GSE and Phosphates...

[Bhu]

Hi all

After 3 weeks of great progress and growth I've started getting the dreaded green spot algae on some of my Anubis leaves. I have researched as much as I can and haven sad that some are getting rid of it with phosphate increases. I just tested (running for cover from Clive) the water and the phosphates are at 2ppm. I do now have a phosphate in the for of potassium phosphate I could add using the James's calculator to increase this level.

Is this a myth? Will it help? If so what ppm PO4 should I be looking at achieving to get rid of the GSE?

At the moment I just dosing an all in one off the shelf feed Neutro+ but I have invested in the EI starter kit which I will start using as soon as the other runs out.

I could reduce lighting but the rest of the plants are doing great and even pearling

I have increased my water changes to daily (25lt/day on a 150lt tank) to see if that helps.

I didn't want to have to cut leaves off as apart from the GSE they look really healthy

Any other ideas appreciated.

Cheers

Bhu

 

[ian_m]

dreaded green spot algae on some of my Anubis leaves

I get that as well, it's due to the slow the slow growth and "higher" light levels.

So,
- you can remove the leaves.
- Wipe the leaves with diluted solution of Excel as that will kill the algae and certainly works. However too strong and it kills the leaves, you get holes and brown areas and too weak has not effect.

To keep my Anubis leaves algae free I removed the algae covered leaves (actually severely hacked it) and moved it to under the tank bracing bar (actually bracing bar covered in Glosso) so that it is shielded from the light.. So far algae has not returned.

 

[Jose]

I think doubling your phosphate dosing can do no harm and its solved all my GSA issues. Although you also have to get rid of whats already there. I think Tom Barr has been dosing something like 1/2 the NO3 ppm of PO4 but I am not 100% sure on the numbers. He has reported good results whith this.

 

[Bhu]

I think Tom Barr has been dosing something like 1/2 the NO3 ppm of PO4 but I am not 100% sure on the numbers.

Hi Jose, that's not very clear I though its advised to double the PO4 not to half it? To increase PO4?

Can anyone please tell me the ppm that is required by plants to be happy of PO4? Also is doubling safe? i.e if it's x ppm PO4 for normal dosimg is 2x ppm ok?

 

[Jose]

Hes dosing phosphates at half the nitrates amount. So...its probably near 10ppm of phosphates a week. But again I am speaking out of my memory here so numbers might be a bit off.
Its most probably safe to dose 4 ppm of phosphates.
If it doesnt get better then it might be a CO2/flow problem not phosphates.

The seems to be a relationship between GSA-CO2/Flow/light-PO4. So you might be able to resolve the problem in 3 different ways. You could up the phosphates, up the CO2/flow or you could lower the light. Of course any combination in-between should also help. But for me I have kept everything else the same and started dosing like 6ppm and stopped getting GSA.

 

[Bhu]

Hi Jose
At the moment there are no other issues. Everything else is including said Anubis is growing well and healthy (except for the GSE) The flow is great as is the co2 and distribution. My UP inline pumps a huge cloud of co2 ultra fine bubbles into the tank, I can sit and see all the places they go and its pretty much everywhere. There is one slight dead spot but that's the other end of the tank to the Anubis. There are some petit Anubis on the dead spot and they are GSE free. They do however get a lot less light and the one with GSE gets a lot more light so it is probably due to excess light. So I hope the extra PO4 solves it as it would be a pain in the ass to have to move the Anubis to a more shady area.

 

[Jose]

You might have to move it in the end. Just because any algae issue you might have anubias are going to be be the first hit if placed under strong light. And for anubias its harder to recover since it takes ages to see a new leave.

 

[Bhu]

Well I will try with increased PO4 first and let you all know how I get on... I've had a few leaves in 2 weeks so I'm happy with its growth. Fingers crossed on the magic PO4 lol