae than ammonia levels. Good filtration means less ammonia regardless of how much and often you feed.

I'm over filtering my shrimp tank and the only algae that still lingers is GSA on the front glass. I do have Amanos and enough shrimp to make almost any algae invisible.

My light is at >1W/L, 2XT5 24W for 10 hours over a 40L tank with one lamp being an 8.000K and one 4.000K.

Another small 10L tank has a 23W 1400lm bulb over it and contains only a small colony of snails and it got some weak staghorn that i removed with tweezers. This tank is my experimental one and I overfeed on purpose. The filter is an Eheim Ecco Pro 130 designed for 130L tanks.

[hedge_fund]

Let me throw some facts out there about my water parameters before assumptions are made. First off, I have zero ammonia in this tank. I religiously change 10% of the water once a week and I have 3 filters on this 20 gallon along with two air stones. I am probably over filtering by x5, especially since I have purigen bags in each hang on filter. Shrimp in this tank are Taiwan Bees, PRL Ebiten, Crystal White, CRS, CBS, Snow White and Goldens. At the moment I have 10+ berried females with tons of babies all over the place. I doubt any of my shrimp would be breeding if I had crazy ammonia levels. I also never have shrimp deaths. Not too long ago I was actually worried that my water was too clean for the shrimp due to all the filters and weekly water changes.

Some time ago I used to get other algaes if I left the light on too long but ever since switching to ADA Africana and Amazonia I only get it on the glass. Not sure what type of algae it is but it scrapes of VERY easily and it's not the baked on stuff. I am thinking that it has to do with the fact that my PH is around 5.6 and the water is super oxygenated (2 hang on filters, two sponges and two air stones). Tank has a good amount of plants as well.

Originally Posted by NeoShrimp

Hi Kamil! Really enjoy these images. I could only dreamed of having tanks like that back when. If I left my lights on more than 10 hours hair algae would form. So what is the secret to lots of lighting and no algae. I assume its lots of low light and far from the water surface?

About how many hours per day you would leave the light on, is it one period of extended lighting to broken down to a couple cycles of about 4-6 hours each? How long did it take to get from fresh clear glass to that thick in algae?

Hey My. I generally keep the lights on from 6pm to 11pm and every 3 days I'll let it run from 6pm to 6am (overnight). Saturday/Sunday the light is on for another 10 hours each day. I am actually very surprised that I am able to grow this on the glass like this without getting algae anywhere else. My substrate, rocks, driftwood and plants have nothing on them. The front glass usually develops some algae but I scrape it off once a week. I've never tried to harvest algae before so not sure what actually goes into it but the walls are generally covered with baby shrimp which is always a nice sight.

I have these 21 inch bulbs in my T5 dual bulb system.
http://www.kensfish.com/moreinfo/wav...5-ho-bulb.html

[hedge_fund]

Originally Posted by danielt

Light has less to do with algae than ammonia levels. Good filtration means less ammonia regardless of how much and often you feed.

I'm over filtering my shrimp tank and the only algae that still lingers is GSA on the front glass. I do have Amanos and enough shrimp to make almost any algae invisible.

My light is at >1W/L, 2XT5 24W for 10 hours over a 40L tank with one lamp being an 8.000K and one 4.000K.

Another small 10L tank has a 23W 1400lm bulb over it and contains only a small colony of snails and it got some weak staghorn that i removed with tweezers. This tank is my experimental one and I overfeed on purpose. The filter is an Eheim Ecco Pro 130 designed for 130L tanks.

Check out how much this guy over filters and he has the same algae on the side walls.

http://alvinchan80.blog.fc2.com/blog-entry-134.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=LmmRjLt7wvI