Need help with cloudy water

[Dam777]

I have an issue that keeps popping up in my established 75gal show tank. It seems every two months I get cloudy water. My LFS guy claims its a bacterial bloom and suggested I tried Acurel. This does clear up the problem however by clumping all the bacteria so the filters can catch it creates a mess in my canisters. Im trying to find information on what causes this heterotrophic bacteria in the first place and eliminate it. Ive read lots of articles and some say frequent water changes can cause this type of bloom, kinda counteractive to my house cleaning routine (75% WC every two days). Could it possibly be something in my tap water? Too much or frequent wc's? Is there something I can add to my my filtration to help? I currently don't use any chemical filtration. Would a UV sterilizer work? Thanks in advance.

[discuspaul]

You might give Seachem Purigen a try.
I've used it 24/7 for years, and it does wonders to super clarify your tank water, and keep it that way 100% of the time.

[Ryan925]

What type of filter are you running?

[Phillydubs]

How often are you cleaning your filters ? Are you doing anything around this time to possibly cause such an issue?

I'll tell ya that clean water doesn't cause this and if you are changing water as you say this shouldn't happen.

What type of substrate ?

[Dam777]

I have two Eheim Pro 4+ 350's with mechanical, coarse, medium, then fine going next into two baskets filled with Biohome plus biological filtration. I run zero chemical filtration.

What type of filter are you running?

[Dam777]

I clean my filters once a month a week apart from each other. I have a thin layer of pool filter sand. I feed 8 5-6" discus 2 cubes of Al's FDBW worms daily.

How often are you cleaning your filters ? Are you doing anything around this time to possibly cause such an issue?

I'll tell ya that clean water doesn't cause this and if you are changing water as you say this shouldn't happen.

What type of substrate ?

[Dam777]

Was tossing around the idea of adding a HOB Aqua Clear with purigen only but would rather not addd another piece of equipment if i can avoid it.

You might give Seachem Purigen a try.
I've used it 24/7 for years, and it does wonders to super clarify your tank water, and keep it that way 100% of the time.

[Ryan925]

Was tossing around the idea of adding a HOB Aqua Clear with purigen only but would rather not addd another piece of equipment if i can avoid it.

I run a single eheim pro 4+ 600 on a 75 with 9 discus. My water is always crystal clear. I run an eheim prefilter on intake and only the coarse sponge in the filter. I removed the fine one. Do you rinse your bio media?

[Dam777]

I gently rinse in the basket with aquarium water only. I use the bottom basket for the medium and fine filters, the very top were waters first enters is the coarse filter. So it goes from coarse to the bottom basket of medium then fine then through the two baskets of bio material then return back to tank. I did away with the floss filter that it passed through before going into tank. My theory is three stages of mechanical then bio material makes perfect sense. I don't use the filters supplied, I cut my own with filter material I get from Greatwave Engineering.

I run a single eheim pro 4+ 600 on a 75 with 9 discus. My water is always crystal clear. I run an eheim prefilter on intake and only the coarse sponge in the filter. I removed the fine one. Do you rinse your bio media?

[Ryan925]

I gently rinse in the basket with aquarium water only. I use the bottom basket for the medium and fine filters, the very top were waters first enters is the coarse filter. So it goes from coarse to the bottom basket of medium then fine then through the two baskets of bio material then return back to tank. I did away with the floss filter that it passed through before going into tank. My theory is three stages of mechanical then bio material makes perfect sense. I don't use the filters supplied, I cut my own with filter material I get from Greatwave Engineering.

I do the same I just sort of jiggle the baskets in the canister as I remove them then I hose out the canister.
Does your cloudiness always correspond with wc or is it more random?

A UV sterilizer could definitely have great benefit but I would want to find the root of the problem

[Dam777]

its random, I just did a water change yesterday and started using seachem's Pristine again. So far no cloudiness but it usually returns unexpectadly.

[dillct]

How do you treat your water?

[Dam777]

I refill with a python (tap water) and treat w/prime.

[Phillydubs]

You sure it's not something from the tap or w the straight tap? Every try to age ?

[dillct]

How much Prime are you dosing with your water changes? What chlorine/chloramine levels are you targeting with each dosage?