Algae bloom?

[MidTnBetta]

Okay so about a week and a half ago now, I had a massive algae bloom in both my 5 gallon and my 10 gallon tanks. My 1 gallon hospital tank is fine. It bloomed about a week after doing a 75% water change in both tanks. I have no live plants, and no snails, etc. I'm going to look into snails, but what could have caused this? I took everything out, scrubbed tank, did a 100% water change, and scrubbed everything in very hot water. I don't have a testing kit so I don't know what the water levels are. It's not bothered my bettas at all though. I'm keeping an eye on both tanks now, but so far both are all clear. It was probably a week or so after I did the water change that I saw it. And it wasn't a gradual thing. It was maybe 2 days for it to turn my tanks fairly green. What's weird is in the 10 gallon, it was only on the side that had the light bulb (yeah I know algae needs light etc). Was just weird to see only half my tank green. I also had to take all the plants out, soak in hot water and scrub. That was fun. At least I know my lights would be good for plants now.

[emeraldmaster]

I would like to see the answer to this too, this happened to my 10 gallon last week, the algea is still there... 2 snails and 5 cories are barely affecting it.

[babystarz]

Algae blooms are typically caused by too much light coupled with enough food to support algae (even if you're not overfeeding, your fish still produces waste). A long photoperiod will cause an algae bloom, as I found out after leaving my tank lights on for 4 days straight :P

Scraping + limiting photoperiod + snails = the best way I have found to cut own on the algae.

[Kithy]

How long are your lights on and how bright? Any sunlight will help algae growth as well. Cutting back on direct light will reduce the amount of algae you have and give your algae eaters a fighting chance to cut it back.

[aokashi]

algae is beneficial to water quality. Typically people want to get rid of it for aesthetic reasons.

Nitrates + Phosphates are usually what causes Algae, and this is produced via fish waste.

as above posters have said, cut down on light.... what kind of algae is growing btw?

[emeraldmaster]

I cannot speak for the OP but i just had boring green algea. brown in areas... though i am wondering what type of algea did you have MidTnBetta?

[Kithy]

IIRC, brown algae in my tank started during a high ammonia spike that made my fishies very upset. But you do want some green algae in your tank although maybe not so much on the front or sides.