Getting rid of hair algae

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Da Squid,

Our tank has cleared up now. Never added a drop of any chemical just plucked and plucked, did the black out and w/c. Our lil otos and the bamboo shrimp took care of the few remaining strands.


Did you try a black out yet? Try plucking as much of it out as you can then doing the black out. I hope that helps.
 
Ok. I guess I wanted to try everything else first, but its time to throw in the towel :) . Did you pluck every tiny little strand you could find, or just the big, easy to see clumps? Mine is even weaving a fine net over the gravel that when I pull it up I'll get a handful of turface with it. Also, how long did you black out for?
 
Did another Huge algae plucking yesterday and will do another one tonight to catch all the threads that have recently grown. Then I'll cover the whole thing with a blanket. How many days is reccomended again? I should make sure my fish are well fed before the darkness comes right?
 
Alrighty, here we go! There are still lots of noticable green threads, but I took out a considerable bit of it without destroying any plants. threw two dark bed sheets over the tank and pulled all blinds and curtains completely shut. My biggest fear is the room will heat up and not enough oxygen will be in the water now that the plants aren't photosynthesizing. but if its only for two or three days then it shouldnt be too bad right? The tank is very lightly stocked with only 10 neons and 3 adult mollies + random tiny fry.
 
Starting to wish I had airstones and pumps. Oh well, we didnt get the heat wave that was advertised so hopefully everything will be ok. Tonight will be 48 hours of blackout. How many days did you keep your lights off for Dragon?
Thanks for all the help by the way.
 
Hmm. I took all the blankets off, pulled up the window shades, parted the curtains to let a little light in. It doesnt look good. The algae seems to have just kept growing like a beast. All the long threads are back from my big cleaning 3 days ago. The blackout lasted for about 2.75 days.

I'm about to just give up and buy a pressurized co2 system to starve them out that way.
 
Hmm. I took all the blankets off, pulled up the window shades, parted the curtains to let a little light in. It doesnt look good. The algae seems to have just kept growing like a beast. All the long threads are back from my big cleaning 3 days ago. The blackout lasted for about 2.75 days.

I'm about to just give up and buy a pressurized co2 system to starve them out that way.

Don't be discouraged. I swear diligent water changes, gravel vacuuming and the right algae crew will get rid of hair algae. My tanks is so bare right now I am worried I didn't unbalance something. I don't even get film algae on the glass anymore.

I posted a thread on it. I changed my water changes to every 2-3 days 30-50%, changed lights to 11 hours with 1.5 hr off midday. Dose with Flouirsh excel daily. Dose with comprehensive every 3 days. I have 3.5 wpg of light and no more hair algae to speak of. It happened in a 4 week span.
From the start of the intervention I added a buttload of plants, to compete away nutrients from algae, a rubberlipped pleco, a fiddler crab and I already had 3 otos and 4 mystery snails. Even my plants are sparkley now.

Water changes....like crazy. Don't overdose your tank with CO2. I have heard about this going very wrong. There is a thread just last night,...someone od the tank and his fish all died.

Stick with the water changes and boosting the plants thatare growing in your tank. Starve the algae with plants and diluting nutrients (high phosphates).

Edit: the thread about possible overdose of CO2
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f17/massive-fish-deaths-120106.html
 
Thanks for the pick-me-up Kai. I agree with the stratagy to make the plants grow grow grow. Right now I have mostly low light and a few medium plants over only one 54w T5 bulb. I'm eager to double up to two T5 bulbs and get some faster growing plants, but that will involve needing some CO2. I told myself I'd spring for a pressurized system this x-mass (ie ask for cash gifts so I can buy it) but now I'm getting impatient.

I'll hunt out some otto's/SAE's at teh fish store this weekend and maybe see if that doesnt help a bit. Nitrates are at about 5 right now so their as low as I want them.
 
You can use excel. That is what I use. I don't have a CO2 system and my plants are going nuts!!!!

I just gave them a pruning but I will have some more clippings that I can send you before it gets too cold. I will likely have some wisteria, asian ambulia, purple cabomba, and perhaps some sunset hygrophilia. I will keep you posted on anything that I might have.

I use excel daily and seachem root tabs and i dont have an algae problem anymore. I really think you can do it without the co2 system as long as your light isnt too high and you use excel, or some carbon source.

The wisteria I have grows like a weed seriously! I might be able to send you a couplr bunches in a couple weeks. I think the wisteria alone could out compete your algae :D. I think there is a picture in my album of it. It is a really nice lime green colour.
 
I recently eradicated some nasty hair algae along with a few other types from my 10g with 2.6 wpg and no CO2. Manual removal, frequent large PWCs, gravel vacuuming (at least on the surface) and dosing phosphate every day did the trick, although it took about 3-4 weeks. I did not do a blackout. I was ready to ditch the tank and now it's looking great. I also have a small SAE in the tank although I'm not sure how much of the hair algae he ate.
 
It could be my imagination, but since I took the blankets off the tank and did a big cleaning and WC per your advice, the algae seems to be growing in much slower than before. It's still noticeably there, but its been a few days since I've done a cleaning and the tank still looks ok!
I added 8 generic cory cats and 2 baby SAE's yesterday.

You all have me very interested in trying some more light in my tank. two 54watt T5's in a 55 gallon could be around 3 to 3.5 wpg though couldnt it? I'm very tempted to try it with a few faster growing plants (i'd definately take you up on the offer Kai. Just let me know!).
 
Algae is still going fairly strong. I just put a black backround on the tank and its more obvious than ever. But some faster growing plants are a good idea. My amazon sword keeps melting when it hits a certain height, so I may take that out which would free up some space for new plants.
out of curiosity, if I did run both T5 lights, what is the worse thing that would happen? A different sort of algae bloom? Or would all the plants start getting sickly after a while.
 
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