# Is this Brown Algae / Diatoms?



## Julian (6 Apr 2014)

I had a bit of a problem with Cyanobacteria a month or 2 ago, which after the expert information on this forum was resolved by manual removal, 3 day black out, turning light intensity down and increasing my Phosphate dosing.

Plants are showing signs of growth but it is very slow which I think is attributed to the brown algae. It rubs off the leaves but comes back after a 3-4 days. It's hard to wipe it off the Glosso without uprooting them. I also have some BBA growing on the hard scape which I've been removing manually. You can see some in the pictures that has drifted onto the substrate, it does not seem to be growing here however.

It's early days and I'm confident I'll get rid of it now that I've taken the following steps (wondered if you guys could suggest anything else?):

LED's are on a controller, cut down intensity from 65% to 50%
Cut down photo period from 9 hours to 7 hours
Increased CO2 to from 25~ to 35~ ppm (FE+Ph controller)
Adjusted spray bar to point more directly at substrate
Added power head to increase flow/surface movement
Added 20 x Red Cherry Shrimp (I know these might not do much)
Added 20 x MTS + 1 x Assassin Snail (for crowd control)


Specs:
70L Nano - Running for 4 months
3 x TMC Mini 400 LED's (don't panic, they're running at 50%)
Dosing 3/16 KNO3 1/16 KH2PO4 on days 1,3,5 - Trace on days 2,4,6 (50% WC per week, before lights on)
2ml Easycarbo daily
Temp is 24C

8 x Galaxy Rasbora's
3 x Otto's
1 x Pearl Gourami


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## Aquadream (6 Apr 2014)

Is the substrate Amazonia Aquasoil?
If yes, the answer to your problem is a big amount of active carbon that will have to be replaced approximately every 30 days.
It is what I have established recently, but ADA does not emphasise on it much.
CO2 checker have to get yellow. Forget the PH controller. Non of them works reliably with Amazonia.
7 hours is good enough cycle.

The algae looks like GSA, the most common type in troubled tanks with Amazonia.

I would recommend water change to be made after light go off. If you change water before lights go on you will be removing a lot of CO2 that is required by plants right from the start of the light cycle.


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## Julian (6 Apr 2014)

Aquadream said:


> Is the substrate Amazonia Aquasoil?
> If yes, the answer to your problem is a big amount of active carbon that will have to be replaced approximately every 30 days.
> It is what I have established recently, but ADA does not emphasise on it much.
> CO2 checker have to get yellow. Forget the PH controller. Non of them works reliably with Amazonia.
> ...



I'll look into the active carbon, I had some in my filter but removed it as I read it wasn't necessary. This is definitely a gap in my knowledge.

With regards to the substrate, its a mix of amazonia and Eco complete. I'd be interested to know why my ph controller would not be accurate with aquasoil. I think I read that it has a pH buffering capacity that wears off over time. But as long as my drop checker is green I don't see why I should get rid of the controller.

I do my water changes 2 hours before lights on which gives it enough time to build back up.

Thank you for the input, you've given me somethings to think about.


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## Julian (6 Apr 2014)

I've had a lot of green dust algae growing on my glass. I read a method of getting rid of it was to let it grow for 3 weeks then wipe off during a water change. It would make sense that this is the stuff that is growing on the plant leaves as well...


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## Aquadream (6 Apr 2014)

Julian said:


> I'll look into the active carbon, I had some in my filter but removed it as I read it wasn't necessary. This is definitely a gap in my knowledge.
> 
> With regards to the substrate, its a mix of amazonia and Eco complete. I'd be interested to know why my ph controller would not be accurate with aquasoil. I think I read that it has a pH buffering capacity that wears off over time. But as long as my drop checker is green I don't see why I should get rid of the controller.
> 
> ...


PH controllers do not work well with Amazonia, because this substrate realises too much organic substances in the water that interfere with the PH sensor and readings are inaccurate.
Since I got to use Amazonia back in 2011 I sold my JBL PH controller, because it was giving me the same inaccurate readings.

For 2 hours CO2 will not build up enough. I keep my CO2 running forever and just to keep the CO2 checker yellow. Green CO2 checker does not seem to be enough CO2 with Amazonia. Can't say why, just had problems for almost a year with the newer Amazonia version.

As long as you use Amazonia try to keep the CO2 levels at the high end (yellow CO2 checker). Other wise it will not work.

I would also increase the water changes for a couple of weeks on 50% every other day. This will help to reduce the algae.


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## ceg4048 (7 Apr 2014)

Julian said:


> LED's are on a controller, cut down intensity from 65% to 50%


Still too much. These should be at no more than about 20%.

Also, you should not use the pH controller to actually control the CO2. This causes instability of the CO2 concentration level, which is associated with the rise of BBA.



Julian said:


> Adjusted spray bar to point more directly at substrate


This is counterproductive. Spraybars should point horizontally, not down. The flow direction should also be in parallel with any additional pump(s). If possible, you can try to move the spraybars and pump outlets to the aft wall instead of the left wall shown in photo #4 of your opening post.

Cheers,


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## Julian (7 Apr 2014)

ceg4048 said:


> Still too much. These should be at no more than about 20%.



I will give this a try. I've been in this hobby for about 3 years and you are one of few people who's information I know I can trust. I do not wish to sound rude but could I ask how you came to this percentage? Obviously not all LED's have the same output so "20%" is relative, my guess would be that you've used the same lights before?



ceg4048 said:


> Also, you should not use the pH controller to actually control the CO2. This causes instability of the CO2 concentration level, which is associated with the rise of BBA.



Would you recommend that I set the desired level on the controller slightly higher than the target level, then "manually" try to reach the target level by adjusting the needle valve, using the controller as kind of fail safe mechanism instead? 



ceg4048 said:


> This is counter productive. Spray bars should point horizontally, not down. The flow direction should also be in parallel with any additional pump(s). If possible, you can try to move the spraybars and pump outlets to the aft wall instead of the left wall shown in photo #4 of your opening post.



Everything pointing in the same direction, got it.


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## ian_m (7 Apr 2014)

Julian said:


> Obviously not all LED's have the same output so "20%" is relative, my guess would be that you've used the same lights before?


It is clearly obvious, that with LEDs running at 50%-65% is far too much as you are farming algae rather than plants. No guess work required, look at tank...hmmm algae... too much light or CO2 issues.


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## Julian (7 Apr 2014)

ian_m said:


> It is clearly obvious, that with LEDs running at 50%-65% is far too much as you are farming algae rather than plants. No guess work required, look at tank...hmmm algae... too much light or CO2 issues.



Thank you.


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## ceg4048 (7 Apr 2014)

Yeah, that's mostly it, and also, you are the umpteenth person using this particular brand who also is having difficulty.... There was one fella who needed to go down to 15% on a similar model.
Repeat the following mantra 10X:
Light causes algae...Light causes algae....



Julian said:


> Would you recommend that I set the desired level on the controller slightly higher than the target level, then "manually" try to reach the target level by adjusting the needle valve, using the controller as kind of fail safe mechanism instead?


Yes, I would only use the controller as a safety mechanism. Now, of course, it is possible to use the controller effectively, but it has to be outsmarted. pH controllers control pH, not CO2. They do not really care about the CO2 levels, so the CO2 concentration level stability is sacrificed for pH stability.

Cheers,


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## viktorlantos (8 Apr 2014)

Just to give you a different point of view   Not to mix you up but so many feedback and sometimes i feels missleading intructions.

- Carbon for Amazonia is a must to have? Nope! This is useful at start but if you do not use it it's not something why you will fail. We do run dozens of tanks with this substrate without any carbon. We do have purigen for water clarity in some
- BBA this isn't because you're using pH controller probably, but because you have a small tank (short sides) and your spray bar point to the substrate which mix up the mess there. Your substrate is dirty so this is an ongoing problem. Even if you clean it carefully the battle with BBA takes some time. You need to adjust the spray bar to be paralell with the substrate. Make sure the flow is not strong otherwise you will face with the same effect. The current will hit the opposite glass and will come back on the substate level to mix up the dirt on your soil.
- This will not be a problem later when your substrate will be covered fully with plants.

Now why your substrate looks so bad? Dirty? Because of the melted/rotted plants? Or is this a reused soil?

I am not about any WPL measures, and photos can trick you, but your photo shows me that you have very low light. If you have 30ppm CO2 why would you lower the light even more? Just to have your plants struggle in the shade?
From every 10 issues what i've seen the majority was about the low light. I am not telling that these plants would not survive with lower light, but low light cause trouble in many cases.

From the photo:
Hydro Japan? is in a shade. This plants love the light so not in the best position.
Glossostigma? Loves the light. This is a real runner. Give it the light so it can cover your substrate as quick as possible and you will not face with issues becasue of the dirty substrate.
Lotus is blocking the light from Amannia Bonsai in the corner? That plant will die off shortly. Even fissidens need some open space.  Right back corner. Those stems are in shade.

So do a big maintenance on this tank. Clean the substrate from dirt with a hose. Reduce the plants which block the light. Trim back the large leaf of the lotus, reduce the number of limnobium on the surface. Just keep a few of them.
If you're sure your CO2 is on a good level (and as i see you have a good diffuser) you can use more light. Let the plants enjoy the light. Just give them enough CO2 and fertilizers. Keep up with water changes.
Not sure what kind of filter you have, but make sure that is aligned to this water volume. And have a good filter medium there. We only need bio filters. Foam, lava, plastic stuff is just place holder. Replace them with bio filters.

If this is glosso i probably would mix it up with a different type of foreground plant too as this looks ugly when you trim it. You mainly see the root structure after you remove the leaf with the trimming. So parvula or a similar plant is useful to mix it up a little.

Now you have different kind of feedbacks  And from the above suggestions as you can see i am more on the high light side. Plants need light. Otherwise we would still keep anubias and cryptos in our tanks.


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## Antoni (8 Apr 2014)

I agree with Victor, the tank needs very good maintanence before all and with optimising the flow, the problem should be sorted. 

Victor, what do you mean by using bio filters?


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## viktorlantos (8 Apr 2014)

Antoni said:


> I agree with Victor, the tank needs very good maintanence before all and with optimising the flow, the problem should be sorted.
> 
> Victor, what do you mean by using bio filters?



Substrat pro, siporax, matrix, bio rio, etc so bio filter mediums  most of the filters on the market today is filled with low performance mediums to have lower pricetag on the filter packaging unfortunately.


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## Julian (16 Apr 2014)

Just wanted to post an update, tank is doing much better now.

As advised, I turned the lights down to 20%, most, if not all the BBA has been removed and isn't showing signs of growing back. I used to have to clean the glass every few days as I would get lots of GDA but I managed to go an entire week with hardly any.

Plants are also doing really well, each Glosso stem seems to grow a new set of leafs each day,  should have a full carpet in a few weeks!

This episode has taught me the error of my ways, it's made me realise how I fell into a sort of trap... Like many others, I took up the hobby after seeing some awesome pictures of other peoples tanks. A lot of the pictures show tanks that are insanely bright, where the person taking the photo has tried to get a better shot by adding extra lights or turning up the output on their LEDs. This then leads people to believe that the picture was taken under normal lighting conditions, thus giving people the idea that you can never have too much light, when in reality you can. It almost makes me feel like some of these pictures should come with disclaimers!

But anyway, thank you all for your help. I'll post some more pictures later in the week, I want to move a few of the plants about as the positioning isn't really optimal at the moment.


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## ceg4048 (17 Apr 2014)

Julian said:


> This episode has taught me the error of my ways, it's made me realise how I fell into a sort of trap...


The trap is actually a neural interactive programming we call; The Matrix. It's a prison...for your mind.

As you've noted, when people have difficulty with carpet plants, they are programmed to believe that more light will solve their problems. But adding more light is 1000X easier than improving CO2, yet, they are programmed to believe that CO2 is easy. As you have clearly demonstrated, glosso does not care about having high light. Glosso cares about high CO2. This is the same for ALL plants and the people who encourage high light mania also coincidentally have excellent CO2 so that the pants can make use of the higher energy levels.

What you must learn to do is to find ways of improving your CO2/flow/distribution so that the plants can accommodate an increase in light intensity if you so desire. If high lighting is added before CO2 optimization, then the plants suffer radiation poisoning and algae will attack the weakened and dying tissues. Therefore, algal blooms occur in RESPONSE to the combination of overzealous lighting + poor CO2.

For the moment, I would leave the lighting low, continue to perform frequent massive water changes, removing as much organic debris as practicable in order to keep the tank immaculately clean, and allow the plants to build the strength to resist any future photon torpedo bombing missions.

Cheers,


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## sciencefiction (15 May 2014)

Any progress on the tank Julian?
I can't quite believe that glosso needs high CO2 having had it carpet in a low tech soil tank myself.  Mine died when my light unit went bust and I had to run on 1/3rd light so I just wanted to know if yours improved after the changes you did?


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## Julian (15 May 2014)

sciencefiction said:


> Any progress on the tank Julian?
> I can't quite believe that glosso needs high CO2 having had it carpet in a low tech soil tank myself.  Mine died when my light unit went bust and I had to run on 1/3rd light so I just wanted to know if yours improved after the changes you did?



30 ppm CO2 is enough for Glosso I think, although I've upped mine to about 40ppm about a week ago as I've noticed some of it was melting.

This is 5 weeks of growth after turning the lights down from 50% to 20%:



 

As you can see, I've made a few changes. 

The Lotus died when I tried to up root it, wasn't too bothered as my tank is way too small for that plant. I've moved the Ludwigia where the Lotus was on the left hand side where there's more light for it to grow. Also added some Eleocharis Parvula to mix in with the Glosso, probably should have planted it a bit more sparsely and evenly but I consider this tank to be experimental and more of a learning experience, plus it'll all fill out eventually. Also moved the Christmas Moss to the top of the wood, the shrimp LOVE it up there and all hang out together.

In the picture below, you can see the Glosso and Parvula up close with what appears to be BBA growing on them (at least this is what I think it is). The reason I think it's BBA is because I had a huge problem with it before I turned my lights down. There's still lots of it floating around on the substrate that needs to be siphoned off and the effected leaves/grass will need to be trimmed out asap, just haven't had the time. All the new growth isn't showing any signs of it, just the older growth which existed before the lights were turned down.


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## sciencefiction (15 May 2014)

Thanks for the update Julian. It's good to know it's no longer having BBA issues. I hate BBA. The old leaves on the picture were definitely infested with BBA but when you cut them you'll be fine, otherwise they may reinfest the new.  If it's still having algae issues, make sure there's flow reaching it down there as with 40ppm CO2 and presuming you are dosing enough nutrients there shouldn't be an issue with algae on it and vertical/slow growth.

Here is my glosso below before the light issues in a non-co2 non fertilized low tech soil tank(not such low light at all) Once I fix my lights I am getting more again. My point is, glosso doesn't need much co2 to stay horizontal or grow well.

This is when I planted it at first. The only reason I tried glosso in a low tech was because I got it for free with a pack with other plants from a forum member. I thought it would just die but a stuck the few plantlets I got.




And this is around 2 months later. Grew slowly enough in a low tech but steady and horizontal along with the bacopa australis which also decided to grow horizontal. Whatever it is that causes them to grow well and horizontal isn't high levels of CO2. Maybe CO2 speeds up the process though.


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