BGA and other stuff

[kevin silva]

Hi all. I have been quite busy dealing with algae for the last couple months. Even tho i adressed most of the common issues (CO2, flow, nutrients, light), i am still strugling trying to find a good balance between all those elements. Algae, BGA for the most part, is still being chased. Now from my research, BGA relates to high organics and poor water conditions (low O2), or low N, which is not my case since my ferts schemes follow EI full dosage. This lead me to question what might be the source to all that organic matter buildup...

The aquarium in question as it is (17/02/19)
https://imgur.com/a/XKy2eHP (scroll down)


Specs:
aquarium: 80x45x40(140L)
Flow: 780lph external cannister(bio rio only), 1800lph powerhead
Light: 50w chihiros a801 (4/7 dimmer)
CO2: 3 hours before lights, green drop cheker at light start, lime green 1hour after
Substrate: 50% old used ADA aquasoil poorly stored on a bucket, 50% new aquagro soil
Water/nuts: 50-60% WC weekly, EI full dose(kno3, kso4, k2hpo4,micros).
Plant health: poor healt on roots (stem plants and carpet), Suboptimal health in general (some green hair algae/bga). some weird tips.
weird note: lots of brown stuff on my filter. i used to clean it monthly, now every two weeks (because it gets dirty quite fast).

From this perspective, it seems like the high organic might play a huge role on all the mess i created. As for the culprit, could be the fish/plants (when not in good health) or substrate/wood. As a first atempt to solve the problem, i did a 4 days blackout (good cleanup and wc before and after) and took most of the wood out (still out ATM). Worked at first but it came back. For the second atempt (2 weeks ago), i did a blackout(good cleanup and wc before and after), upped the CO2. Plants pearled like hell(1 hour after light start) and the tank looked quite good for the first few days, but algae is starting to show again.

So, for my third atempt, i am trying to get some insight. Should i add another filter? should i change the whole substrate? should i blame any of the other parameters?


Arigato from Portugal,
Kevin silva

 

[Guest]

Can you post some pics of your tank, it may also help with diagnosis.

 

[Geoffrey Rea]

Hi @kevin silva nice avatar. Haven’t watched Bleach in forever.

 

[kevin silva]

Hi @kevin silva nice avatar. Haven’t watched Bleach in forever.

Me too!!!! this avatar was made by me on paint when i was 15, used to come here every now and then as i loved aquascaping. BTW i am now 25 time flies

Can you post some pics of your tank, it may also help with diagnosis.

There is a imgur link, but i'll post some more pics when i get home.🙂

 

[rebel]

With the BGA, I would suggest using Chemiclean with plenty of aereation and water changes. Then reduce light to 3/7 and increase the CO2 again by 20%. Keep everything else the same including manual removal daily if required.

 

[Oldguy]

Algae, BGA for the most part

I know its only fire fighting, but manual removal (by siphoning out the BGA, assume its gelatinous) and topical application of say 6 Vol H2O2 on affected areas before your water changes might help.

 

[kevin silva]

I've already killed most of the bga with a blackout(i guess h2o2 or any treatment that works would do the same) a couple times and it worked wonderfully, but since the real issue wasn't solved, the thing always came back fairly quick. What i assume by this is that i my tank is unbalanced, and there's something wrong right under my nose. I am quite clueless with the naming of the culprit and have no idea what to try next.
Some more pictures.
https://imgur.com/a/QsJcS9M

 

[Geoffrey Rea]

What i assume by this is that i my tank is unbalanced, and there's something wrong right under my nose.

Currently what would be your best educated guess as to what could be the cause of an imbalance?

I know this might appear a stupid question on the face of things but what happens day to day in your tank is directly relevant to outcome.

 

[kevin silva]

I would say that if its really caused by high organics, then the root of the problem might be whats inside (fish,wood,substrate and plants if poor health) in the first place. I don't think that fish or wood might play a huge role in here since i experimented taking out some wood after a blackout and it didn't helped (in the long run) and i am not overstocked(30 characides and 12 amano shrimp for 140L). Concerning the substrate or plant health i am not so sure, as they both interact with each other.
The substrate may be limiting the health of plants, and plants (if not healthy) on the other hand, could also prevent microbial activity with a higher release rate of organics and not providing enough O2.
Could be that the biological media on my filter is not enough to clean the water properly. As for now, i upped my CO2 a little and am now dosing on full EI. Its been two weeks since all those changes and even tho the blackout cleaned 95% of algae, theres already some BGA and plenty of hair algae.
So yeah, answering your question, i would say that the unbalance is related to the current state of the substrate combined with poor plant health.

 

[Geoffrey Rea]

The substrate may be limiting the health of plants, and plants (if not healthy) on the other hand, could also prevent microbial activity with a higher release rate of organics and not providing enough O2.

Would make sense but difficult to prove. O2 was the variable I had in mind. You appear to have plenty of surface agitation in one of the photo's though.

Also temperature, what temp are you running your system at?

I don't think that fish or wood might play a huge role in here since i experimented taking out some wood after a blackout and it didn't helped (in the long run) and i am not overstocked

It's a fair point as BGA can form symbiotic relationships with fungi in the wood. Although once introduced it can independently live in your substrate. So where it originated from is no longer relevant anyway.

It may be that it will remain in the substrate for a prolonged period of time.

 

[kevin silva]

https://imgur.com/a/ukfDKew

Hi, just to give you an update. Plants are getting more and more algae and health in general is getting worse. I also see an increase in debris (small brown stuff) on plant leaves and on the substrate. Rotalas are getting greener. Myrioph. started uprooting (no roots after 2 weeks). Stems look thin. I upped the CO2 this week and there seems to be no difference at all. CO2 rate looks insanely high compared to what i see on other tanks in general. As for nutrients, i am still dropping EI and testing 30ppm of NO3(i know comercial tests sucks but had to check) Looking for some advices here.


Light: 4/7 chihiros A801
CO2: 2h before light, lime green when light starts
Ferts: Full EI
Temp: 25ºc

 

[DjDamo]

Similar issue with a growing out break of Blue-green algae which I believe is more bacteria rather than algae, I’ve seen
Ultralife Blue Green Slime Stain Remover from the US or Easy Life Blue Ex
I’m going to try blackout for a period....also considering selling up after 7yrs!

 

[kevin silva]

Hi guys. So i did a couple things in order to find a definitive solution for my algae problem. Here's what i did:
Day 1:
-100% water change.
-Removed the entire substrate and washed it in the shower. The ammount of debris/dust/mud was unbelievable.
-washed all the plants/hardscape.
-Placed everything back (except the fish and plants) and plugged in the equipment back in.



Day 2:
-80% water change followed by cleaning the filter (changing the wool...etc).
-Planted everything back and introduced the fish.
-Updated the light to 100% and upped it to the max height. The light is 58cm above the substrate(22cm above water), which means i have 45-50 par there.
-Started dosing EI full dose. (weekly: 15N, 5P and 25K, 0.5 Fe (micros))
-Started dosing 12ml Tropica primium ferts (who knows my salts might be the problem)
-Added a skimmer and readjusted the CO2 distribution sistem.




15:00 when light comes on

22:00 when lights are about to shutt

Day 8:







It seems like the only plants who benefited from this change were the tennelus, the cyperus and the cryptos. All the other plants continue with poor health specially the moss. In terms of algae, there's an explosion of all kinds of algae, from green hair to gsa, bba, bga. I hope that it is only a result from messing up with the substrate (beneficial bacteria) and plants are still adapting to their new environment.

 

[kevin silva]

Hi, here i come with another update, hoping to get some advices this time. For the most part, everything looks worst, even if some plants are growing, i would say the algae outgrow the plants by a large ammount. The worst being the condition of monte carlo, which is only attracting algae at this point. Most of the plants are showing poor colouration and weird growth pattern. Yes, even the myriophillum...The algaes i am battleing at the moment surpasses even those i was battling a month ago before cleaning the substrate. Got a huge ammount of green hair algae now. With some BGA on tipo of stem plants (which slower their growth). As for changes,none, i have followed the same procedure for the last 3 weeks, which consisted in dosing 8ml Tropica premium fert/day and KNO3,KCL and K2HPO4 solution. Equating to a weekly total of:
-12ppm NO3
- 16ppm K
-3ppm PO4
-0.35ppm Fe (and other nutrients)
-2.00ppm Mg
Light is still the same 7 hours of 100% chihiros light, 23cm over the tank water(60cm over substrate). I guess the colour(green/yellow) of my rotalas h'ra indicates that the light is moderate. Same combination of flow with a 780l/h filter, 350l/h skimmer and 1800l/h circ. pump. Drop checker showing a yellowish green when lights come on. Same routine of 50% wc every 7 days...I really don't know what could i possibly be doing wrong, ferts seem OK, CO2 is almost asfixiating fishes, light couldn't be any lower without compromising plants...I didn0t expected the tank to have stabilized by now, but i am dealing with a much worse problem than the one i had a month ago. Any idea?

 

[Easternlethal]

Other than co2 which I think is less of a problem nowadays with so much awareness about it, I think it's down to too high organics or too low inorganics.

For tank cleaning, really make sure you keep the substrate clean by disturbing it a lot during water change with your finger or turkey baster or something. Then spray h2o2 on the glass, corners of the tank during water change. Did you clean your filter also? During algae attack it's important to clean that out often. Almost as frequently as every water change. The tank has got to be so clean you'd be willing to drink from it 😉

Then I would check your ferts. Are you really getting all the macros and micros? Sure of your calculations? Extrapolating from pre-mixed solutions can be tricky. For example where is your mg source from? MgSO4? Sure your PO is not chelating with your Fe?

One way to find out is to use a surface plant like duckweed because they dont suffer from algae, co2 or light issues normally. If those plants fail to survive then you're missing a crucial fert which can be anything - even calcium, sulphate, boron... This is why i switched to rolling my own ferts eventually.

 

[kevin silva]

Hi, i would say you're right about fertilization, it is true that one of my problems could be my calculations, and thats why i switched to tropica fertilization. To take that out of the way, you know...So here's my ferts regimen:

NPK solution = 275ml

13g K2HPO4
23g KNO3
38g KCL

per 10ml solution:

4.66ppm NO3
1.06ppm N
10.38ppm K
3ppm PO4
0.98ppm P



Tropica premium ferts 56ml(7*8) adds:
0.35ppm Fe (0.05ppm/day)
6.82ppm N (0.97ppm/day)
0.51ppm P (0.07ppm/day)
1.99ppm Mg (0.28ppm/day)
5.24ppm K (0.75ppm/day)
other micros

TPA water parameters:
4ppm NO3
1ppm Mg
15ppm Ca
0.015ppm Fe

Routine
1- 50-60% TPA, 8ml tropica fert
2-8ml tropica fert
3-5ml NPK solution, 8ml tropica fert
4-8ml tropica fert
5-8ml tropica fert
6-5ml NPK solution, 8ml tropica fert
7-8ml tropica fert

Now you say that high organic might be a trigger, and that i can understand, even tho i don't see what could bring it up (substancially) in my tank, beside poor plant growth...And if thats the case, then something else is missing. Maybe the light? When you say too low inorganics, what do you mean about that?

Thanks

 

[kevin silva]

Hi, here's another update on my aquarium. So for the last 3 weeks i lowered the ammout of light by placing it 23 cm (instead of 5cm) above the surface of the water, this would get me around 40-50 par at the substrate, which is medium/low light. I thought this would definetely solve any CO2 problem, even tho i knew that it was very unlikely, since my DC comes almost yellow as soon as lights come on. As for ferts, i also changed it a little bit, since i wanted to make sure there were no issues, so i switched from EI powder/solutions to Tropica ferts (coupled with some powders), as shown on my message above. I thought, "yeah, this should make my plants happy, even if algae doesn't go away, at least my plants do well", and it seemed like a pretty good combo on paper. Low light, Good CO2, plenty of nutrients. Exept it didn't worked at all. My plants were strugling since the begining. Rotalas were thin, had small tips and long intersections between leafs, the h'ra version was almost greener than the green version. Monte carlo growing upwards, hygrophila polysperma growing small tips. When it comes to algae, it was everywhere, BGA on the tips of stems, on the "carpet", on the moss. Green thread algae, on hardscape, plants. Basically algae was outgrowing plants by a fair ammount. I though at first that the algae was a result of disturbing the substrate, since i washed it before starting this routine, but that would not explain the bad plant health. I am now running short on ideas to where i should go next. My guess would be to increase the light and keep the ferts. As for now, i just uncovered the tank from a 4 days blackout, followed by a TAP.


before the BO:









after:







English is far from being my native language so im sorry my writting. I would be happy to answer any related misunderstanding.
Thanks.

 

[Easternlethal]

Your plant health actually looks okay - at least nothing is dying or melting, and long internodes can be caused by low light and too little pruning so I think you have basic growth. Now it's just improving their conditions and cleaning up all the algae in your water.

As for the clado and algae I still suspect insufficient ferts. Take a look at my fert regime. For N I am 15ppm per week, K I am adding nearly 30 per week ppm and Mg I am adding 15ppm (my chart shows 4ppm but I have found 15 to be perfect).

Won't all those extra ferts just encourage algae? In my opinion no because I have found that algae hate inorganic ferts.

You can see in my earlier posts way back when I started this hobby several years ago I had the same problem as you until I switched to EI and learnt to calculate ferts properly (use rotalabutterfly.com to help you)

You can also kill them with h202 so get a huge spray bottle and spray generously.

Sent from my SM-T820 using Tapatalk

 

[Onoma1]

I don’t have any particularly brilliant answers to your problems, however, wanted to let you know that I am on the same journey and that and am struggling with the same issues. I certainly feel that I am doing the right things, however, still trying to find the tipping point or things that could bring me back to a stable algae free tank. I have had some superb advice on two threads (which you may find useful):

https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/easy-life-blue-exit-problems.57095/#post-557561

https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/for-those-at-the-back-of-the-class.56326/page-2#post-557847


@alto has been particularly helpful. Like me I guess you have seen all of the you tube videos and the overview from Green Aqua about ferts, flow, co2 etc:



The key to success seems to be finding the correct balance between these factors. I found it (by accident) lost it and seem now to be in a perpetual battle with algae. Our Zen masters of aquascaping find this fairly easily (and make it look effortless).

Some of the additional solutions that have been suggested to me (these may help with all algae types) are:

· More frequent water changes

· Use of Seachem Purigen and activated carbon in your filter.

· Increasing the size and diversity of your clean-up crew

· Reduction of your bio-load by removing fish/ feeding regime

· Using a Chihiros Doctor 3 IN 1. I have used one and can testify that it prevents algae forming – ads more 02

· Jurijs also suggested positive filter bacteria products

Some short term fixes are:

· Spot dosing of liquid carbon or hydrogen peroxide

· Treating heavily infected plants outside the tank with liquid carbon (see Jurijs Jutjajevs )


I am trying all of these atm. I guess I feel that once the algae spores are in the tank a more radical approach may be necessary. I am considering:

Filipe Oliveira’s on use of liquid carbon to treat the whole tank:

Treating the whole tank with hydrogen peroxide https://www.aquasabi.com/aquascaping-wiki_algae_hydrogen-peroxide-treatment

Alto’s suggestion for an approach to whole tank cleaning (see link above).

I hope this helps.

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

I guess I feel that once the algae spores are in the tank a more radical approach may be necessary.

Any (and every) tank will have Cyanobacteria, Diatoms, Green Algae etc. present. They are pretty much universal in liquid water and will arrive in any new "pond" within a very short period of time.

If you get a dust sample (even from high in the atmosphere) and re-hydrate it, it will grow all sorts of "algae" from resting spores.

cheers Darrel