Got an algae bloom. I'm lost without the search feature

[jestes]

So I've got an algae bloom in my 55. Some of the algae is the regular green algae on the tank walls, buy a few of the plants have green string algae on them. Here are the parameters:

2WPG
PH 7.4
Ammonia and Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 40
Lights 10 hours a day


I don't dose fertilizers. I do have Flourite substrate and I also dose Excel every other day. I know algae is an imbalance of nutrients, but which ones? Without the search function, I'm a little lost.

Thanks in advance!

 

[OhNo5000Bees!]

The first thing you can do to help is to cut back on the duration of your lighting. 8 hours a day would be more appropriate.

Not sure which type of algae you have, can you provide more info about the stringy algae? Does it grow in thick clumps or long strands? When you remove it does it break up into smaller pieces? Is it slimy or coarse to the touch? Or a picture would be great.

It looks like you've got a good chunk of nitrates. If you don't have many plants then doing more frequent or larger water changes can help remove the excess nutrients that the algae is taking advantage of.

 

[Andrey]

So I've got an algae bloom in my 55. Some of the algae is the regular green algae on the tank walls, buy a few of the plants have green string algae on them. Here are the parameters:

2WPG
PH 7.4
Ammonia and Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 40
Lights 10 hours a day


I don't dose fertilizers. I do have Flourite substrate and I also dose Excel every other day. I know algae is an imbalance of nutrients, but which ones? Without the search function, I'm a little lost.

Thanks in advance!

Photo is needed. In general algae grows when plants cant compete with them for getting nutrition. What the light do you use?

 

[Sonomakid]

I would suggest getting some timers for your lights to break up your lighting periods or cut back to 6 or 8 hours of light

 

[bs6749]

First, do a 75% PWC to bring your nitrates down to 10ppm.

Secondly, stop dosing Excel. Your plants are either taking advantage of all of the nutrients that they can and there is MUCH excess nitrate, or they are lacking a key nutrient and can't grow much, so they aren't using the nitrate, which also means that the carbon source in Excel isn't largely being used by plants, but rather the algea in your tank.

Third, do a blackout on your tank. Get a large black plastic garbage bag or two depending on your tank size and cover it so that NO LIGHT gets into the tank. Keep it covered for 3-5 days or so. Plants can go much longer without light than algae. This means that the algae will die first and the plants will still be able to live after the cover has been removed from the tank. Try 3 days at first and if it looks like it is going good but still a problem do it for 5 days. That should largely help your problem.

From there you will need to figure out the cause of your problem, otherwise you are going to encounter the same thing time and time again.

 

[7Enigma]

I agree on the large-ish water change. How often and what % of water do you change?

You've got to get some macro ferts. I'd recommend potassium sulfate (my gut says if you're water isn't horribly soft and/or you rarely do water changes you've got adequte calcium and magnesium present so this would be my #1 guess as to a deficiency). I'd also pick up a good trace fert such as CSM+B (another dry fertilizer like the potassium that has a good bit of iron among other traces, in a pinch you could use Flourish Trace but I dislike it since it's so dilute and $$$). Your nitrAte level sounds like you have the tank stocked pretty full (please correct me if I'm wrong) so while most of us have phosphate as a macro fert we dose, you may not need it (in my particular case I'm overstocked and my plants get more than enough phosphate from the fish food and my tap water).

I would recommend against stopping the Excel dosage. Excel chemically inhibits algae REALLY well (I just finished using it to get rid of a BBA outbreak when my CO2 tank malfunctioned and it ended up removing all of the natural algae in the tank that my oto's and BN pleco graze on; almost like I had cleaned the glass with a razor blade).

Depending on how bad the outbreak is I probably would also not recommend a black out. Green water or a crazy tankwide algae outbreak are the only times I recommend them. Too many chances for problems from rotting algae, stress to the fish/plants from lack of feeding/light, not to mention not knowing what is going on in the tank just aren't worth the chance it works IMO.

Get the potassium and trace ferts and start dosing. Hair/String algae is unsightly but about the BEST algae you can possibly get in a tank since it rarely damages anything (if you indeed have what you mentioned). If it's growing ON the plant then we have a different situation all together. I hope for your case it's the former. The normal green algae on the tank walls is also nothing to worry about. Once you figure out the imbalance it should diminish considerably, or you could always razor blade the glass (DO NOT do this if you have an acrylic tank!!!). The added benefit of the razor blade is that most fish (even non-algae eaters) will have a great meal on the stuff.

 

[jestes]

Thanks!

I just checked, and the nitrates are down to 10 after the water change. I typically do a 10 gallon water change every week. Some weeks its a bit more, maybe 15 gallons. The tank is pretty full, but not really overstocked. I'm not new to aquariums overall, just planted tanks. Normally I wouldn't have ever let the nitrates get over 10, but I thought I read somewhere that planted tanks generally need nitrates around 30. Maybe I read wrong...

Unfortunately, some of the algae is growing on one plant. I've posted a pic of that algae and an Amazon Sword that's not looking too hot.

The funny thing is, the dwarf subulata I've got is spreading with runners, and one of the amazon swords gave me two baby plants about a week ago.

Thanks again!

 

[mfdrookie516]

i had that same algae in both of my planted tanks, but mine was way way worse. I took the advice of jsoong and split my photo period from 8 straight hours to a much better 4 on 4 off 4 on schedule... i have no algae issues at all now and i just dose flourish comprehensive twice a week and occasionally some nitrogen if it starts staying at 0

 

[jestes]

Well I've got my timer set to do the four hour split photo period now. This may sound like a dumb question, but is there any kind of bacteria that eats nitrates? Seems like it would be nice if the nitrogen cycle didn't stop there... lol

 

[mfdrookie516]

there is... they make these coil denitrators that supposedly work well

 

[jestes]

I just read about them on here: DIY Coil Denitrator Plans - DIY Coil Denitrator Plans

That's pretty cool! Something tells me I will be heading to Lowes or Home Nightmare this weekend

 

[7Enigma]

That first pic of the sword definitely looks to me like a potassium/iron deficiency (chlorosis of the leaves).

While the second picture isn't the best, I hate to break it to you but it looks like staghorn algae.....a nightmare algae I dealt with in my tank a while back. Nothing eats it to my knowledge (maybe SAE's?), and it can really do damage to a plant. Unfortuntely for you (since it's a sword) the normal recommendation is to remove affected leaves. Staghorn is a parasitic algae in that it adheres to the leaf at places where the plant is leaking nutrients. When you have a nutrient imbalance in an aquatic plant those open wounds are perfect places for algae to get a free meal.

Since you can't remove the leaves on the sword my recommendation would be to remove the sword from the tank, and do a hydrogen peroxide dip. Buy a new bottle of peroxide from the supermarket and make a 25-50% peroxide bath in a clean bucket. The % doesn't really matter, you just want the entire plant (BUT NOT THE ROOTS!) to be able to be submerged in the dip. I would do between 30 seconds and 2 minutes depending on the % (30 seconds for 50% strength, up to 2 minutes at a lower concentration).

After the dip rinse the plant in tap water (even easier is to just dunk it a couple times in a clean bucket of water), and then put it back in the tank. Hydrogen peroxide is great IMO compared to bleach because you don't have to worry about harming your tank as the peroxide is just oxygen, doesn't leech into plants/decorations like bleach can, and breaks down very quickly if you get some in the water (even faster under lighting). A long time ago a couple of us on this forum where using direct injection of peroxide onto effected leaves IN THE TANK, just try to do that with bleach!

The algae immediately (or over the course of a couple days) should change color (mine got red) and then die off, hopefully without much damage to the sword. You can do this dip with any plants you see infected, but the plant species really dictates how long you can dip for (thicker waxy leaves can take much longer dips, while fine fleshy leaves can only take a short dip).

But realize the problem will come back quickly if you don't get the ferts!

Goodluck

 

[jestes]

Thanks for the advice guys! I found a local pond supply shop that I'm going to check out tomorrow. I know they care Flourish potassium, which although expensive, would be worth it to me as opposed to waiting to get dry ferts. Plus, they may carry dry ferts as far as I know. I've got flourite in the tank, so I don't think it's an iron problem. Hopefully my newbie thinking is right... The staghorn algae is on a Val, so I guess I'll do a 30 second dip and see how that goes.

This brings me to another question or two: I know that Anacharis doesn't do well with Excel, but mine is growing well. I'm doing one capful every day. Would it hurt to dose a little higher to help with the algae?

 

[jsoong]

Vals will not do well with H2O2 or bleach dips. <Mine died.> My vals seem to tolerate Excel at half the maintenance dose on the bottle, but definitely will not stand the "double the initial dose daily for 5 day" regime for algae kill.

As a rule, any of the Excel sensitive plants will be sensitive to bleach or H2O2. But since vals grows fast, you do have the option of removing algae infested leaves.

The solution is of course balancing your ferts, light & CO2 (or carbon source.).

 

[jestes]

Well, I think I'm finally making some progress against this stuff... Thanks to everyone for all of the help! I've started dosing potassium, increased dosing excel, and I manually removed the worst infected leaves.

I did a 50% water change, and when I added the initial dose of excel for that large of a W/C I used a syringe to spray it directly onto the vals that had the worse algae. I figured it couldn't hurt. If it didn't work, I'd remove those leaves anyway. I've also been dosing excel at twice the daily dosage, not the initial, and almost all the aglae has turned red! Everything else is turning really green. I found a little BBA, so I'll probably do the syringe thing again with it.

Now I have yet another question: Is there a reliable test kit for nutrients in the water? I'd like to know how much potassium, iron, and such is in the water.

 

[7Enigma]

Well, I think I'm finally making some progress against this stuff... Thanks to everyone for all of the help! I've started dosing potassium, increased dosing excel, and I manually removed the worst infected leaves.

I did a 50% water change, and when I added the initial dose of excel for that large of a W/C I used a syringe to spray it directly onto the vals that had the worse algae. I figured it couldn't hurt. If it didn't work, I'd remove those leaves anyway. I've also been dosing excel at twice the daily dosage, not the initial, and almost all the aglae has turned red! Everything else is turning really green. I found a little BBA, so I'll probably do the syringe thing again with it.

Now I have yet another question: Is there a reliable test kit for nutrients in the water? I'd like to know how much potassium, iron, and such is in the water.

Glad to hear everything seems to be progressing nicely. Just keep an eye on the fish as Excel can cause problems at higher dosages for extended periods of time. The syringe method is excellent at spot treating, just make sure the fish stay away when you inject as concentrated Excel to the gills is NOT good.

And no, there is no hobby-grade kit for nutrients in the water. We typically take the kitchen sink approach of making sure we know there is always some of the macro/micro nutrients in the water. If you take that approach it shouldn't be too difficult to keep the algae at bay and keep the plants healthy.

 

[jestes]

That's what I was afraid of. I'd imagine a lab quality kit is pretty expensive... Oh well. Also, the amazon swords still aren't doing as well as they should. I don't think I've got an iron deficiency since there's flourite in the tank, but I guess I could be wrong. It's happened before... Is it possible that water column fertilizing isn't helping it since it's a root feeder?

 

[mfdrookie516]

root tabs will do more for swords than anything. mine looked horrible until i used root tabs... then i had to trim them weekly because they got so big so quick

 

[7Enigma]

That's what I was afraid of. I'd imagine a lab quality kit is pretty expensive... Oh well. Also, the amazon swords still aren't doing as well as they should. I don't think I've got an iron deficiency since there's flourite in the tank, but I guess I could be wrong. It's happened before... Is it possible that water column fertilizing isn't helping it since it's a root feeder?

It might be an iron deficiency but it's hard to tell. Swords are heavy root feeders and can deplete the area surrounding their roots quickly but I think the flourite is probably fine. More likely it's the potassium and possibly other trace nutrients. But root tabs can't hurt (and many people with swords use them as a guarantee that they are not root starved). You can even make your own if you wish (search the forum for root tab recipe or google it).

Forgot to mention in my last reponse to keep up on the water changes and monitoring the water quality. All of that algae that turned red is dying/dead and will rot and foul the tank. If you have a great biofilter it's like free fertilizer (as you get all the nutrients back from the algae not just the ammonia), but you can get a spike depending on how bad the infestation was.

Give us a pic of the tank!

EDIT:

While responding to another post in the planted forum I came across where you can buy dry ferts by the pound. Seriously think about investing in some (potassium sulfate, trace (CSM+B), and maybe a phosphate even though you appear to have quite a bit in your tap water) as it's much cheaper over the long haul. Buy a pound and you might not need ferts for 2-5 years (I'm still on my original 1lb bag of CSM+B, pottasium nitrAte, and monopotassium phosphate). Really the only thing I've purchased again is the potassium sulfate since that gets the highest dosing in my tank.

http://www.bestaquariumregulator.com/ferts.html

 

[jestes]

Sorry for the late reply with a pic, but here's a few. The Penguin 350 has since been replaced with a Magnum 350 cannister filter, and it works SO much better it's not even funny. The vals are also growing like weeds. I'm getting a new runner every week out of one of them. This is my first planted tank, so all this is new to me!