Driftwood growing slime?

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Plowboy91

Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Joined
Jun 19, 2007
Messages
47
Location
Eastern Pennsylvania
I have a large tank that I recently filled up and only have driftwood, gravel, some rocks and plants in and there is black slime or some kind of black water mold growing on the wood in some places. It just sticks to the wood and when it is rubbed it floats around the water. If you try and take it out of the water it looks kind of stringy like a slime. Does anyone have any advise or experience with this? I would like to begin transferring some of my fish from my other smaller tank to this one but I am unsure how this black slime will affect them. Any help is greatly appreciated! I have attached pictures so hopefully they can help explain what it is.
 

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Does it smell like rotten eggs? If so, it may be BGA - blue green algae (actually a bacteria).

However, from your third pic, it does looks more like a fungus. BGA grows in sheets.

You should try boiling the driftwood or soaking it in boiling water. That should kill most fungi.

BTW, underwater fungi and algae are generally not a hazard to fish. Still, I'd prefer to eliminate any problems in a new tank, or at least discover the cause before adding fish. It's more of a hassle to remove and clean decor from a populated tank.
 
I have no idea what kind of wood it is but I found it on a N.C. beach. Since then I have soaked it for atleast a week and a half in a plastic drum and changed the water several times. I also thoroughly scrubbed it after peeling whatever bark remained off of it to get any salt and sand out of it.

I justed checked and I can't seem to smell anything from the water or the slime when it is in my hand so that may rule out BGA.

Another piece of info...the tank was filled for a week before the lights were being used. I had the filter, heaters, and bubblers running during that time. Since then the lights have been on during the day. In short, I began to see this before I used the lights so I don't think it is algae since there was very little light and the water doesn't have much nutrients/waste since there are no fish and some plants I just put it within the past 2 days.
 
Driftwood you find yourself WILL get fungus on it, unless it is totally bleached out by the sun for a long time... it may still have a little bit of live wood in it, which will make that happen. No way around that one, unless you can bake it in a kiln.
 
Take it out, put it in a proper sized bucket/container so it can be completely submerged and use 1 NEW bottle of hydrogen peroxide per 5 gallons of water. A 5 gallon bucket works great for smaller pieces, while a Rubbermaid container works great for larger pieces.

After adding the wood, water, and peroxide, stir it up so its well mixed (peroxide is denser then water and will sink to the bottom of the container), and let it soak overnight (in a dark area preferably).

Rinse it off the next day in tap water and add it back into the tank. This will kill anything on the surface and help to treat the wood under the surface. It is no guarantee that stuff will not grow on it again (boiling is always the best option to kill anything below the surface), but it will gaurantee it is sterile when put back in the tank.

HTH
 
Thanks for the help everyone but those fixes all require me to remove it from the tank (which I would also reccommend if I were in your shoes too). The issue is, I have to remove a very large piece of driftwood from my 150 gal tank and in order to do that I must remove the gravel, flourite in the gravel, substrate heater cable, and finally plexi-glass like sheets (that are fastened to the buoyant driftwood to hold it down) in order to soak it in anything. The other problem is that only half of it fits in a 55 gallon drum to give an idea of its size (or odd shape). To be honest I was hoping there was an easier way (fish/snails) using it as a food source or that it will grow less and less as the tank cycles really begin to work well. Anyway thanks for all the advise and hopefully I don't have to pull this monster apart which I spent the past month or so building. Any further advise is appreciated.
 
You can leave it in the tank and wait it out. The fungus should be fish safe. There is no 100% guarantees however.
 
You could over the course of a week or 2 clean it in the tank. A small amount of Excel or hydrogen peroxide shot directly onto the piece will kill the algae/fungus in that area. The problem is if the piece is as large as you say it would be very slow going, and its possible the fungus will go back to the previously treated spot because you can't clean it all at once.
 
Well I have put a few "test" fish" into the tank (a pleco, algae eater, and 2 snails). So far they all seem to be doing ok so I am assuming that it is cosmetic which is a partial relief. I will keep everyone posted on the progress. My plan is to clean it every few days and suck the suck out of the tank. Thanks!
 
Plowboy91 said:
Well I have put a few "test" fish" into the tank (a pleco, algae eater, and 2 snails). So far they all seem to be doing ok so I am assuming that it is cosmetic which is a partial relief. I will keep everyone posted on the progress. My plan is to clean it every few days and suck the suck out of the tank. Thanks!

Suck the suck! You don't say! :D

Sounds like a good plan. Just keep up on the water changes to make sure you don't run into any problems.
 
Well the first cleaning was done last night...

I will keep everyone posted on the progress. My plan is to clean it every few days and suck the suck out of the tank. Thanks!

oops...suck the stuff out of my tank... must have been when my girl friend was trying to talk to me. haha
 
Well the very late update is here...

after a few cleanings the slimed seemed to grow a few times and then that was it! no more slime! thanks for all the advise everyone!
 
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