Algae question....

[Lonewolfblue]

I have another kind of algae, and not really sure what it is. I have plants in both my 10G tanks, and both were doing great til I started dosing Excel in one of them. Now I'm getting this algae on my ground cover plants. Don't have pics right now, but the best way I can describe it is it looks like rust build-up. I'm also getting it on the output of my internal filter. Any ideas what it might be? The tank that I haven't dosed Excel doesn't have it. And it didn't start until almost a week after I started dosing Excel in the one tank, and have 2 25W screw-in CF bulbs over the tank. I started dosing the Excel a week after upping the 2 10W bulbs to the 25W bulbs that I had taken out before because they were too big for the other hood. But they seem to fit ok in this hood. So there it is. The algae in question looks like rust buildup. No threads or slime. Just looks like rust buildup, and haven't checked the feel of it.

Edit:
Got some pics.......

Also, there's very little plants in this tank, just a couple patches of this ground cover, and a little bit of one that looks like grass. It's even got the rusty stuff starting on it.

[malkore]

To me, it looks more like unhealthy plant growth, than algae growing on the leaves.

some plants are sensitive to Excel's main ingredient and will melt or grow improperly.

[Purrbox]

Looks like BBA or Diatoms to me. Whether it's easy to remove or not should let you determine which it is.

[Jaybird]

that's how mine started too. Always along the edges of the plants.

Then I started getting little hairs on it. This weekend I'm going to try to start adding the flourish excel (gotta get some first). Don't think I'll do the overdose thing, but I will keep adding it. It should kill the stuff slowly, and I'll take slowly over having floaters.

[kostasonia]

I have the same problem, my photos would be really similar..!

In an other thread I was said that they are probably diatoms, as long as thay can be removed easily.

http://www.aquariumadvice.com/viewto...311&highlight=

Indeed they can be removed easily, I did it once or twice but they came back, I also have the problem of the litle hair around. Some fishes go around and eat from this sometimes...

On the other hand, the growth of the plants continues, when a new leave comes out its SOOO green and nice compared to the other brownish ones.

They told me they will leave after some weeks or a month or so..

Im still waiting...

[Purrbox]

If yours is easily removed then it is diatoms. There's no way I could remove this stuff without damaging the plants. It's very firmly attached to the leaves. Diatoms are very common in new tanks and will usually only last 2-8 weeks. You can hurry it along by picking up some Otos, but it really isn't necessary.

[LindaC]

This looks like the algae I used to have on my dward sags in my 29 gallon tank. Looked like someone through a bucket of rust on them. Mine went away when I turned my CO2 up a lot higher. I was also told that it was diatoms.