# [Wet Thumb Forum]-Slime Layer on Surface



## andy485 (Aug 19, 2005)

I have a slime layer on the very surface of my 90 gallon aquarium. I have noticed that it increases slowly after my weekly water change. It starts as a whitish film in the first three days and begins to turn greener and greener for the next four days until my water is changed again. Is the only relief for this a water change? Could I have a 50% water change twice a week with out hurting my heavly planted tank? Could to much iron dosing be doing this? I have recently changed from a 50% EcoComlete 50% gravel substrate to a 100% flourite substrate. I dont think I stirred up anything because I comletely empty my aquarium before I did the substrate change and I also rinsed the flourite heavly with a garden hose and a window screen. Will I not need as much iron with the flourite substate?


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## KRiley (Jun 30, 2005)

Hey,

A slime coat is totally normal in a planted tank. I have seen them on both my 50s and on my 20. The way to get rid of it is to apply some surface agitation. You dont want violent agitation. You want to gently ripple the top of the water. I dont know what it does, but it gets rid of the slime. Hope this helps.


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## kam (Nov 23, 2005)

Protein remover can also do the trick.


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## MOR B. (Oct 9, 2003)

a tiny power head on water surface would do the job


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## Hawkeye (Aug 20, 2004)

I have the same problem now and then. Mollies work very well for surface scum and algae. But the best thing I came up with is surface scum removal when I do water changes. Here is what I did:
http://www.mpiaquatics.com/articles/articles_scumRemoval.htm

When I do water changes I use this setup to remove surface scum. To make sure to doesn't come back you may need to do this several times. OH and yes surface turbulence will help too.

Hawk


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## JJR (Dec 14, 2004)

A couple of nooby questions:

1) Wouldn't surface agitation decrease the amount of CO2 in the water?

2) Doesn't surface agitation simply mix the protein into the water? Instead of getting rid of the protein, agitation just makes it less obvious to the naked eye.

Recognizing that surface protein is a problem in many planted aquariums, isn't it more helpful to say that more-frequent water changes would help the problem? It might also be helpful to feed less protein-rich foods, as they seem to significantly increase the slime in my tank.

Hope this helps clarify things (for both you and me)


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## flagg (Nov 29, 2004)

> Originally posted by JJR:
> A couple of nooby questions:
> 
> 1) Wouldn't surface agitation decrease the amount of CO2 in the water?


Yes, but depending on how much the surface is agitated CO2 loss doesn't have to be all that bad. I mean, if you're churning the surface of the water, then yes, that will definetly get rid of a lot, if not most, of the CO2. On the other had, a gentle "stirring" of the surface would keep the film from forming w/out an excess loss of CO2.



> 2) Doesn't surface agitation simply mix the protein into the water? Instead of getting rid of the protein, agitation just makes it less obvious to the naked eye.
> 
> Recognizing that surface protein is a problem in many planted aquariums, isn't it more helpful to say that more-frequent water changes would help the problem? It might also be helpful to feed less protein-rich foods, as they seem to significantly increase the slime in my tank.


Again, I think the answer here is yes, or at the very least, just keeps it from "sticking" together and forming a film. A biofilm however, isn't necessarily proteins. It could be other organic compounds, bacteria, protozoa, etc... I don't think that mixing any of these into the water column would be necessarily bad... as long as plants and fish are doing well, I wouldn't worry about it.

-ricardo


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## JJR (Dec 14, 2004)

Thanks for the clarification Ricardo.

JJR


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