staghorn algae???

[secretagent]

I have a fairly new 55g planted, its probably 3 months old or so. I recently started up some diy co2. Since then this algae has almost exploded. I think its staghorn, all I know is that its practilly growing before my eyes. I did a search and saw that on an old post Malkore suggested running the co2 through a gas seperator. Will this help or is there something I need to do in addition to it. I need some help on this one, its starting to depress me
Chris

oops didnt mean to download pic twice

 

[LAGlocker]

Ok question for you, what are your water parameters besides running co2? do you know your phosphate levels in that tank? what about your wpg on the tank? I am not sure if just running diy co2 will cause algae to bloom, never had that problem in my tanks, but i know bad water parameters can and will cause lots of algae in the tanks.

 

[rich311k]

What are your nitrate, phosphate, kh and ph levels?

 

[secretagent]

My kh is 3 and ph is 7, I believe that gives me a co2 level of around 9, a little low. I do not have a nitrate or phosphate kit. But even if I did and the levels were high then I would just do a waterchange to bring them down. I already do one 40% change a week. I have 130 watts of light also and run them about 13 hours or so a day. I was dosing once a week with flourish but I've stopped since the trouble started.

 

[travis simonson]

9 ppm of CO2 will not cause algae problems. You need even more CO2. Using DIY CO2 in a 55G is tough. If you can find a way to increase your CO2 levels (pressurized CO2 is the way to go with a tank your size) to the 25-30 ppm range you should find that your algae problems will be much more manageable. You should also really test for NO3 and PO4. Once nitrates fall to 0 ppm (when your plants uptake all of the ferts in your water column) you can see massive algae explosions. You have enough light that your plants are being driven to uptake most of the fertilizers/nutrients in your tank. You definitely need to check NO3 and PO4 with your system and supplement them when necessary or you will continue to experience algae problems. HTH

 

[Simpte]

Clean, pick, pull, prune, cut, trim, comb all algae infested plants. Constant Co2 levels are more important than higher levels. Algae adapts faster than plants. Dont try to starve the algae. Algae can uses nutrients at levels we can't commonly test for. Give the plants what they need, harass the algae. Plants will recover, algae won't.