Cloudy Pea Puffer Tank

[Kimberly P]

I started a pea puffer tank a couple weeks ago.  There are currently 4 baby pea puffers & It is a 17 gallon tank.  I started it with a sponge filter, 3 crypts and a piece of driftwood from other tanks.  It has a sand bottom.

The driftwood had a bunch of hair algae.  I scrubbed it down+ beforehand.  After about a week I’ve noticed the driftwood was getting heavy with algae & the water was getting cloudy.  I’ve now removed the driftwood and done a water change (2x).  I added a hang on back filter for this size tank (the HOB filter has cycled media). 

It’s still not clearing up & I’m worried about the fish.  The parameters I can measure are all ok.  I have 2 other tanks that I’ve had for 18mo plus & never really dealt with cloudiness that didn’t clear in a day or two.

Any ideas on what I can do to clear it up?

[castiel]

Did you soak or boil the driftwood beforehand? It could just be a biofilm from the wood. Also, what parameters were you able to test and what were the numbers? 

[Kimberly P]

The driftwood had been in my community tank for a year.  It was getting heavy with hair algae & I had taken it out.  I scrubbed it with hot water.  But it's big and I'm  not able to put it in my 5 gallon bucket.  Any ideas on how I can clean it when it's larger?

[castiel]

If it's been in water for a year that's probably not what caused the cloudiness. You could try putting it in a garbage can? I've only run nano tanks so I don't have any experience with larger decorations like that, hopefully someone else will chime in.