Help in getting algae in check

[Greeny]

Hi everyone,

I recently posted in another thread about my own algae issues a couple of you may know and was encouraged to start my own thread to see if we can all work through it with much appreciation from me.

It was looking quite bad on Friday, took a couple of pictures and posted it. After that, I did a good maintenance session on both the tank, filter, and pipes. Today I also did more maintenance and tried further to get out as much detritus as possible. I explain a lot in the videos so I will leave it at those for now. Let me know if you can't open them. The first link is after the first maintenance and the second is after today's maintenance. I have no livestock currently...





The red plants are Alternanthera Reineckii ''Mini' and not Ludwigia. In the first video, I said Ludwigia but realized for the 2nd video it was Alternanthera Reineckii ''Mini' but said that it wasn't Rotala instead of Ludwigia lol (that bit was discussed in the other thread)

Anyway, much appreciated your help.

 

[G H Nelson]

Hi
Manual removal with an old tooth brush and harassing the filamentous algae would be the order of the day!
Rub off any algae on leaves and remove any damaged leaves.......proceeded with a large water change after doing this.
There seems to be new fresh green Anubias leaves emerging so that's a good point.
Tropica Green Bottle states 6ml per week for 50 Litres. I would split this into 3 doses per week......2ml per dosing day for 50 Litres.
Monday/Wednesday/Friday.
Any stem plant can be used as a floater, but some are better than others as mentioned in this link below.

Using stem plants as a filtering aid at Start Up!

The subject of using fast-growing stem plants as part of a filtering aid has cropped up a few times recently. This idea has been around for a long time so not new, it has benefits especially for a new set - up. I try and cover at least 50% of the water surface minimum. 1. Improves water...

www.ukaps.org

Send me your address and I will send you a few pieces of Water Sprite/Ceratopteris thalictroides as a floating plant....this is ideal for removing water column detritus!

More information would be helpful as the link suggests below!

Please read the guidelines for Algae help!

Dear Member Please give as many details as possible regarding your aquarium set-up, when requiring advice/help! The above will be posted at the start of each help request. Why do we ask these questions? It will stop the member posting multiple times, plus adviser's don't need to scroll through...

www.ukaps.org

hoggie

 

[Greeny]

That's very kind of you for offering to send me some floating plants. I'll send you my address in a pm.
1, I'll keep harassing the filamentous algae
2, Some of the leaves have very stubborn algae, should I just remove them? Some leaves I can get most of it off but there can be stubborn parts that don't come off.
3, Ok, will start your suggested dosing regime.
4, Good link, nice to have that as a reference.
5, Again much thanks for the offer of sending the floating plants.
6, I will post more detailed information as soon as I get a chance.

 

[G H Nelson]

Yes remove any leaves that have stubborn algae....they will not recover!
Probably Thursday I will send out.

 

[Hufsa]

Oh I must have missed this thread, sorry about that @Greeny
Just gonna start with a disclaimer, I am not a user of injected CO2 (quite yet), so all my advice on that front is based on observations and the experience of the other users on the forum.

Some thoughts, I dont think you can do too many water changes, it should be a good thing because you are continually removing algae spores, loose detritus and other "stuff" that is suspended in the watercolumn. I see they commonly advise that water changes are done outside of the photoperiod, this allows your plants to do undisturbed growing with relatively stable levels of CO2, which a water change mid photoperiod would mess with. The fact that you dont have any livestock makes things a bit easier for now, you dont have to take them into consideration.

The new growth on your plants look healthy, that is good and it is this part of the plants you should be focusing on. The older growth cannot be changed much by the plant. Plants with CO2 injection seem to tolerate more trimming than low tech tanks, which is a bonus in your case. I would remove the worst of the old leaves, leaving some patches of bare stems behind if neccessary. Unless my memory is failing me, damaged plant tissue leaks ethylene, which signal for algae to attack the decaying tissue. We want the plant to spend less time trying to salvage half dead leaves and more time making new healthy leaves. But you should leave a bit of plant mass behind, even if it is not perfect. Check out this thread especially the posts by Geoffrey Rea

If you are doing large amounts of water changes, be sure to replenish the fertilizer you have removed, otherwise the water might be running very lean without it being your intention.

 

[Greeny]

Thanks once again for everyone's help, I am trying to get to a good balance, I'm still fighting to get it to that stage but I am taking the necessary steps. I thought I saw someone mention what root tabs they use but can't find it. Any recommendations of which root tabs to purchase?

 

[Hufsa]

Can you fill us in with the information requested earlier?
If your substrate is fairly new you shouldnt have to worry about root tabs.
Would love to see pictures of how it is going for you now?

 

[Greeny]

Can you fill us in with the information requested earlier?
If your substrate is fairly new you shouldnt have to worry about root tabs.
Would love to see pictures of how it is going for you now?

Hi Hufsa,

It's all a bit of a mess in there at the moment, I've removed the Eleocharis mini as the hair algae just keeps growing so quickly within it and it's so complex. After removal, lots of detritus were left behind from it that I can actually get to now. I'm systematically going through the leaves to remove those with stubborn algae on. Unfortunately, the Alternanthera Reineckii ''Mini' is so riddled with algae on its leaves I don't really know what to do, I need to remove it as much as possible to stop it from spreading but it's like decimating my plants. I've uprooted most of the plants so I can try and remove as much of this detritus as possible, each maintenance before this session felt like I'd done a good job with removing detritus but today has proved me wrong cause there's still so much of it in there. Tuesday I will try and remove as much as possible but it feels like such a huge task, 2nd to actually starting again. I'd love to be able to take a picture of some progress but it's a bit of a mess right now, on Tuesday, I'll take some pics of where I'm at for you to see. I'll also slowly fill in the details by editing the list below...

1. Size: ADA 45P
2. Age: Nearly 2 years.
3. Filtration: Oase Biomaster 250, stock media removed and replaced with Seachem Purigen
4. Lighting and duration: Twinstar LED V3 Aquarium Light 450EA Adjustable, dimmed to 35%, currently 6 hours.
5. Substrate: ADA Amazonia, a bit of sand that was a path once.
6. Co2 dosing or Non-dosing: CO2 dosing
7. Fertilizers used + Ratios: Tropica specialized nutrition 6ml per week, 2ml on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday as directed by Hoggie.
8. Water change regime and type: usually a 70 to 80% change weekly, tap water mix.
9. Plant list + When planted. Anubias Nana Nana, Staurogyne Repens, Alternanthera Reineckii ''Mini', Cryptocoryne Albida Brown. Apart from the Alternanthera Reineckii ''Mini' (been in for a few months, the rest planted at setup,
10. Inhabitants: none
11. Full tank shot.

 

[Hufsa]

Hmm, sounds like its still very extensive despite your efforts. Big problem means there is likely a big solution needed in my experience, in other words a major factor is off still. I wouldn't personally worry about algae "spreading", others may disagree but.. The way I see it your water is already full of algae spores, having some leaves with algae on them is not going to make or break your progress. The goal must be to make the algae less happy to grow, because algae spores are everywhere anyway. Algae will not grow on healthy plant leaves. How is the new growth, is it being overtaken at the same rate it is coming? Have you looked at your CO2 implementation? How much CO2 is being delivered, is it getting to all corners and is the level of CO2 steady throughout the photoperiod? Yours is a high tech tank so it seems unreasonable you should have to go much lower on light then you currently are

 

[Hufsa]

Sorry if I have forgotten any details or mixed something up with someone elses thread 🙂

 

[Hufsa]

Your tank is 2 years old, this is useful to know. There is potential for a fair bit of crud to have built up in the substrate over that period of time. Have you seen this video?

 

[Greeny]

Thanks for your fast response, I will reply properly tomorrow as it's late now. The algae are growing on leaves pretty quickly especially on the Alternanthera Reineckii ''Mini', I hope I can remove most of the detritus cause I'm sure it will really help but I couldn't do it without uprooting the plants first, I'll see if it will make that job easier.

 

[G H Nelson]

2. Age: Nearly 2 years.
3. Filtration: Oase Biomaster 250, stock media removed and replaced with Seachem Purigen.

2. Age: Nearly 2 years.....This substrate could be spent of nutrients?
3. Filtration: Oase Biomaster 250, stock media removed and replaced with Seachem Purigen......more information needed on the filter cleaning regime!

 

[Greeny]

2. Age: Nearly 2 years.....This substrate could be spent of nutrients?
3. Filtration: Oase Biomaster 250, stock media removed and replaced with Seachem Purigen......more information needed on the filter cleaning regime!

2, Yes, I was thinking that it couldn't hurt to put tabs in, any recommendations? Some of my plants did feel brittle and broke easily, I don't know if this is common for healthy plants.
3, There's not much of a filter cleaning regime so to speak, to be honest, it had been neglected. I haven't looked inside the canister for some time, although I did clean the pre-filter finally after too long and that was why the circulation was slack before that. Funny how the obvious things pass you by sometimes, like why isn't my 'insert any electrical gadget here' working? Forgetting it actually needs electricity to work, "oh it's not plugged in, I just spent an hour messing around with complicated wiring and I didn't plug it in?!". So yes, lots of detritus that I can't seem to get rid of, maybe check to make sure the filter is running efficiently? I suspect you are going to tell me to clean a lot more frequently good idea. That being said, I remember about an internal filter, I'm not sure I have one or at least one small enough to fit in my 45p.

Below are pictures of what the tank looks like at the moment. I'm in the middle of a big clean-up, I already siphoned some of the detritus on the left side front as it was covered. I don't think the filamentous algae which I believe was struggling but still growing helped as it would grow and then seem to die and cause more of it, like waste recycling.

 

[Andy Pierce]

I think some amano shrimp will sort your problem out right away. They're brilliant on the softer algae; not so much on harder green spot algae or black beard algae, but these don't seem to be your problem (at least from looking at the photos). Otto catfish are good too and are pretty benign, low maintenance and interesting.

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

There's not much of a filter cleaning regime so to speak, to be honest, it had been neglected. I haven't looked inside the canister for some time, although I did clean the pre-filter finally after too long and that was why the circulation was slack before that. Funny how the obvious things pass you by sometimes, like why isn't my 'insert any electrical gadget here' working? Forgetting it actually needs electricity to work, "oh it's not plugged in, I just spent an hour messing around with complicated wiring and I didn't plug it in?!". So yes, lots of detritus that I can't seem to get rid of, maybe check to make sure the filter is running efficiently? I suspect you are going to tell me to clean a lot more frequently

I suspect you are going to tell me to clean a lot more frequently

We are.

and replaced with Seachem Purigen

Do you mean <"Purigen">, the little round white granules in a mesh bag?

Tropica specialized nutrition 6ml per week, 2ml on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday as directed by Hoggie.

Plant growth definitely wasn't quite right, so it will be interesting to see what happens now.

Send me your address and I will send you a few pieces of Water Sprite/Ceratopteris thalictroides as a floating plant....this is ideal for removing water column detritus!

I like <"Ceratopteris spp."> as well.

cheers Darrel

 

[Greeny]

Thanks everyone, I'm pretty busy and will try and answer as soon as I get a chance.

 

[Greeny]

Hi all,


We are.

Do you mean <"Purigen">, the little round white granules in a mesh bag?

Plant growth definitely wasn't quite right, so it will be interesting to see what happens now.

I like <"Ceratopteris spp."> as well.

cheers Darrel

Ok,

1, I will be extra vigilant on my filter maintenance. I'm looking to buy the lily pipes again so I can get back an intact inflow and surface skimmer. I'm not sure that the current position of the inflow is helping. Detritus accumulates on the front left hand side and I think that would be the better position for the inflow (see picture) i recently got word of an unexpected bonus, I could afford it anyway but that will buy it for me.

2, My mistake, I'd forgotten what I had put in there, I meant to say Seachem Matrix.

3, Most of them are uprooted at the moment while I spend some days cleaning as much of the detritus as possible and carry out frequent water changes as George Farmer endorses as a good way to keep plants happy and algae not happy.

4, Nice 👍

Thanks for your help, appreciate it.

 

[Greeny]

I think some amano shrimp will sort your problem out right away. They're brilliant on the softer algae; not so much on harder green spot algae or black beard algae, but these don't seem to be your problem (at least from looking at the photos). Otto catfish are good too and are pretty benign, low maintenance and interesting.

Thanks Andy, my only worry about Amano shrimp is that I got 6 of them a few months ago or a year ago something like that, they were fine for a week until I did a water change (pretty big one) and my weekly maintainance, went to work the next day to find a couple easy to spot that were dead and with a bit of digging around found the rest bar one dead. I kind of feel worried if I get some more, im only issuing a death sentence 😟 i guess i really stressed them and perhaps they were not fully acclimatised. With the otto's us a 45 litre big enough?

 

[arcturus]

Ok,

1, I will be extra vigilant on my filter maintenance. I'm looking to buy the lily pipes again so I can get back an intact inflow and surface skimmer. I'm not sure that the current position of the inflow is helping. Detritus accumulates on the front left hand side and I think that would be the better position for the inflow (see picture) i recently got word of an unexpected bonus, I could afford it anyway but that will buy it for me.

This is a small tank and you should be able to have sufficient water circulation with the lily pipe. I would try placing the intake closer to the substrate. But that will not replace weekly maintenance to remove the detritus that will always accumulate.

3, Most of them are uprooted at the moment while I spend some days cleaning as much of the detritus as possible and carry out frequent water changes as George Farmer endorses as a good way to keep plants happy and algae not happy.

You need a minimum of 50% weekly water changes. This will not be problematic in a small tank. You can increase the frequency to 2-4x per week while you are experiencing these issues. After the tank recovers you can stay with 1x per week. And you cannot skip the weekly maintenance. No way around that while you keep injecting CO2.