algae:(

Dephea said:

For greenspot I actually just wipe it off the glass and I got some Nerite snails for it. Tried to battle it but lost due to the amount of light my living room gets

For staghorn I needed to introduce Co2 to reduce it, I got API algae removal which didn't do much, now I just pinch the algae of the plant when I'm cleaning the tank. Comes off easily. There are plenty of other plant fertilisers battling that issue but I find manual removal to be easier and less risky as I am still learning about keeping underwater plants - don't want to overdo it with different chemicals. Apparently Seachem Excel Flourish squirted directly to the algae does the job too, so if you have access to it it is a good start - I was told in two days staghorn can be gone

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Dephea said:

I find pinching to be easy but absolutely HATE the feel of it on my skin, reminds me of spiders which I am really scared of so I'm not a fan of this cleaning method Let's see if there is anything better we can do

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Uberhoust said:

The weird slime is likely cyanobacteria, bluegreen algae, I have been fighting it a bit myself. On tank I totally cleaned all the substrate, the filter, even took the plants out and treated them, and I still get some developing in the tank. I never had this before then one day about a month ago it started up. I primarily use manual cleanup, wipe the leaves with my fingers and siphon up the pieces. So far I haven't the pleasure of staghorn or blackbeard algae . . . (. . . those are knocks on wood) I have one thought and that is that my tanks with aquarium soil seem more likely to have cyanobacteria.

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Byron said:

First question is, are you talking common algae, or "problem" algae? Common algae is natural and will be present in any healthy aquarium. It will grow on all surfaces; snails, shrimp, some fish can easily deal with this, and a wipe of the inside front glass with a sponge at every weekly water change is all you need to be doing. Cyanobacteria is another issue, caused by excess organics in the presence of light.

Problem algae in a planted tank is different; here the problem is an imbalance of light/nutrients, nothing more. Establish or restore the balance, and end of problem algae. Never use algicides, add special algae-eating fish (they have their own issues usually), or resort to any chemical. If the light is of sufficient intensity and spectrum to provide what the plants require, and there are adequate nutrients in balance, you can control the algae with the duration of the lighting. I have not had black brush algae for over four or five years, since I worked out the balance of tank lighting duration, ambient window light, and fertilization.

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hansgruber7 said:

Don't compare your tank to those sorts of pictures. They probably spend hours cleaning it and getting the lighting right and it may be photoshopped or edited in various ways. It probably doesn't look like that long-term and I'm sure it develops normal levels of algae. From the pictures I saw, your tank has totally normal levels of algae that are not harmful or unsightly in my opinion.

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