How To Grow Algae?

[rebrn]

I know this is a strange question, most are asking how to get rid of it. Here is the situation, I have a rather large algae problem in 2 of my tanks and a minor one on the large 55 gallon. At any rate, I purchased some Nerite snails as I just couldn't keep up with the algae in the 12 and 5 gallon tanks, the snails are doing a great job in those two tanks. Now the 55 gallon had some algae but not a ton, I bought 10 snails total (had to buy in groups of 10), 3 in the 12 gallon - the worst of all the tanks, 1 in the 5 gallon with the Betta and the rest in the 55, so 6 snails in there. The 6 snails in the 55 gallon did such a great job that I really don't see anymore algae and I am afraid they will starve. I do have algae wafers that I have put in there and the snails do eat them, however, the cherry barbs seem to eat the wafers much faster and by the time the snails get there they are almost gone. So I figured the best option is to try to get some of the algae back into the 55 gallon, but not sure what is the best way to do this. I have some plants (artificial) in the 5 and 12 gallon that are covered in algae so I thought about cleaning them off in the 55 gallon to "seed" some algae, but wasn't sure how safe this would be or if it would even work. I don't appear to have any water problems or illness in the 12 nor the 5 gallon, however, my one pearl gourmai (female) is currently in isolation for what I think is an internal bacterial infection (she swims funny) the rest of the fish in the 55 are fine, but I don't want to risk cross contamination from the 55 to the other tanks. I have not prophetically treated the 55 gallon as of yet as none of the other fish appear to be ill. Any suggestions to try to re-grow some algae in the 55 would be great.

Thanks

FYI all artificial plants. I also keep the lights on in the 55 gallon for a min of 8 hours (no more than 10) hoping that will help to regrow algae.

Edit: Also just out of curiosity, does algae grow more readily in acrylic tanks? The 5 and 12 gallons are acrylic and the 55 is glass, but the acrylic tanks are by far the worst, and prior to the snails I would scrub the walls and decor in the acrylic tanks and before the day was done the algae would be back.

 

[Truck]

Go for 16 hours of light for a few days, along with lots of over feeding and you'll have loads!

 

[rebrn]

Sounds good to me, and my Zebra Danio and Cherry Barbs thank you for that suggestion, they are little piggies.

 

[erk628]

I'd watch the overfeeding it could cause an ammonia spike!

 

[Truck]

I'd watch the overfeeding it could cause an ammonia spike!

Thats the point, for algae to be triggered you need ammonia, anyway there won't be enough to make a considerable affect because the algae will use it as a source of nitrogen.

 

[erk628]

Heres an article about them that gives some food suggestions!

http/www.aquaticcommunity.com/snail/nerite.php

I'd watch the overfeeding it could cause an ammonia spike!

Thats the point, for algae to be triggered you need ammonia, anyway there won't be enough to make a considerable affect because the algae will use it as a source of nitrogen.

Oh I see thanks for the info!

Another thing you could do is get like a one gallon or something small like that just to grow algea in!

 

[rebrn]

Thanks Erk, I read that article and that is why I bought the algae wafers, but the Cherry Barbs love the wafers to and usually get to them before the snails do. I was thinking of filling a gallon container, throwing some fish food in there and putting it in the window and try to grow it that way. It is weird though I don't have any ammonia spikes in any of my tanks but the 2 acrylic tanks the algae just grows and grows (not over feeding eithor). May be those tanks are getting more light some how, I don't know. I would just hate to have the snails in the 55 gallon die because I couldn't get algae to grow

 

[erk628]

I had the same problem on two of my tanks but the other two were always clear of algea. One thing I noticed helps a lot is good water circulation it harder for algea to grow in those conditions. I read a post the other day that OldMan47 wrote talking about creating algea for something that he was using to feed his fish but I can't remember what they were called. He may have some pointers for you. How do you go about cleaning the algea?

 

[rebrn]

That is the weird part though, the 12 gallon tank is the worst of the 3, and it truely has the most water circulation. The 5 gallon gets the least amount of water circulation, only because I have the filter turned down really low for the Betta, I was expecting that tank to be the worst, and it is fairly bad, but not nearly as bad as the 12 gallon. Of course the 55 gallon has the least amount but is middle of the road for water circulation, I mean great circulation, but not as good as the 12 gallon. I don't know it is just weird, I think it might have something to do with the 2 worst tanks being acrylic, I don't know for sure though. It can't be lighting, because they all get roughly the same amount of lighting. I don't know, I am not too worried in the smaller tanks, those seem to have enough algae to keep the snails going, maybe I will have to rotate the snail out, move some from the big tank to the smaller tanks for a while. That seems like a lot of effort though, I will try to grow some first, I have a fairly clear gallon container I can try to grow some see how that goes.

Thanks

 

[Assaye]

Try feeding about an hour after the lights go out. The snails will probably find it and hopefully the other fish will be asleep.

Saves you re-growing the algae if it works!

 

[rebrn]

Try feeding about an hour after the lights go out. The snails will probably find it and hopefully the other fish will be asleep.

Saves you re-growing the algae if it works!

That's not a bad idea, I will have to try that, I will let you know if it worked.

 

[llamalord305]

What it could be, is tiny, tiny, scratches in the acrylic, which provide a little nook and crannie for the algae to live in. Just a hypothesis.

 

[erk628]

What it could be, is tiny, tiny, scratches in the acrylic, which provide a little nook and crannie for the algae to live in. Just a hypothesis.

That very well could be! Like I mentioned above I had this same problem in two tanks but not the other two. With my case I had/have all glass tanks. But this could be the issue with yours!

 

[rebrn]

That would make sense, it always started on the walls of the acrylic tanks, but has now spread to the ornaments and the plants. I was wondering if the sand could also play a role, I have sand in all the tanks, but I did notices a fair amount of algae on the sand, and in the 55 gallon the algae I had started on the sand.

 

[erk628]

That would make sense, it always started on the walls of the acrylic tanks, but has now spread to the ornaments and the plants. I was wondering if the sand could also play a role, I have sand in all the tanks, but I did notices a fair amount of algae on the sand, and in the 55 gallon the algae I had started on the sand.

Hopefully you dont get it on the sand I had tosuck the top layer off to get rid of it. The snails should do teh job though!