Let me ask a couple of questions: What kind of tank setup do you have (size, filter, heater?) What and how often do you feed? How often do you do water changes? How long has the tank been set up in its new location? All of these things may affect your water quality.

Sorry, I should have posted all of my tank details right away...

I have two tanks. Both tanks were moved about six weeks ago, but most of the water was saved, and the rocks were kept covered in water during the move in the hope that hte good bacteria would remain in place. Previously they had been up for over a year.

One is about a gallon (bought it used). This only has a betta and a couple small plants. I feed 3-6 Hikari betta bio gold pellets once per day, most days. Once in a while I skip a day because I understand it helps the fish pass what is in their system. Water changes are my downfall. With the new move, I didn't do very well at all and it was about three weeks before I did anything. About two weeks ago (right before the mold appeared) I did a drastic 90% or better water change when I realized there was a thick scum forming on the surface of the water. Now, I'm trying to do 1 liter every other day. I have no filter system on this tank yet, but am looking into the Whisper 3i filter. (Comments on quality of this filter??) This is the tank that has significant fungus growth (up to an inch or so in a couple days), and the scum is trying to reform on the surface, but I'm keeping it mostly in check with siphoning.

My other tank is 1.6 gallons, with another betta and a dwarf frog. This one has one tiny plant, two mini clay pots, a small piece of driftwood and flat piece of rock all for froggie homes. Betta gets the same feeding regime as the other, and frog gets one or two 1/8" pieces of HBH shrimp pellets depending on when the most recent skin shedding was. Frog feeding days are exactly the same as bettas. I know that the frog creates a lot more debris than the bettas, so I'm somewhat more diligent about siphoning (aka water changes) but it was still a few weeks after the move that I really got to it. I try not to do more than a liter at a time because that is the only container I have to allow the water to come to room temperature and dechlorinate. As with the other tank, I'm doing about a liter exchange every other day. This tank did have a nano filter with loose activated carbon added (8 pieces or so) until I saw the fuzz starting inside the filter. Currently I don't see any of the cottony looking fungus inside the tank, and the filter has been removed entirely. However, I do see things that look like tiny whitish hydra on all surfaces that don't move.

I do have a decent test kit (tube type, two part ammonia), and am planning to find it this weekend and take measurements.

Thanks for your help! My tanks may be beginner, but I'm trying to renew my efforts to give my little guys the best life possible. (tank size is bad, I know... apartment regulations limit me.)

There is what is called water molds, that I see crop up in my new water (pre filtered) and in the local aquarium stores. I did much research but don't have the time to find all the links. (as too exactly what it is, can be bacteria as well)... so it could be that due to municipal water supple (all over the place) or your not so great water conditions. or...

Pond scum (from memory here) is actually bacteria, that build a structure along the water surface, much like coral. In itself it is harmless and in my small bowls with starter java moss on rocks and some snails you will see the snails moving along the top eating this stuff. If aerated it will not grow.

I just put my diaton vortex filter in new tank then it's gone. This is for much larger tanks then yours, but I then go back and change the fluvival filter which is used for pre filtration. or start fresh.

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For you smaller betta tank you can get one of those really small filters with little suction cups. I keep it up higher so water flow won't disturb bettas fins, which are a single cell thin and easily damages. I also add a valve to adjust flow to slower rate. A couple plants, and I do syphon off bottom of environment every other day. Add new water slowly with small sized tubing (air line) and bit of salt, all temp ph same of course. I keep mine in the Explorer eclispe 2 (2 gallon) and don't use their filter (too much too fast) will suck up the fins and just put in this smaller gentler filter.

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I Looked up the filter you mentioned. Sounds like a good filter but I strongly feel that it will be too much for such a small size. Note the specs re 20 gallons per hour! I also noted the uptake tubing your betta will get sucked up in this. I can not post the one I use, but you will see, no uptake tube, much more gentle and very very small. They make them smaller but will need more often changes, and I have used this one extensively for ages now and am very happy with it. Cheap once you have pumps or buy in bulk as I do. I change it once every two weeks or when needed, with rince out during time in between. Depends on bio load as always not time line.

"Product Description

For aquariums up to 3 gallons. The Whisper In-Tank Filter moves water using air to filter your tank. This creates an ideal small tank environment for keeping delicate fish and breeding fish. Install the filter on the back wall of your tank--its small size makes it easy to hide with a plant or other decorative object. Filter measures just 2.5 inches wide x 1.75 inches deep x 4 inches high.
Has the same quality and performance of an external power filter.

NOTE THIS PART WAY TOO FAST/MUCH FOR SUCH A SMALL SPACE

The air-driven design filters up to 20 GPH while oxygenating water.

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I have used this filter extensively and it is perfect for 2-3 gallons and under. (again, adjust height and use value to slow current down even more if need be, I do this more at night when they are sleeping, and put behind plant to hide)

I even use it in large bowl (about 15 gallons) where it is hard to have any other type of filter, for small school of black neon tetras and one female betta. Since they need cleaner water any way, I just do the usual twice weekly water changes as I do with all my tanks (smaller amount more times) and change a new filter weekly (not same time as water change, too much disturbing of bacteria culture)

(hope this is ok to post if not email me at sherryazure@yahoo.com - well won't let me paste photo)

xxhttp://www.petco.com/Shop/petco_Product_R_7334_PC_productlist_Nav_222_N_24+112_cp_2_Nao_12_sku_79936_familyID_3199.aspxx


Penn Plax Small World Pump & Filter Kit

Compact unit removes harmful gases, odors, and discoloration from your aquarium making the water crystal clear and healthier for your fish. Includes air pump, airline, and filter unit with disposable carbon and sponge filter cartridge.Sized for all shapes and sizes of small tanks and fishbowls.

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Also, your betta likes more variety of foods, I never liked pellets as they swell considerable in size with water. I feed the softest flakes, and frozen Hikari (thrice or more sterilized)(other brands can carry diseases) blood worms and shrimps, with vegetables I make from my dinner, (zuchinni, peas so on) on occasion. I feed a few flakes morning, and plant food (or kelp plant type flake someone gave me) evenings. Their eyes are the size of their stomachs so underfeeding is not a worry here. (though they beg and beg)

I will try to find the links re the water mold et al. I did much research on this and if you like science it is interesting until of course it is in your tank! It grows especially well during the summer with hotter temperatures.

When it gets a hold though, it grows every where, filters, plants so on. I don't use sand for bettas (2 gallons) easier to clean but some surface like softer rock is neede for bio culture (anything sharp like plastic plants will shred their fins again)

You can use hydrogen peroxide to clean, but it won't solve the problem as it is in the water system. I just had a crop that grew so fast, like in 1/2 hour, long stringy, all over. And it is responsible for large number of amphibian deaths in South America, moving so fast scientist got as many species at they could (computer model told them where it might strike) without even studying some new unknown species (ny times artile a while back). within weeks this esp virulent strain wiped every thing off the map!

I check and completely cleaned fluvival which I had just cleaned a week prior (no fish just pre filtering nasty east side nyc water with old pipes so on)... but I was amazed how fast it grew after I changed all the bettas tanks! Within a few mintues then huge clusters of it later. Now gone but ugh! I cleaned the fluval filter tubing and gunk came out so think that was the feeding areana for this stuff. I also poured the new water through filter floss to hopefully catch anything which seemed to work. Nothing a few days later.

Also, I find it does not grow in already established tanks. So, if I use filter floss from established tanks and some water from an established tank, this does not occur. So something in new water (uncycled or not kept up with cleanign water) allows it to grow unchecked. Sorry for length I have tons of files as this nasty, lol.

Info on water mold. (or slime, or bacteria, or what ever it might be) AlL in know is that it occurs here in my water, and filtration (esp the diaton which unfortunately breaks down easily (vortex) and I am looking for another brand that won't.)(so far that has resolved it for me) I use the filter on my pre water set up as I have eight tanks. Best Sherry

water mold

Encyclopia Britannica Article

also spelled water mould any of about 150 species of fungi belonging to the order Saprolegniales within the class Oomycetes. Many of them live in fresh or brackish water or wet soils. Most species are saprobic (i.e., they live on dead or decaying organic matter), although some cause diseases in certain fishes, higher plants, algae, protozoans, and marine invertebrates. The mycelium (filaments composing (rest one has to pay)

xxxhttp://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/chromista/oomycota.html

I am leaving much out, please go to link to see all.

"Water molds were once thought to be fungi.
The Oomycota were once classified as fungi, because of their filamentous growth, and because they feed on decaying matter like fungi. The cell wall of oomycetes, however, is not composed of chitin, as in the fungi, but is made up of a mix of cellulosic compounds and glycan. The nuclei within the filaments are diploid, with two sets of genetic information, not haploid as in the fungi."

"Parasitic water molds damage fish and many crop plants.
Some water molds are parasites on other organisms; they may grow on the scales or eggs of fish, or on amphibians. The water mold Saprolegnia causes lesions on fish which cause problems when the water is rather stagnant, as in aquaria or fish farms, or at high population densities, such as when salmon swim upstream to spawn. Other species of Saprolegnia are parasitic on aquatic invertebrates such as rotifers, nematodes, and arthropods, and on diatoms."

Gteat link for algae and molds.

xxxhttp://members.aol.com/casey144801/aquarium/algae.htm

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xxxhttp://www.skepticalaquarist.com/docs/biofilm/molds.shtml

Fungi and water molds (and slime molds too)

Fungi typically work unseen, like bacteria. We notice them only by their results. Fungi are colorless; except for a few kinds, their only colors are provided by their spores; the spores make bread molds colorful. The real body of fungi, their mycelia, are less noticeable, unless a damp spadeful of garden humus reveals their frayed gauzy cobwebs.

A few familiar manifestations of fungi are not at home in water. For a start, there are no aquatic mushrooms or toadstools, because those large fruiting bodies depend on currents of air to scatter their spores.

Also absent in water are the lichens, a kind of catch-all group invented to describe the symbiotic pairings of a fungus with an alga or a cyanobacterium. These partnerships were among the first conquerors of the land, the tougher cell walls of the fungus protecting the alga from drought. By contrast, there's no especial advantage for lichens in a water environment; instead, aquatic fungi are more likely to be closely associated with bacteria within the biofilm.
Another terrestrial role for fungi that's minimized in aquatic habitats is that of the mycorrhizae. Just about every terrestrial flowering plant, including each species of tree in the rain forest, has its own species of co-evolved mycorrhizal fungi, which coat its microscopic root hairs and penetrate the very cells of the root. The mycorrhizae bring water to the roots and share with the plant those essential nutrients that only fungal enzymes can "digest" out of the soil. The "higher" or vascular plants originally evolved on land. When some of them colonized freshwater, they largely left behind their symbiotic fungi. The mycorrhizae weren't necessary in the aquatic environment, and most of our familiar water plants don't have them.

Fungal roles in water. Fungi rot the wood and leaf litter in tropical water. The fungi that have been most thoroughly studied are terrestrial, but their ecological role in freshwater is important: fungi are the main decomposers of softer plant and animal tissues . And they are the only organisms that can oxidize lignin directly.

Water-saturated wood is a suitable substrate for fungal growth, as long as there is enough oxygen in the water: indeed the powerful carbon-to-carbon bonds of lignin that form the skeletal structure of wood can only be broken down by fungal enzymes. (Bacteria can break down the cellulose in plant walls, but not lignin.) Those enzymes need plentiful oxygen to create highly oxidative free radicals in order to crack the powerful chemical bonds of lignin and cellulose. By contrast, without oxygen--Â for instance at the bottom of an anaerobic bog--Â wood can lie for thousands of years without rotting. Closer to home, the enzyme cellulase, derived from fungi, produces your "stone-washed" jeans by dissolving away the outermost layers of cellulose-rich cotton fibers, thus releasing some dye.

Two of the main divisions in the kingdom of fungi are the basidiomycetes and the ascomycetes.

Comparatively few basidiomycetes are found on submerged wood, according to a recent Thailand study. Though the particular assemblage of fungi was different at each site, most of the fungi in leaf litter that has been washed into tropical streams turn out to be ascomycetes, normal terrestrial mitosporic fungi, the same Thailand study found. These are the fungi that break down leaf litter on the forest floor. "Mitosporic" simply means that these fungi normally reproduce vegetatively, dividing and elongating and forming asexual spores, rather than sexually, by exchanging genetic material within the nucleus.

In contrast to the basidiomycetes, a wide assemblage of the other major group of fungi, the ascomycetes, are more or less adapted to life in the water. All they need is some vascular plant material, alive or dead, either growing in the water, or emerse like the stems of reeds and rushes, or else to be washed in from the surrounding terrain on woody debris or even in leaf litter. The planted aquarium is a haven for them.

The filaments of the ascomycetes invade submerged plant stems, woody substrates and senescent leaves. They secrete enzymes to break down the cellulose of cell walls, break down the pectins that hold cells together and assimilate stored sugars and starches. These decomposers serve as food for the primary grazers in the biofilm.

Without passing through their sexual state, the freshwater ascomycetes constantly produce, at the ends of some hyphae, filamentlike or hollow spores ("conidia") that float or entangle or stick to new substrates. Eventually, if conditions are good, the ascomycetes may also form sexual fruiting bodies, in the form of a disc or a sac or cup that is more or less closed, according to the species, usually less than half a millimeter across. Then they can release their spores, which are dispersed in the water currents to fetch up on new substrates. Many of the microscopic spores of these aquatic ascomycetes are provided with filaments and gelatinous coverings to help them get entangled and stick fast in suitable places. The structures of these details are extremely various. So both the sexually produced spores and the conidia are distributed all through the freshwater planted aquarium. They provide mysterious subjects in floc to puzzle amateur microscopists.

At the website "Freshwater Ascomycetes and their anamorphs" (anamorphs are the non-sexual fungal life stages) you can see micropix of ascomycetes species and get some background information about the group of ascomycetes to be found in freshwater.

Yeasts. Also at home in water are yeasts, the unconnected, rounded, budding forms of fungi. Instead of forming a filamentous mycelium from hyphae like most of the fungi, the yeasts are constantly budding and pinching off, fragmenting and multiplying in small clusters of cells. The yeasts have a page to themselves in this folder.

Water molds. As the biofilm develops, the spores of funguslike water molds (Oomycetes) will also settle on any suitably "biodegradable" surface that they are able to penetrate with their extending rootlike process and digest.

The water molds or Oomycetes, Saprolegnia and its clan (the "Saprolegniales"), are partners with bacteria and true fungi in decomposing cellulose and lignin. In the aquarium, at the early stage in the biofilm's development, the fungal mycelia have few competitors for space. Saprophytic water molds can form large whitish colonies, especially on wood, in the newly set-up tank. But fungi have such a messy manner of feeding that they attract tablemates. Fungi must exude enzymes to decompose their nourishing substrate, to break down complex organic structures into soluble sugar units and other simple molecules that can diffuse through their cell walls. Then they absorb the molecular soup they have created in a microscopic layer surrounding the fungal mycelium. The immediate neighborhood of thriving water molds and fungi offers rich rewards for bacteria. Before long, as benthic populations mature, open space will be at a premium, and saprophytic fungi will assume their usual less important role in underwater decomposition, as symbiotic partners of bacteria. Ordinarily you won't see mats of fungal hyphae forming unless there's been a temporary windfall of degradable tissues, like a dead fish. Then the saprophytic fungi will experience a population boom. But fungi and fungal spores are a major food source for many protists, and for nematodes and other minute organisms. So the resource that sparks a boom is followed by a crash, like the population of a gold-rush camp.

As a rule fungi are aerobic, but under anoxic conditions the Oomycetes can switch to fermentation like yeasts. There are more than 500 species of water molds, but that figure includes those oomycetes that inhabit the water films of damp terrestrial soils, such as the one that caused the potato blight in Ireland of 1845-1848, or the closely related ones that are now causing "sudden oak death" among native Californian oaks and Coast Redwoods and the East Coast canker of beeches.

Most water molds prefer clean cool waters, but a few thrive in polluted streams. Most water molds don't tolerate much salinity. Thus you raise the temperature and add salt to counter "fungal fin rot." (But since the kingdom of fungi always offers exceptions, a few of the Saprolegniales are found in slightly brackish waters.)

Oomycetes do operate like typical fungi in many ways. When a fungal spore germinates, it begins a budding process, building a branching and self-grafting network of hyphae. Throughout their structure hyphae remain only a single cell thick. Fungal growth is largely confined to the tips of the hyphae, which elongate in the water and will also penetrate cells. You can easily see that, in comparison to its volume, the network structure offers huge surfaces for nutrient absorption. That's important for oomycetes and fungi, for absorption is the only way they can "feed."

The oomycetes are saprobic, that is, subsisting on dead organic matter and helping decay it. But since they absorb their pre-digested food rather than ingest it whole or envelope it, say, as an amoeba does, a parasitic life-style is a natural opportunity for them. When they invade living organic matter, we consider them parasites. Opportunistic Saprolegnia can attack a weakened living fish, in the guise of "mouth fungus" or "body fungus." Saprolegnia and its kin are the only group of water molds that can attack fish eggs or tissues of living fish.

But are Oomycetes fungi after all? Freshwater oomycetes are among the "primitive" group of fungi that produce motile zoospores in sac-like spore-cases called sporangia --that is, if they are in fact fungi at all! Some aspects of oomycetes set them apart from all others in the kingdom of fungi. Their zoospores have flagella, which enable them to swim in water. That's not very fungal. And there are other very fundamental differences from the typical members of the fungal kingdom. The Oomycetes contain a unique mix in their cell walls of cellulose compounds and glycan, whereas the other four phyla of fungi construct cell walls containing chitin, (which is also the material of insect exoskeletons). That's a pretty basic metabolic difference. And since oomycetes spend most of their life in the diploid state (like plants and animals), rather than in the haploid state (like other fungi), some biologists are questioning now whether the oomycetes have any true connection with the fungi at all! DNA analysis seems to confirm that they're only very distantly related, if they do have any common ancestry. So stay tuned! There's more about the possible "kingdom of Chromists," where some biologists would associate oomycetes with diatoms and even with kelp, at the Berkeley website, www.ucmp.berkeley.edu

But in the aquarium we still think of the Saprolegniae as fungi.

Fungi link. A really broad portal to web information concerning every aspect of fungi is at http://mycology.cornell.edu/fteach.html

Slime molds (myxomycetes). Slime molds only make rare appearances in aquaria. Probably just as well, since a blob of protoplasm that very slowly shifts from one place to another may raise alarms. Slime molds commonly occur in microhabitats where bacterial populations are dense. Decaying submerged wood is the usual substrate for the aquatic myxomycetes, but their common lifestyle is ordinarily in the form of microscopic amoeboflagellate cells that live independent lives, feeding mostly on bacteria but also ingesting fungal spores and algal cells. But then, at a chemical signal, the cells congregate, moving together to join into a plasmodium, the single, amorphous, slowly-shifting mass you might see. It's a whitish blob of protoplasm like a big amoeba but with many nuclei, which very slowly shifts about. Beverly Erlebacher's slime-mold post "What was the white monster crawling in my tank?" in response to a newsgroup post is archived at theKrib.com.

Myxomycetes are more common in damp forest ecosystems than underwater. The Myxomycetes homepage gives you some general information but makes the merest mention of aquatic slime molds: "Didymium aquatile has been found on submerged plant material and Didymium difforme is capable of completing its entire life cycle under water. Plasmodia have been observed submerged in glass flower vases."

In Veracruz, Mexico, the plasmodia are collected and fried and eaten as the untranslatable caca de luna.