cassandra87
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
I have an algae problem that's gotten a wee bit out of control. I don't have a lot of experience with aquariums.
I have a 20 Gallon high lightly planted tank. Current denizens are 2 amano shrimp, 5 bloodfin tetra, a pleco (purchased to stem the algae issue, worked for a while...) and a variable number of nuisance snails I seem to be constantly removing. The substrate is mostly gravel, although theres some fluval stratum around the base of some of the plants. I change 5 gallons out every 7-12 days. I have a 24 W full spectrum light. I was previously keeping the light on 12 hours, because my plants have only ever done so-so, and my light is relatively low power for a planted tank, but I've since dialed that back in hopes of tackling the algae problem.
There are two issues. First, a green, impossible to remove, algae on the glass. The sponge-on-a-stick scraper does virtually nothing. It doesn't exactly look like the pictures I've seen of spot algae.
Second, there is short, fuzzy green algae on all the plants, which I think all need to be removed and replaced because the algae is killing them. There doesn't seem to be much hope of scraping that algae off the leaves either. There's also algae on the gravel, particularly where the plants are planted where I can't vacuum.
I've read a lot of articles about algae control, and they are confusing - I don't know whether to add more plants, less pants, fertilize, remove phosphates, turn the light down or up or what.
Any help would be most appreciated!
I have a 20 Gallon high lightly planted tank. Current denizens are 2 amano shrimp, 5 bloodfin tetra, a pleco (purchased to stem the algae issue, worked for a while...) and a variable number of nuisance snails I seem to be constantly removing. The substrate is mostly gravel, although theres some fluval stratum around the base of some of the plants. I change 5 gallons out every 7-12 days. I have a 24 W full spectrum light. I was previously keeping the light on 12 hours, because my plants have only ever done so-so, and my light is relatively low power for a planted tank, but I've since dialed that back in hopes of tackling the algae problem.
There are two issues. First, a green, impossible to remove, algae on the glass. The sponge-on-a-stick scraper does virtually nothing. It doesn't exactly look like the pictures I've seen of spot algae.
Second, there is short, fuzzy green algae on all the plants, which I think all need to be removed and replaced because the algae is killing them. There doesn't seem to be much hope of scraping that algae off the leaves either. There's also algae on the gravel, particularly where the plants are planted where I can't vacuum.
I've read a lot of articles about algae control, and they are confusing - I don't know whether to add more plants, less pants, fertilize, remove phosphates, turn the light down or up or what.
Any help would be most appreciated!