• You are viewing the forum as a Guest, please login (you can use your Facebook, Twitter, Google or Microsoft account to login) or register using this link: Log in or Sign Up

What exactly causes BBA? Part 2 - Bacterial imbalance

fablau said:
Guest, I am beginning to think about a possible toxicity in my tank. I have just measured my Fe and it is almost at 3ppm (2.94ppm). I dose CSM plus DTPA, but I also have high KH (7) and GH (15-18) which should mitigate any possible toxicity of CSM.
Click to expand...

Should but it may not actually do so. The only way to find out is to reset the tank by dosing multiple massive WCs and then wait and observe the plants for deficiencies. Then dose and observe but only in minute concentrations. Currently, I'm dosing 0.3ppm of Fe/week from FeDTPA:CSM+B at a 2:1 ratio. This is enough to prevent deficiencies so far. Need further testing.

And what you observed above (damaged leaves margins, BBA, etc) are the exact symptoms I have in my tank. Despite I pump a ton of Co2 (80ml/minute, over 1.5 PH drop with KH 7!!!), BBA is always there, mostly on slow growers, mostly on the edges of older Anubia leaves.... My Valisnerias also get regularly fuzz or BBA on the edges of leaves... And so Alternantheras. Could that be really related to a toxicity??! Maybe we are here thinking about wrong Co2 or lack of autotrophic bacteria, when instead is just overdosing of traces??!
Click to expand...
The algae on the plants grow on the affected leaves, not healthy leaves. This tends to be the older leaves since it's exposed to higher concentrations for longer periods of time.

And a 1.5pH drop? That's insane. I ruled out CO2 deficiency as a source of algae outbreaks a short while ago. There really isn't any need to dose so much. Even ADA doesn't dose very much nor do they turn on CO2 an hour or two before lights on; they turn them on simultaneously. So why the correlation between low CO2 and algae? Because of toxicity. Low CO2 results in slower nutrient uptake which results in higher metal concentrations in the water column which leads to toxicity.

The paradigm that I've been using these past couple of years has been wrong. It's actually quite amazing that all the problems I've had since I started in this hobby were actually the result of trace element toxicities. It wasn't CO2, GH, NPK, WCs, flow, light, etc, but toxicities. Now we just need to figure out which nutrients are causing them and associate them to the signs.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
http://plantstress.com/Articles/toxicity_i/Metal_toxicity.pdf

Also, according to this paper regarding metal toxicities in plants, specifically Mn, Zn, and Cu, it describes the symptoms of manganese toxicities on plants such as damaged leaf margins, necrosis, and tissue damage of older leaves. Sound similar to the pinhole issue in Hygros? And why do BBA and staghorn tend to grow on the leaf margins of plants? Is this a sign of Mn toxicity?
 
What kicked me off on this whole thread was dosing neat liquid carbon and chemically burning leaves, which then became covered in BBA.

As Yo-Han points out, heterotrophic bacteria break down dead, dying and damaged leaves. They break break down proteins in organics to amino acids, then ammonia. High organics can lead to high ammonia. An available organic food source means an increase in the population of heterotrophic bacteria.

As Sciencefiction says, lots of Purigen may be needed to remove ammonia, but you could attempt to remove the sources of the ammonia, using activated carbon to remove organics from the water column or reducing the number of fish which are excreting ammonia and organics.

As Yo-Han points out, toxicity could well be the root cause of your leaves being damaged, but that also means heterotrophic bacteria may then be feeding off the organics released.

Also, I do think this effect of photorespiration could be quite important.

This affect occurs when CO2 is low or O2 is high (lots of O2 produced by too much CO2?).

If CO2 is low the plants uses more of the O2 available instead, while it is trying to photosynthesise. This is wasteful of energy and it releases CO2 and ammonia. It may re-absorb the CO2 and ammonia it generates, but I can't believe the plant can be absorbing as much ammonia from the water column while this is going on. There is an energy cost relating to re-absorbing CO2 and ammonia in this way, which long term may lead to the plant becoming unhealthy. This is what people observe, bright lights, low CO2, unhealthy plants, BBA.

If the plant is absorbing less ammonia, could it slow the nutrient uptake rate (speculation).

If you were to increase surface agitation while the lights were on to benefit the bacteria, you'd add more O2 but also drive off injected CO2 lowering the concentration, which in turn could lead to more photorespiration.

While the lights are, it may be more beneficial for the bacteria to receive O2 indirectly through healthy plants photosynthesising due to an excess (by a little) of CO2, rather than increasing surface agitation (or pumping in O2) to provide more O2 to the bacteria, but at the same time making the plants unhealthy.

Once the lights are off, photorespiration would be less of an issue and increasing surface agitation to prevent O2 levels dropping too low, would make sense to me. This ties in with successful people increasing aeration at night.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Also, according to this paper regarding metal toxicities in plants, specifically Mn, Zn, and Cu, it describes the symptoms of manganese toxicities on plants such as damaged leaf margins, necrosis, and tissue damage of older leaves. Sound similar to the pinhole issue in Hygros? And why do BBA and staghorn tend to grow on the leaf margins of plants? Is this a sign of Mn toxicity?
Click to expand...

Also, earlier in this thread, we discuss plants that use bicarbonate (HCO3-) ions as their source of carbon, lead to an excess of OH- ions accumulating on their leaves.

lightinducedphchange.jpe
This affect will lead to more positively charged metal ions being attracted to the leaf. An amazing image was added of calcium deposits on the top of anubias leaves.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Ok guys, I wanna try to do this: tomorrow big water change, adding carbon and Purigen to filter, then lower Co2 injection to more "human" levels (1.2 max drop) and try to stop dosing for a few days by monitoring all levels (No3, Po4 and Fe) and see what's gonna happen.

I have been amazed by this Dutch tank, very beautiful, which claim to use reduced EI but very low Co2 (0.7 PH drop) and no algae at all:

http://www.barrreport.com/forum/barr-report/aquascaping/14668-a-dutch-style

I want to find out from that guy "how much" he has reduced EI dosing.

Also, I almost forgot: I tried to increase both K and traces for a few days the past week, but I didn't notice any BBA regression. Actually... Situation got worse right after I tried double CSM dose!! I thought it was just an unfortunate case.... I can guess now.!??!
 
Currently, I'm dosing 0.3ppm of Fe/week from FeDTPA:CSM+B at a 2:1 ratio. This is enough to prevent deficiencies so far. Need further testing.
Click to expand...
Guest, does that mean you dose 0.1ppm each dose, x3 times a week which gives you a total of 0.3ppm?

Also, important: do you know your max level of Fe in your water in ppm? I mean, whats your max accumulation with your current dosing?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
fablau said:
Guest, does that mean you dose 0.1ppm each dose, x3 times a week which gives you a total of 0.3ppm?

Also, important: do you know your max level of Fe in your water in ppm? I mean, whats your max accumulation with your current dosing?
Click to expand...
Yes, 0.1ppm x2-3 per week. Since I dose when I see chlorosis, then Fe is probably taken up almost completely before I dose again. I have no iron test to confirm but the concentration should not be more than 0.2ppm on any given day of the week.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
fablau said:
Also, I almost forgot: I tried to increase both K and traces for a few days the past week, but I didn't notice any BBA regression. Actually... Situation got worse right after I tried double CSM dose!! I thought it was just an unfortunate case.... I can guess now.!??!
Click to expand...
When I dosed K, I dosed because I thought there was a deficiency/low concentration. It was only after a few weeks that BBA started gradually disappearing off the walls. I have no idea why this occurred but the only thing different was the single potassium dosage.

Another thing to mention, it seems like BBA infests plant tissue that has been damaged by micronutrient toxicity. For example, I've never had BBA grow on H. pinnatifida but have had staghorn grow on leaf margins. When I reduced CSM+B dosages recently, BBA suddenly infested the older leaves along the margins that staghorn usually infests. This is why I think that BBA infesting plant leaves is likely attaching onto damaged tissue.
 
Well, after weeks of experiments, my conclusion is that, in my case, the problem of BBA was micro nutrient toxicity as discussed on this thread:

CSM+B Toxicity Experiment
http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=853001

After 2 weeks of no CSM dosing, BBA is slowing disappearing. If anyone has BBA and has tried everything else, should try the new "micro detox" procedure and post their results. Thanks for discussing!
 
Fablau, first of all congratulations on reducing the BBA in your aquarium!

This is an interesting direction of thought.

Please can I make a couple of suggestions?

Could a common theme be that the enzyme Rubisco is being affected, which is key to photosynthesis?

Please take a look at this abstract, which builds upon your suggestion that metal ion concentrations may impact on enzymes.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/17968513/?i=3&from=/23112176/related

"Mg2+ in various concentrations was added to purified Rubisco in vitro to gain insight into the mechanism of molecular interactions between Mg2+ and Rubisco. The enzyme activity assays showed that the reaction between Rubisco and Mg2+ was two order, which means that the enhancement of Rubisco activity was accelerated by low concentration of Mg2+ and slowed by high concentration of Mg2+."

However, please can you also read this regarding photorespiration from a Wikipedia?

We discussed photorespiration earlier in this thread. This happens when O2 instead of CO2 is used in photosynthesis reactions, when light is bright and CO2 is low (or O2 is high).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photorespiration

"Photorespiration (also known as the oxidative photosynthetic carbon cycle, or C2 photosynthesis) is a process in plant metabolism which attempts to reduce the consequences of a wasteful oxygenation reaction by the enzyme RuBisCO."

Could there be a common theme? I'm trying to suggest that in both cases, high metal concentration or bright light + low CO2, the enzyme Rubisco that is critical for photosynthesis becomes less efficient.
 
Yo-Han, I'm even considering funding a BBA university study if I won big on the lottery! Perhaps I wouldn't mention this at the press conference when I collect my winnings.
 
That's hilarious Andy! And of course, I think you are right, the correlations you put together make sense. Truth is: I still have some BBA in my tank, but what I see is a gradual die off in a natural way. I need to wait a few more weeks to see if actually it is going to disappear completely, but have a look at the two pictures below, they show the same bunch of Anubias. The first picture is taken 3 weeks ago, before the traces "detox" cure, and the second one has been taken today after almost 3 weeks with very low traces.

cd6813a7bbeca79f231b2ad10e7e4f0e.jpg

cd06c778a5e2337e28379d5256b0088b.jpg

As you can notice, leaves still have some BBA but greatly reduced, and leaves look much healthier. Also, notice trumpet snails cleaning up what remains of the dead BBA... Isn't nature amazing?

Here are some more Anubia leaves after the detox cure:

98204ac6b8a56866a855fec9214aa10f.jpg

They were pretty much all covered of fine BBA before.

I am doing the same experiment in a low-tech tank and I am taking pictures of the progress. I will share everything once finished.
 
I don't have much to add, but I do remember reading that overdosing on iron causes BBA and red algae. I can at least confirm that with red algae in my tank when I was dosing about 4x more traces than EI when I was trying out PPS-Pro. But my tank isn't the healthiest so it's just purely my own observation.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top