Hairy Algae

[dane261]

whats best to get rid of this stuff as its starting to make me go grey with stress trying to get rid of it


cheers dane

 

[GuppyDude]

How big is your tank, how bad is it?

I usually try to avoid chemical treatments if possible, but if your tank is completely overgrown with the stuff i suppose it'd have to be considered. You may want to try to find out some information on hair algae, see what makes it grow and cut off it's food source perhaps.

And also, what kind of fish are currently in the tank?

 

[pedal]

whats best to get rid of this stuff as its starting to make me go grey with stress trying to get rid of it


cheers dane

Hi Mate

Just been though it all myself.

no.1 stop playing gardening in the tank.. (thats what caused mine)

no.2 reduce your lighting duration ( i dropped mine from 16hrs! too 7hrs)

no.3 grab yourself a nice 500ml bottle of flourish excel.

i was doing 20mls (its advised to do between 2 or 3 times the normal dose) in a 45gal tank every day, took around 4 days for it turn the algae red (thats means its dieing)

i kept doing the excel for another 4/5 days.. and its all gone now (by product is my tank looks like a jungle)

i did loose one fish, but i doubt its related to the excel.

 

[JEC96]

Florida Flag Fish love hair algae. You may want to pick up a few to see if they can keep it down. I have 3 in my tank, and they keep things pretty clean.

 

[Arfie]

I had it for over a year in one of my tanks, 6 amaono shrimp polished it off in 3 days B)

Arfie

 

[Musho3210]

I followed the bottles instructions of fluorish excel and it killed ALL my hair algae in 1 day. The bottle says after a big water change (40%+) put in 4x the recommended amount. So i did a 50% water change, put in 4 capfuls of the 2 liter bottle in a 75 gallon planted tank, next day all algae was gone, all fish were perfectly fine, hair algae never came back. But i also did other things like balance the nutrition (i didnt take any out, i just added more of the other stuff), clean filter etc.

 

[afishdude]

Florida Flag Fish love hair algae. You may want to pick up a few to see if they can keep it down. I have 3 in my tank, and they keep things pretty clean.

those are american flag fish, they are a cichlid and are very agressive. i had two once and they killed everything in my tank.

 

[Musho3210]

adding life to the tank is not always the best way to go.... But sometimes it is i guess lol.

 

[Robotochan]

My Mollies love eating the hair algae off my filter and the Vallis

 

[Ilya]

Ghost shrimp.

 

[Musho3210]

none of my ghosts have ever considered having hair algae.... Maybe im just unlucky?

 

[JEC96]

Florida Flag Fish love hair algae. You may want to pick up a few to see if they can keep it down. I have 3 in my tank, and they keep things pretty clean.

those are american flag fish, they are a cichlid and are very agressive. i had two once and they killed everything in my tank.

I've had mine for 4 months in a 75 gallon community tank (tiger barbs, bolivian rams, gold barbs, and a few others) with no aggression at all. The ones I am talking about are a killifish (Jordanella floridae).

 

[afishdude]

yea same ones, i had a male and a female.
you have all hardy fast moving fish that a flag fish could never catch. i had guppis, platys, and angelfish.

 

[Ilya]

I have an algae problem. And I'm highly contemplating on buying a algae busting force.

1 good sized pleco to suck up all of the water .
A small army of snails (2 mystery, and a whole bunch of pond snails).
Some Cories to peck my substrate.
And Ghost Shrimp to get everything in between.

I've got half of what I want completed 8).

 

[Musho3210]

some things about your cleanup crew...

A good size pleco may (depending on species) cause more algae growth by raising DOC levels, they poop a lot as im sure you know.
Careful with pond snails and plants. Snails are great algae eaters but they reproduce fast and you may have another problem on hand.
Cories dont eat algae, but they are cool fish and do eat leftovers (you still have to feed them purposely as well)
Ghost shrimp do the same thing cories do.


I would get a pleco, but not a good sized one, if you have a 30 gallon + tank a bristlenose one is perfect. They get to about 5-6" (algae and maybe leftovers)
Snails, well they reproduce a lot but you can make friends with them, until you try to kill them lol. (leftovers and algae eater) Try em out, i love my MTS
Cories, go for them (leftover eaters)
Dont get ghost shrimp, get amano shrimp instead (Algae and leftovers)