Tank cloudy with lights on

[Rodolfo Garcia]

Any idea why my tank is cloudy when lights are on but crystal clear when the lights go out? It doesn’t look like a bacterial bloom as I’ve seen how vastly cloudy they get. I’m running rox8 carbon and have a skimmer along with bio and mechanical filtration.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Do you have a photo?

 

[Utubereefer]

Got a picture? Maybe you need to clean the outside of the glass?

 

[Rodolfo Garcia]

Do you have a photo?

These are the clearest ones i could take

 

[Rodolfo Garcia]

Got a picture? Maybe you need to clean the outside of the glass?

It’s definitely not that. I’m always cleaning the outside glass, if anything it may be the inside of the glass more. It looks cloudy from the front but from the side it looks way worse. The cloudiness is also more towards the sand.

 

[backbayreef]

How old is the tank? You got any critters that might stir up the sand?

If you want crystal clear water: run UV, carbon, or Ozone. I happen to run all three! ;)

 

[Fish Fan]

Typically, cloudy water is caused by bacteria and green tinted water is caused by an algae bloom. When I look at your pics, I think I see just a bit of green in the first pic, making me think this may be algae, which would explain why it's worse when your lights are on.

If so, you may have an abundance of nitrate and phosphate that's feeding the algae. What are your water parameters?

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

It looks like the tank, or at least the sand, is new, and it looks like fine sand. Perhaps just silt in the water from the new sand?