# algae on vallis



## aliclarke86 (9 May 2013)

After all the reading i have done so far i can't put my finger on what algae this is....sorry as i'm sure this has been covered but is this hair or staghorn is something different?

i appreciate that all the material is available for me to figure this out myself but i'm going round in circles in my head 

I have been very "lucky" with algae in this tank and have managed to get away with a small amount of GSA only for these first 2 months. Anyway any advice would be great.

Tank is 60lt
i'm running eheim classic 250
CO2 1bps 1 hour before lights on and off 1hour before lights out
lights are 2 x 24 watt t5 one is red and one is 10000k ( T5 Fish Tank Lights Two Bulbs - All Pond Solutions ) they are on for 2 hours from 13:00 till 20:00 (7hr)
i dose 2.5ml easycarbo and 2ml profito daily
2x weekly water change
23°c water






full tank layout





Thanks

Ali


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## Sean J (9 May 2013)

Looks like stag horn algae to me. I usually clean my filters when this appears, and dose with excel.


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## Alastair (9 May 2013)

Just to add, profito doesnt contain nitrates or phosphates so that could lead to additional algae if the plants arent getting the full nutrients.


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## aliclarke86 (10 May 2013)

OK thanks guys

I will start with a filter clean and up the easycarbo a bit then in a couple weeks I will start dosing EI to try even out the nutrients. Would the lacking nutrients in profito lead to this outbreak? Also would the same lead to the green spot I am getting at substrate level on the glass?


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## Sean J (10 May 2013)

Low phosphates will increase the likelihood of green spot algae, yes.


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## aliclarke86 (11 May 2013)

Should I remove the leaves or would it die back if I manage to fix the problem?


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## Pinkmummy79 (25 May 2013)

Hi Ali, did you fix this and not trim the leaf? If so what did you change, has it reappeared?
Thanks


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## aliclarke86 (25 May 2013)

No  still fighting it I'm doing more frequent water changes like 20% every 2 days and cleaned the filter and the substrate the best I can without up rooting all the HC but if keeps coming back slowly


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## Kannu (6 Jun 2013)

Get hold of a few fish/shrimp that eat algae (eg: mollies, Siamese Algae eater, 'amano' shrimp). Do you know what the nitrate reading is in your tank?


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## aliclarke86 (7 Jun 2013)

The tank has Japonica and crs at the moment. And my nitrate readings are around 5 to 10 ppm using API test kit. I think I have got a handle on it in that it doesn't seem to be getting worse but then its not going away either


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## Andy Thurston (7 Jun 2013)

Turn filter off and use your daily dose of easy carbo to spot treat it will turn orange/pink and fall off in a few days. This can burn hc though and may burn other plant too. I dont know which other plants could be damaged like this, sorry


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## aliclarke86 (8 Jun 2013)

I have done just that and it hasn't effected the hc at the moment only the staghorn I thought it may kill the vallis nana but that also seems to be OK after the carbo bath


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## Kannu (10 Jun 2013)

aliclarke86 said:


> The tank has Japonica and crs at the moment. And my nitrate readings are around 5 to 10 ppm using API test kit. I think I have got a handle on it in that it doesn't seem to be getting worse but then its not going away either


Staghorn is quite stubborn, so the only way is to keep scrubbing it off with your fingers every few days. Adding Excel and other nutrients to help the plants grow will help bring the algae in check.


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