Polyglutaraldehyde?

I read an article which lead me to consider that Co2 injections will improve my black beard algage issue whilst allowing my plants to thrive. Previously I was fertilizing then I realized it just fed the algae and the plants could not compete.

I found a product which is named as a BBA remover essentially and has only

• Polyglutaraldehyde

And deionized water as ingredients.

Just wondering is this Co2? Will it help my plants as well as remove the BBA?

Also, the article mentioned that some hobbyists enjoy growing the BBA as it can look kinda cool when long as well as provide hiding space. Has anyone done this?

I'd be keen to see!

Hi interesting topic! BBA can be really hard to get rid of and I'm not sure using Co2 will help.

Using Co2 to beat algae is ok in some instances but not in others, the intention would be to make the plants grow faster using more of the nutrients in the water faster and starving the algae but in order to do this you have to balance 3 elements, lighting, Co2 and fertilisers. When you inject Co2 you need to increase your lighting and increase your fertilisers with the goal of making your plants photosynthesise faster. But this can also just make your algae worse. Interestingly BBA and Staghorn are pretty common in Co2 tanks and often come in areas of high flow and high Co2, so if you get your outlet pipes angled wrong it will grow.

Co2 can be great - though with plenty of risks for example overdosing can kill your fish very quickly and you will be handling pressurised containers and have one sat in your home. Though there are plenty of ways of doing it safely you just have to be careful.

In terms of the Polyglutaraldehyde - I wouldnt recommend it, if you google it or particularly the name without the poly bit it, its used for sterilising lab equipment. In aquarium use the plan is to basically act as a toxin in a low dose to kill off single cell organisms and the effect to fish and plants is not plainly explained anywhere but my imagination runs a bit...

How bad is the algae, what is it on and what is your set up like - eg which fertilisers were you using, what kind of light and how longs its on? How dense is your planting and what kind of plants do you have already? Pics of the tank might help too

Wills

glutaralehyde is the primary ingredient in liquid CO2 products It is used primarily as a disinfectant and can be toxic to fish and some plants.While plants can use it as a source of carbon it is not really CO2 gas. CO2 doesn't cause or inhibit algae. Most aquarium with CO2 are dosed according to Estimative Index dosing guidelines. And typically these tanks use more fertilizer than needed. Also EI dosing dose not require using CO2. These tanks often have fewer issues with algae.

Polyglutaralehyde is the same except a protean molecule has been attached to it. I don't know how the alteration changes it.

However in my experience using commercial fertilizer making my own fertilizer is that all 14 nutrients plants need must be present or hair and dBBA will take over the tank. If just one is missing or not at a sufficient concentration you are going to have algae issues.

Most fertilizer don't have all 14 nutrients and other use different compound that interact with each other in water that can result in a deficiency. End results that if the chemistry of your water doesn't mach the chemistry of the water used to develop the fertilizer, it may not work in your tank.When all 14 nutrients are pressent plants do great while algae does not. No one knows why.

I would think of Polyglutaralehyde as a bandaid. You should rally focus on figuring out why your fertilizer is not growing. What fertilizer were you using and how much did you dose, how often,and how many gallons in the water in the tank? Also what is the GH, KH, and PH of your tap water?

Wills said:

Hi interesting topic! BBA can be really hard to get rid of and I'm not sure using Co2 will help.

Using Co2 to beat algae is ok in some instances but not in others, the intention would be to make the plants grow faster using more of the nutrients in the water faster and starving the algae but in order to do this you have to balance 3 elements, lighting, Co2 and fertilisers. When you inject Co2 you need to increase your lighting and increase your fertilisers with the goal of making your plants photosynthesise faster. But this can also just make your algae worse. Interestingly BBA and Staghorn are pretty common in Co2 tanks and often come in areas of high flow and high Co2, so if you get your outlet pipes angled wrong it will grow.

Co2 can be great - though with plenty of risks for example overdosing can kill your fish very quickly and you will be handling pressurised containers and have one sat in your home. Though there are plenty of ways of doing it safely you just have to be careful.

In terms of the Polyglutaraldehyde - I wouldnt recommend it, if you google it or particularly the name without the poly bit it, its used for sterilising lab equipment. In aquarium use the plan is to basically act as a toxin in a low dose to kill off single cell organisms and the effect to fish and plants is not plainly explained anywhere but my imagination runs a bit...

How bad is the algae, what is it on and what is your set up like - eg which fertilisers were you using, what kind of light and how longs its on? How dense is your planting and what kind of plants do you have already? Pics of the tank might help too

Wills

Click to expand...

This time is the 3rd time we've had BBA, previously we just did a deep clean and dipped ornaments and plants in hydro peroxide. It was spreading like wildfire. This time, it was spreading very slow, barely at all, and it was sticking only to one plant. An anubias nana (I think, looks like it, came stuck to half a coconut shell ages ago and I didn't buy it so not sure). I took it out two days ago and dipped in hydroperoxide dilution, so you can't see the algae right now.

Lights: I was told my lights are too bright, which aids the algae, so I got duckweek. Since I still had the algae, I reduced lights to 6 hours max. Before, we'd keep it on morning - night, about 12 hours. Evening time we enjoy watching the aquarium, but now I turn it off around 6pm. I turn it on early, because I have to feed the fry first thing in the morning.

Main plant I have which was 1 out of 5 which survived and spread is: Hygrophila Polysmerma, as you can see it is mostly yellow as it grows taller. I don't fertilize anymore as I felt it was just creating more algae and the plants weren't improving. It is covered with a combination of indian almond leaves' residue which passes around the tank and attaches itself, and traces of black beard algae. There's a bit of BBA on the live rock also. Other than that, it's not spreading.

Most recently, Nymphaea Rubra Red Tiger Zenkeri Lotus was introduced as a bulb and has taken off also.

The article I read : https/fishlab.com/black-beard-algae/#:~:text=Nope, black algae is not,in the long flowing hairs

Suggests increasing Co2 with Seachem flourish excel, and I considered this a good option if it also helps my plants.

I'm very aware using tap water is the cause and is high in phosphates.

I was using the TNC fertilizer and plants were thriving but so was green algae, I then stopped and used a phosphate reduction product called Red Sea algae management, phosphate and nitrate control when we had way too much green algae.
.
I then switched to TNC LITE without nitrate and phosphate

I've never used additional CO2 and it's my first time considering it as I want the plants to be healthy again. But as I can see from reviews, the SEACHEM flourish excel isn't carbon, it becomes carbon slowly, so it should be fine? What do you think?

As for my water flow, I have fluval U3 on low steady flow, sometimes I change to deep flow to move the water deep in the tank, sometimes I switch to the top setting to oxygenate the tank but usually I set it to a low setting, steady setting as I can see it blows the fish around otherwise.

Previously I had the fluval 307 canister filter (when we had MORE black algae the first two times it showed up) so maybe higher flow did increase it. That filter stopped working and I got the Fluval U3 as a temp but works fine so the 307 is in the shed, U3 having lower flow might be helping it not spread then?

Also tried mollies for black algae but then read they need to be very underfed to go for the BBA.

Plants start off healthy and green when young but yellow as they grow taller and snails eat lower leaves . separate issue lol

ALSO: I've started vacuuming the gravel, but I've also wondered, does this take nutrients away from the plant's roots?

Here are photos:






THIS WAS THE BBA BEFORE I dipped the anubias (I think it's anubias) in hydro peroxide. Actually it was worse, two leaves were covered in black so I just cut them off.
Excuse the sick fish, this was a recent issue hence the photo now being sorted. I have no other photos of the BBA so had to use it.

StevenF said:

glutaralehyde is the primary ingredient in liquid CO2 products It is used primarily as a disinfectant and can be toxic to fish and some plants.While plants can use it as a source of carbon it is not really CO2 gas. CO2 doesn't cause or inhibit algae. Most aquarium with CO2 are dosed according to Estimative Index dosing guidelines. And typically these tanks use more fertilizer than needed. Also EI dosing dose not require using CO2. These tanks often have fewer issues with algae.

Polyglutaralehyde is the same except a protean molecule has been attached to it. I don't know how the alteration changes it.

However in my experience using commercial fertilizer making my own fertilizer is that all 14 nutrients plants need must be present or hair and dBBA will take over the tank. If just one is missing or not at a sufficient concentration you are going to have algae issues.

Most fertilizer don't have all 14 nutrients and other use different compound that interact with each other in water that can result in a deficiency. End results that if the chemistry of your water doesn't mach the chemistry of the water used to develop the fertilizer, it may not work in your tank.When all 14 nutrients are pressent plants do great while algae does not. No one knows why.

I would think of Polyglutaralehyde as a bandaid. You should rally focus on figuring out why your fertilizer is not growing. What fertilizer were you using and how much did you dose, how often,and how many gallons in the water in the tank? Also what is the GH, KH, and PH of your tap water?

Click to expand...

90 litre, PH stays at 6.5 -7.5 ish, when i use the almond leaves, it drops, but after water changes it goes up. KH and GH stay at the highest the API test readers. I use tap water. working on getting an RO system to control this it's a financial restriction atm. Where can I find info on the 14 nutrients required and can you suggest a fertilizer please?

Divinityinlove said:

I then switched to TNC LITE without nitrate and phosphate

Click to expand...

Fertilizers fail for 3 basic reasons.

1. The concentration of nutrients is not consistent with what plants need. TNC is on of only 2 fertilizers I now of that try together the ballance right. I would grade it a A and from what I know TNC is the better choice.
2. Not all 14 nutrients are in the bottle. TNC doesn't list Calcium, sulfur, chlorine, and nickel. Compared to other fertilizers this is also quite good. I would grade it a B. But most tap water contains chlorine and calcium. Nickel and Chlorine is not likely an issue.
3. The ingredients in the bottle react with each other or react with the KH in your water. in the water. Unfortunately there is no information on line listing TNC ingredients. Does the bottle list ingredients like copper sulfate, ninc sulfate, iron gluconate?

TNC Is not available in the US so I have never tried it. But overall it is better than most. If you could provide an ingredient list it would be helpful.

You list your location as London. I have heard that Londan water is high in nitrate and phosphate is that correct? Could you please list the the tank volume and how much fertilizer you dose and how often? And how often do you do a water change and how much water do you replace?.

My guess is that it is a sulfate fertilizer. If that is the case you might have to add fertilizer once a day or so. To counter act the reaction with KH that converts the soluble ingredients in the fertilizer from soluble to insoluble. Plants cannot use insoluble fertilizer ingredients.

Divinityinlove said:

Plants start off healthy and green when young but yellow as they grow taller and snails eat lower leaves . separate issue lol

Click to expand...

Actually that Is Not a Separate Issue. Some nutrients in plants are mobil meaning a plant can strip a nutrient from an old leaf to support new growth. This could indicate a deficiency of Nitrogen, phosphate, Magnesium, chlorine, and Molybdenum. Yellow leaves is typically a indication of a nitrogen. deficiency but If your water is high in nitrate that cannot be the the problem. Visually you have a nutrient deficiency but I am not sure which one.

For ingredients I purchased Manganese sulfate, boric acid, Zinc sulfate, Copper sulfate, From LoudWolf.com (a great source of chemicals in small quantities). But I don't know if they ship to London. I also purchased Iron DTPA and Sodium Molybdate from Amazon.com to make a micro fertilizer. I also had some macros that you probably don't need. I then had to use a nutrient calculator to figure out how many milligrams to add of each. But I don't think we should focus on making your own yet. It is not exactly simple.

Divinityinlove said:

90 litre, PH stays at 6.5 -7.5 ish, when i use the almond leaves, it drops, but after water changes it goes up. KH and GH stay at the highest the API test readers

Click to expand...

Almond leaves release organic acids into the water that can react with KH converting it to GH and reduce the PH. But the plants and bacteria can destry the acids and bring the KH back. It is a temporary fix at best.

StevenF said:

Fertilizers fail for 3 basic reasons.

1. The concentration of nutrients is not consistent with what plants need. TNC is on of only 2 fertilizers I now of that try together the ballance right. I would grade it a A and from what I know TNC is the better choice.
2. Not all 14 nutrients are in the bottle. TNC doesn't list Calcium, sulfur, chlorine, and nickel. Compared to other fertilizers this is also quite good. I would grade it a B. But most tap water contains chlorine and calcium. Nickel and Chlorine is not likely an issue.
3. The ingredients in the bottle react with each other or react with the KH in your water. in the water. Unfortunately there is no information on line listing TNC ingredients. Does the bottle list ingredients like copper sulfate, ninc sulfate, iron gluconate?

TNC Is not available in the US so I have never tried it. But overall it is better than most. If you could provide an ingredient list it would be helpful.

You list your location as London. I have heard that Londan water is high in nitrate and phosphate is that correct? Could you please list the the tank volume and how much fertilizer you dose and how often? And how often do you do a water change and how much water do you replace?.

My guess is that it is a sulfate fertilizer. If that is the case you might have to add fertilizer once a day or so. To counter act the reaction with KH that converts the soluble ingredients in the fertilizer from soluble to insoluble. Plants cannot use insoluble fertilizer ingredients.




Actually that Is Not a Separate Issue. Some nutrients in plants are mobil meaning a plant can strip a nutrient from an old leaf to support new growth. This could indicate a deficiency of Nitrogen, phosphate, Magnesium, chlorine, and Molybdenum. Yellow leaves is typically a indication of a nitrogen. deficiency but If your water is high in nitrate that cannot be the the problem. Visually you have a nutrient deficiency but I am not sure which one.

For ingredients I purchased Manganese sulfate, boric acid, Zinc sulfate, Copper sulfate, From LoudWolf.com (a great source of chemicals in small quantities). But I don't know if they ship to London. I also purchased Iron DTPA and Sodium Molybdate from Amazon.com to make a micro fertilizer. I also had some macros that you probably don't need. I then had to use a nutrient calculator to figure out how many milligrams to add of each. But I don't think we should focus on making your own yet. It is not exactly simple.


Almond leaves release organic acids into the water that can react with KH converting it to GH and reduce the PH. But the plants and bacteria can destry the acids and bring the KH back. It is a temporary fix at best.

Click to expand...

Someone mentioned water

StevenF said:

Fertilizers fail for 3 basic reasons.

1. The concentration of nutrients is not consistent with what plants need. TNC is on of only 2 fertilizers I now of that try together the ballance right. I would grade it a A and from what I know TNC is the better choice.
2. Not all 14 nutrients are in the bottle. TNC doesn't list Calcium, sulfur, chlorine, and nickel. Compared to other fertilizers this is also quite good. I would grade it a B. But most tap water contains chlorine and calcium. Nickel and Chlorine is not likely an issue.
3. The ingredients in the bottle react with each other or react with the KH in your water. in the water. Unfortunately there is no information on line listing TNC ingredients. Does the bottle list ingredients like copper sulfate, ninc sulfate, iron gluconate?

TNC Is not available in the US so I have never tried it. But overall it is better than most. If you could provide an ingredient list it would be helpful.

You list your location as London. I have heard that Londan water is high in nitrate and phosphate is that correct? Could you please list the the tank volume and how much fertilizer you dose and how often? And how often do you do a water change and how much water do you replace?.

My guess is that it is a sulfate fertilizer. If that is the case you might have to add fertilizer once a day or so. To counter act the reaction with KH that converts the soluble ingredients in the fertilizer from soluble to insoluble. Plants cannot use insoluble fertilizer ingredients.




Actually that Is Not a Separate Issue. Some nutrients in plants are mobil meaning a plant can strip a nutrient from an old leaf to support new growth. This could indicate a deficiency of Nitrogen, phosphate, Magnesium, chlorine, and Molybdenum. Yellow leaves is typically a indication of a nitrogen. deficiency but If your water is high in nitrate that cannot be the the problem. Visually you have a nutrient deficiency but I am not sure which one.

For ingredients I purchased Manganese sulfate, boric acid, Zinc sulfate, Copper sulfate, From LoudWolf.com (a great source of chemicals in small quantities). But I don't know if they ship to London. I also purchased Iron DTPA and Sodium Molybdate from Amazon.com to make a micro fertilizer. I also had some macros that you probably don't need. I then had to use a nutrient calculator to figure out how many milligrams to add of each. But I don't think we should focus on making your own yet. It is not exactly simple.


Almond leaves release organic acids into the water that can react with KH converting it to GH and reduce the PH. But the plants and bacteria can destry the acids and bring the KH back. It is a temporary fix at best.

Click to expand...

These are the ingredients:

Overall this is alooot of information which will take me quite some time to research and understand. But, mainly 14 nutrients are required? You substitute individual nutrients, because there exists no such complete fertilizer to make our lives simple right? So I need to figure out what my plants are missing and substitute with the fertilizer I have plus others either as a combination product or individual nutrients via correct calculations.

Is there test kits for which nutrients are in the tank or is it trial and error then guessing based on results?

Divinityinlove said:

Overall this is alooot of information which will take me quite some time to research and understand. But, mainly 14 nutrients are required? You substitute individual nutrients, because there exists no such complete fertilizer to make our lives simple right? So I need to figure out what my plants are missing and substitute with the fertilizer I have plus others either as a combination product or individual nutrients via correct calculations.

Is there test kits for which nutrients are in the tank or is it trial and error then guessing based on results?

Click to expand...

I’m not aware for all of the nutrients apart from a lab test but jbl does a pro test kit (link below) that covers a few of them

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07QNYNS7T/?tag=

As you can see though, very pricy

I think in a lot of cases the build up this stuff is slow and when a change is made to the water conditions, albeit unknowingly, the reaction time to show any improvement is also long.
I had/have it on Amazon Sword. I killed it with a quick bleaching. The sword is magnificent again, however I notice that there's some BBA showing on the tips of a Java Fern now.
All the other plants seem fine. There's none growing on any tank bits and pieces either. I'm guessing that the affected plants are those which need better mineral makeup of the water.
Anyway, best thing is to bleach it off for now to prevent spread, then keep a close eye on how the tank goes from then.
I don't know if my assumption is correct about the use of UV light to kill spores but I think I've heard as much.

Divinityinlove said:

These are the ingredients:

Click to expand...

unfortunately that is just the % for the nutrients. This can be used to calculate the amount of in a given amount from the bottle. Most bottle have this. for a sulfate fertilizer the ingreient list would look something like this.
Iron DTPA
Manganese sulfate
boric acid
Zinc sulfate
copper sulfate
sodium molybdate
nickel sulfate.

For another fertilizer called CSM+B the ingredients are
iron EDTA
Manganeses EDTA
Boric acid
zinc EDTA
Copper
Molybdenum EDTA

TNC doses list EDTA on the bottle but that could be fore one nutrient or all of them.

Divinityinlove said:

You substitute individual nutrients, because there exists no such complete fertilizer to make our lives simple right? So I need to figure out what my plants are missing and substitute with the fertilizer I have plus others either as a combination product or individual nutrients via correct calculations.

Click to expand...

Sadly yes. In my particular case i started with Flourish comprehensive then would have a problem and identify it and then would go out an buy a bottle of that nutrient to correct Eventually I was using Flourish comprehensive, Flourish nitrogen, Flourish phosphate, a GH booster and flourish iron. and even then I still have problems. Tried several other fertilizers and still had problems. So at that point I decided to make my own. It took a lot of time to get to were I am now and I am still learning.

Another solution people have used is to dose more frequently. if the problem is one or more nutrients not lasting long in the water then daily or every other day dosing may help you.

As to test kits many micro or trace nutrients are used at such low levels that conventional color charts don't work well. One test I used for a time was was an ICP OES lab test. yOu mail off a sample of your tank water and in about a week you get the results. It checks the following nutrients: Potassium, calcium, magnesium, phosphorous, sulfur, chlorine, Iron,, boron, Zinc, Copper, Molybdenum, and Nickel down to about 1 part per billion concentration. IT can be helpful and misleading. it cannot tell the difference between an soluble nutrient and n insoluble particle. Plants can only use soluble nutrients.. Some tanks have a lot of iron but much of it may be insoluble

The link is for the US company I used. This test is becoming popular for salt water aquarium. Triton labs is a European company that does this for salt water. The test equipment doesn't care if it is salt water of fresh water but their software might say everything as bad because it doesn't match their saltwater database.

I can't say for sure without a lab test, however jbl makes a pro test kit (see below) that checks for many of the nutrients.