# Should it stay or should it go now?



## Onoma1 (19 Nov 2019)

While away on hols for two weeks my light for my first tank (https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/for-those-at-the-back-of-the-class.56326/page-2#post-568150) was knocked off and the tank stayed in darkness for 12 days.

On my return it was clear of algae, however, the  MC  and hair grass carpet was in tatters. This tank isn't a wonderous thing of beauty, however, I quite like it.  The Co2, ferts and lighting seemed in balance before I left for hols. I have a decent 'clean up crew' of 14 ottos and a few shrimp from @Steve Buce. I was dosing  TNC complete at 5 mils a day before I left and have continued to do so.

I cleaned out all the dead material, replanted the carpet from some MC from a rock in the tank (it seemed to have survived on the rock but died in 'carpet') added some Crypt Parva (to increase plant mass) -a  'panic buy' from Pets at Home and have given it three major water changes in the last two weeks (80%).

Within two days of the light being on the BBA started to grow. I  cleaned away any leaves infested with BBA (on  daily basis) and cleaned it off glassware and the skimmer. I also noticed that the stems aren't growing as expected and added some ADA long food tabs at the base of some of the larger plants to stimulate further growth.

What was initially a sIow battle which I thought I had a chance of winning once the tank settled down now looks like an impossible task - I am now facing an explosion of BBA. Yesterday I had cleared it, twenty four hours latter the tank is infested with the stuff. I have attached a few photos below.

I tried the trick of dunking Buce into a dilute Excel following Jurijs, however, just killed them off, preserving my reputation on the forum as the resident buce killer.

At this point the substrate will be fairly exhausted so should I just salvage the plants (while most are clear of BBA) and go for a complete new rescape?

Alternatively, should I persevere and either go for lean dosing and then follow Filipe's advice using excel or should I continue with high doses of ferts be patient and try to 'outgrow' the BBA?

I cleaned the rocks (manually) two days ago and syphoned off the algae - they are now covered again. I could spot dose with hydrogen peroxide, however, the real problem is the plants.  Is the manual removal of leaves infested with BBA helping or just weakening the plants?

I have 10 days or so to sort this before I go into an intensive period at work and will be away and won't be able to do much with the tank.

Any advice is welcome!


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## Tim Harrison (19 Nov 2019)

It's always difficult to advise remotely but I'll start the ball rolling.
First and foremost check to see if your CO2 is stable and that you are getting a lime green drop checker at lights on and all the way till lights off.
Maybe reduce your light intensity to around 60% and photoperiod to 6 hrs until the BBA is under control; although I've no idea what light you're using and how atm, so that info would be helpful, along with filter and flow etc...
Move your lily pipes to the front rhs. This should create a much better flow around the tank, and give better CO2 and fertz distribution.
Keep dosing fertz, if you don't have so much plant mass because it's dying off you maybe able to dose a little less but I wouldn't go down the lean dosing route.
I'd definitely dose LC as well and keep up with the large water changes; I'd be doing at least a couple of 50-80% changes a week till it all settles down.


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## Onoma1 (19 Nov 2019)

Thank you for the advice Tim. The equipment list for the tank is: Chihiros WRGB 60cm light, an inline Hydor 300w heater, Chronos Doctor, Co2 in-line diffuser and a Aquael Ultrsmax 2000 external filter. The lights are on full for a six hour period (Co2 comes on one hour before the lights).


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## alto (20 Nov 2019)

So annoying 
- and that seems like unusually aggressive BBA 

I’m curious what the substrate is?

After you returned from holidays, were you able to siphon/vacuum most of the melted plant gunk from the substrate?

Filters rinsed of debris?

How are the stems growing after the addition of the ADA root tabs?
- where did you source these? 
- did shop have experience with using that lot number? 
(is it possible that you have high ammonia levels at the substrate? re Green Aqua often mentions a relationship between ammonia and algae (though I don’t recall if they linked BBA to this))

I suspect that if you dose sufficient Excel to affect BBA on those carpet plant leafs, you’ll also negatively affect leaf health - I’d just trim (at substrate level) or remove plants completely ... depending on what is all growing there 

If you do uproot plants, have siphon running nearby so released debris is removed immediately - you should get 70-90% - then do one or two water changes to remove as much of the remaining released organics as possible
Given you have fish in the tank, 2 x 50% water changes (plus the siphoning while lifting any plants) is usually less stressful to fish - sometimes just removing fish from the tank to a quiet container is less disturbing to fish (depending on the fish, I know I always feel less stressed if they’re safely away  ) but you may not be able to easily remove the Otos (in which case they’ll likely do better being ignored in the tank than chased about to net them)

You mention MC and hairgrass, but some of the grass stems appear thicker - once BBA has “infected” H tenellum or L brasiliensis, it seems much more intractable 

In terms of algae crew, you don’t mention anyone that is going to be much interested in BBA - can you pick up 12 SAE juveniles?
(at this stage most of the various species sold as such will clean up BBA, especially if you feed very lightly)
These will only be a temporary fish addition as tank isn’t large enough for any of these species as adults  

From Green Aqua algae eater page 
- you can see two outstanding SAE species
- stiphodon sp. (these are more delicate and all wild caught, if they appear very thin in dealer tanks I’d give them a miss, some species are more algae focused than others, Seriously Fish lists several profiles and you can see the size etc differences, I’d be inclined to add these later as algae crew, though if you can’t source any SAE types, and you do find decent looking stiphodons, I’d succumb and pick up a few ) 
- you could also add 30-40 Japonica shrimp, these are usually pretty consistent at picking through (young) BBA though again you need to feed sparingly (if shrimp are in good shape when you pick them up, I’d just let them clean up algae for several days before feeding additional foods)
I’m not particularly keen on “Amano” type shrimp in smaller tanks as they grow too large and when offered a steady diet of fish food, become very lackadaisical in their attitude to any algae  (and they’ll tromp down any other shrimp or small fish in their path to that delicious fish food - or mug innocent citizens)

What are you feeding your Otocinclus?


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## alto (20 Nov 2019)

Onoma1 said:


> At this point the substrate will be fairly exhausted


How old is the substrate? What is it?

I assume you’ve seen Filipe Oliveira’s 60cm rescape video


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## alto (20 Nov 2019)

Onoma1 said:


> I have 10 days or so to sort this before I go into an intensive period at work and will be away and won't be able to do much with the tank.


Given this, I’d be inclined to do a complete overhaul - remove and sort plants, exhaustively “clean” substrate (as in the FO video) or switch out substrate, rescape, plant etc

Given the algae history of this scape, I’d start anew with Tropica Soil 
(I often wonder if an established MC carpet isn’t an excellent algae inhibitor)


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## alto (20 Nov 2019)

Re Tim’s advice for the limited photoperiod, if tank receives much ambient light (and it really doesn’t take much) plants will be attempting to photosynthesize well outside this period, so set your CO2 accordingly - eg, CO2 may run for 12 hours  

Consider the timing of your photoperiod as well 
I’ve an under-the-stairs tank that is in deep shade, even when the sun is lighting the rest of the room, one can only dimly see shapes in the aquarium. I usually ran light on this tank from 6pm - midnight 
It did fine, minimal algae, decent plant growth ... then I planted some Rotala Vietnam H’ra ... and I noticed that despite the lighting time, this plant had decidedly closed up for the Dark Period by 7-8pm ... despite the very low ambient light, this plant was opening its leafs by noon
I switched the lighting to run from 4pm - 10pm which was better, but 2pm start was still much preferred by the Rotala
Of course this meant more growth in the tank so now it needed more trimming


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## Onoma1 (20 Nov 2019)

Thank you for all the support! I removed all the melted plant gunk when I came back, however, I have  now pulled out all of the hairgrass and carpet plants, dosed the algae on rocks with Glut, given it another water change. I have manually removed as much as algae as possible. I have adjusted the C02 to start earlier (the tank does get a bit of ambient light).  I will also follow the water change regime  you suggest @alto and look out for additional clean-up crew!

The substrate is ADA Africa (probably exhausted), the rock is Larva Rock,  the water is very soft, the tabs were bought from the Green Machine.  I feed the Otto's Soyent Green.

I will continue to dose ferts and hope to get the tank back in balance and plan the full rescape for the second week of December (when I finally get enough time).


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## alto (21 Nov 2019)

Onoma1 said:


> The substrate is ADA Africa (probably exhausted)


I don’t know if it’s likely to be exhausted - ADA substrate methodology is directed towards longterm nutrition - but I suspect there is considerable breakdown of the initial formed particles
If you disturb/gently stir a small area of the substrate, you should be able to feel/see the degree of “mudding”

Carpet plants respond well to easily accessible nutrients during start up, you can just layer some new Aquarium Soil Powder atop the existing, then replant MC etc

I assume you’ve removed all the existing carpet plants, I’d replant with MC (usually quicker to establish and faster growing than hair grass) to increase plant mass in tank 
Obviously you can plant various in that carpet area (eg, grow out some 1-2-Grow stems)


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## Onoma1 (21 Nov 2019)

I am really grateful for all of your advice and comments. Algae is a controversial issue and I realise that there are different strongly held views on it. My hope is that I can to get back to a healthy balanced tank and to learn on the journey.

At the moment I am time poor so implementing the ideas is soaking up time available and I haven't had time to respond properly on this thread. The advice is very welcome though! I am reading and using the ideas.

I will need to reuse the substrate as, while not pleading poverty, cannot justify paying for more three bags of substrate or dumping near enough £90 of 'soil' after 12 months. I have a bag of osmocote ready to go in the next scape and am relieved that I can reuse the ADA substrate.  I have small dirted tank which is doing well, following Tim's approach, however, don't quite have the confidence to try it on this tank.

Equally, I cannot justify starting afresh buying lots of new plants. My thought atm is to use the ex carpet area as nursery for stem plants for the next scape. Plants which will also rapidly bost the biomass in the tank.

Watching @Matt @ ScapeEasy I think his use of floating plants could also help as well as providing  ducked index to Fertz. 

The advice on which algae crew members to buy was helpful. In the past my choice hasn't been particularly inspired https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/help-a-problem-that-really-sucks.56334/#post-555786


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## MJQMJQ (21 Nov 2019)

I believe nutrients in tap water may also fuel the growth of the algae so yes fast growing plants would be worth a shot.Phosphorous in tap water and fish food may contribute.Nitrate from fish waste and food decaying plant matter as well as to a smaller extent tap water.Clean yr tank and watch yr feeding.


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## Tim Harrison (21 Nov 2019)

Exhausted ADA AS is not a problem if you water column dose fertz. For one, the excess will be absorbed by the AS since it's CEC is very high and two, your plants will folia feed anyway. I sift, dry, and then reuse my AS several times, and plants always do well regardless.

In fact I actually prefer used AS. I don't get such a large ammonia spike nor diatomaceous algae, and my plants seem to do better, somehow. More than anything I just like it as a medium for growing plants in (In that respect I think it's unrivalled), not necessarily its initially high nutrient content.

Don't forget to move those lily pipes and reduce the intensity of the light to around 60%.


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## alto (21 Nov 2019)

I love Filipe Oliveira’s attitude to aquarium soil, give it a clean, dry for later use ... give it a clean, rescape 
- add root tabs if you think it needs nutrient loading  
(root tabs are likely slower release than osmocote (made for ponds? or gardens?) so be conservative)

I usually add a new top layer on Powder Soil (after listening to Jurijs mit JS and Green Aqua) - especially in carpet plant areas (seems I mostly use 1-2-Grow lately) 



Tim Harrison said:


> For one, the excess will be absorbed by the AS since it's CEC is very high


My belief as well
Though lately I see a surprising number of posts claiming the opposite 

Ultimately there are many ways to succeed with planted aquaria (& fish keeping)


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## Tim Harrison (26 Nov 2019)

I've removed many of the posts since they were veering off topic and weren't particularly helpful to the OP. Further discussion on the causes of BBA can always be had in a separate thread.


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## Onoma1 (17 Dec 2019)

After a week or so of neglect while I was away the tank seems to have recovered. The things that seemed to help are:

lots (and I mean jungle quantities) of floating plants;
reduction in feeding of fish;
stopping dosing; and
manual removal of older infested leaves.

I will now wait a bit and then rescape just before Christmas. Thank you to everyone that has posted to the thread and provided advice.


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## Onoma1 (9 Jan 2020)

Just finished off a mammoth rescape of the tank and discovered a juvenile Vittatus. It's much smaller than the other mixed group of 16 or so 
Ottos.  Just before the scape was broken down I had masses of floating plants and it must of been within these.


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