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Brown algae

Aquamaniac Fishtanks

Aquamaniac Fishtanks

Member
Joined
7 Oct 2013
Messages
46
Location
London, United Kingdom
Hi guys

I have decided to ask for some help and guidance here. My new scape is not going so good. It's been assembled for almost a month and at the moment it's been completely overrun with brown algae.

Rocky Mountain:
New scape "Rocky Moutain" | UK Aquatic Plant Society


Pictures of the tank:

48le.jpg


rvlr.jpg


jat2.jpg


I am dosing co2 with a pressurized system, i am keeping my lights on for 5 hours a day (6 hours before) to keep it under control, and i think the tank has a good flow. I am using two canister filters,plus a 2500 liter per hour wavemaker.
I do two 50% water changes weekly, vacuum the sand and clean the algae of the rocks and glass regularly.
The filters where already cycled when i started the tank. They were working in my other tanks while the scape was being assembled.

Flow:
:
ngnw.png

This is how the flow is setup in the tank. My fluval 305 has a dual exit,one of them pointing to the left of the tank and the other one to the front,the intake is standing right next to the outflow, the tank is drilled so i do not have a choice here. My other filter has the intake in the left side of the tank and the outflow is a spray bar in the center of the tank pointing forward.
And on the left side of the tank i have the wavemaker pointing to the right side of the tank.
I don't thing flow is the problem.

Light:

The unit is 4x54 watts T5. I am only using 2x54 watts and for only 5 hours now. The confusing is in some places i've been reading that brown algae is a lack of light and to get rid of them you just need to increase the light. I tried this and it just makes it worse.

Nutrients:

I am now doing a EI dosing. I follow the guidelines that were sent to me when i got the dry salts from aquarium plant food.

I am preparing a 500 ml solution for macros:

Potassium nitrate - 3 teaspoons
Potassium phosphate - 1 teaspoon
Magnesium sulphate - 6 teaspoons

I am dosing 30 ml 3x a week of this. It says to do 50 ml for a tank my size but i do not have that many plants yet.

Chelated trace - 1 teaspoon

30 ml 3x a week.

Can someone help me with what i am doing wrong.
I know parvula is not a fast grower and that might be the root of the problem, but then again i see other people with beatiful carpets weeks after assembly and no algae in sight.
My carpet is spreading but is covered in algae and to me it feels like it's spreading slowly.
 
It is the normal problem of not enough gas reaching the plants to match the light!
Looks like you have fish in there but if you did not then the simple answer would be to continuously turn up the gas until things improved.
So you will have to be more carful upping the gas levels unless you can rehouse your fish.
You can safely does full IE recommended amounts though.
I cant quite workout your flow either, wave makers are not popular although that does not mean they are not useful, however it seems to be conflicting the purpose of a spray bar.
The idea of a full length spray bar is to cause a diffused but constant circular flow within the tank. This effect will feed the whole bottom in an even controlled way.
How are diffusing the C02? what size is the tank?
 
The tank is 120 cm x 40 cm × 50 cm. Aprox. 240 liters.
And I am using a glass difuser.
I do see a lot of co2 bubbles everywhere in the tank.
The scape does have a huge mountain hardscape in the middle.
Wonder if it is breaking the flow?


Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk
 
I agree with fox fish. It looks like a light/co2 imbalance.

Aquamaniac Fishtanks said:
This is how the flow is setup in the tank. My fluval 305 has a dual exit,one of them pointing to the left of the tank and the other one to the front,the intake is standing right next to the outflow, the tank is drilled so i do not have a choice here. My other filter has the intake in the left side of the tank and the outflow is a spray bar in the center of the tank pointing forward.
And on the left side of the tank i have the wavemaker pointing to the right side of the tank.
I don't thing flow is the problem.
Click to expand...

It may well be contributing to the problem. Not the amount of flow but the direction(s). You seem to have a very confused flow pattern with outlets pointing in all directions. You need to position the outlets so that the water either:

Flows across the top, down a wall, along the floor and back up again
Or
Flows around the four walls in a continuous loop.

The water needs to flow smoothly around the tank without any of the flows from the outlets clashing.

I can't see a drop checker in any of your pictures. How are you sure that you are dissolving enough co2? Are you taking Ph readings instead?
 
squid102 said:
I agree with fox fish. It looks like a light/co2 imbalance.



It may well be contributing to the problem. Not the amount of flow but the direction(s). You seem to have a very confused flow pattern with outlets pointing in all directions. You need to position the outlets so that the water either:

Flows across the top, down a wall, along the floor and back up again
Or
Flows around the four walls in a continuous loop.

The water needs to flow smoothly around the tank without any of the flows from the outlets clashing.

I can't see a drop checker in any of your pictures. How are you sure that you are dissolving enough co2? Are you taking Ph readings instead?
Click to expand...

Had an accident and broke my brand new drop checker in one of the water changes.
Need to order another one.
But I agree with that my flow is a mess. It did not ocur to me that having flow just for the sake of it is not enough. It needs to be efficient.
I do have the problem that my fluval intake an outflow are on the same side and cannot be moved.
Where should I put the spray bar? In the other side or the same has the fluval outflow?
And the wavemaker? It does more water movement than both filters put together.


Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk
 
Andy D said:
When did you start dosing the ferts as your other thread stated you were not dosing?

4 separate sources of flow all aiming in different directions could well be an issue.
Click to expand...

Started dosing one week and two days ago.
I see now that my flow is bad. It's there but it's actually doing more bad than good.


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foxfish said:
Island scapes work well with a circular flow around the island with all the outlets facing the same direction.
240l tank will need a lot of C02!
Click to expand...

Well my mountain cannot qualify has an island because it touches the glass on the back. The bigger rock actually touches the glass.
Guess this weekend I'll really need to get a new drop checker and not break it again to really check my co2 levels.

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I just checked the ph pen. It does not seem that expensive.
I'll add one to my shopping list.
Question is how will it tell me if I have a co2 problem?


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Co2 effects the pH. If you measure your pH through the day you can see what size drop you are getting. For example my tank runs at 7.4 pH before co2 comes on. By the time lights are on its down to 6.4, it stays there until lights off.
 
aliclarke86 said:
Co2 effects the pH. If you measure your pH through the day you can see what size drop you are getting. For example my tank runs at 7.4 pH before co2 comes on. By the time lights are on its down to 6.4, it stays there until lights off.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I am aware that co2 decreases the ph.
Just not aware that measuring the ph could be used to check if I have enough co2 in the tank.
So can I do it with my normal ph test kit?
I do not have the ph pen. But the tests I do.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk
 
As others mention, flow distribution and CO2 are the root cause of the difficulty in this tank. A 3 day blackout is recommended, along with a total revamp of the placement of the pumps as well as a change in the gas dissolution technique. A vertical standpipe is an upside down affair so it will be not be as simple to port the gas directly into the filter inlet in this case. An inline device may be a better value in this case unless an imaginative way to get the gas into the filter inlet is found. The spraybar and ALL pumps should be placed along the same wall, all should be facing the same direction, and their flow vectors should all be parallel. That will maximize the flow energy and will result in better efficiency of distribution.

Cheers,
 
ceg4048 said:
As others mention, flow distribution and CO2 are the root cause of the difficulty in this tank. A 3 day blackout is recommended, along with a total revamp of the placement of the pumps as well as a change in the gas dissolution technique. A vertical standpipe is an upside down affair so it will be not be as simple to port the gas directly into the filter inlet in this case. An inline device may be a better value in this case unless an imaginative way to get the gas into the filter inlet is found. The spraybar and ALL pumps should be placed along the same wall, all should be facing the same direction, and their flow vectors should all be parallel. That will maximize the flow energy and will result in better efficiency of distribution.

Cheers,
Click to expand...

Thanks.
Will a complete blackout be needed. As in covering the tank from light completely, or just keeping the lights out for 3 days?
Do I shut down co2 and stop fertilizing during the blackout?

I will revamp the flow system today as suggested. I'll use the ph readings during the weekend to see how it affects the tank and go for blackout during the week.

The fluval has an upside down intake pipe. But my other filter has a normal pipe, maybe I can play with that one to get a better distribution.
A inline difuser will be the definite solution in the future anyway.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk
 
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