Thinking Of Getting Rid Of The Sand

[Tonyb111111]

What I am saying is that changing your substrate will not affect your algae. All algae (bar diatoms in a new setup) is birthed due to a number of contributing factors, a recipe of sorts. If you remove one of these ingredients the algae will die. Nitrates + Phos + Light = Black Algae. Seeing as your lights are on for only 6 hours I'd reduce the nitrate to 0ppm and that will kill the algae. It's the same principle as the fire triangle...

Remove one and there will be no fire. And I suggested you adjust either your light or nitrate because the phos count is usually determined with by the water source/authority and I don't advocate trying to adjust tap water params.

Fully agree with primous. My issue was high phosphate causing stag algae on all my plants, dosed phos control and the algae died off in a week. Plants are still fine but had to snip off badly affected leaves, not because they dying but because the dead algae looked unsightly. My high phosphate was due to my tap water at 5 ppm. Lights are on 12hrs a day, nitrate at 10ppm. It certainly seemed to get worse as the flow decreased, so regular filter cleans is important

 

[Spurry]

Once established the algae can live off algae @0.5ppm so lowering it to the above level will not really help. Could you post pics of the algae just to make sure where talking about a specific algae. The names for one particular algae type tends to vary for forum to forum. For example bba is loosely called black algae elsewhere

Also what is your current stocking?

current stock is:

copper harlequins rasboras x 12
Rummy nose tetras x 8
Bronze corys x 6
And one apistogramma cockatoo

and photo as requested

 

[ian]

Spurry, BBA has nothing to do with high nitrates or phosphates. It is brought about by fluctuations in C02 in the water. Believe it or not but to many water changes doesn't help BBA as the fluctuations are more so. Algae is born not of N03 and P04, it is born of Ammonia and light. In a none planted tank high PO4 and N03 won't help, but i don't think that is your problem. Are you using any Excel or Easycarbo?

http/www.theplantedtank.co.uk/algae.htm

 

[Spurry]

Spurry, BBA has nothing to do with high nitrates or phosphates. It is brought about by fluctuations in C02 in the water. Believe it or not but to many water changes doesn't help BBA as the fluctuations are more so. Algae is born not of N03 and P04, it is born of Ammonia and light. In a none planted tank high PO4 and N03 won't help, but i don't think that is your problem. Are you using any Excel or Easycarbo?

http/www.theplantedtank.co.uk/algae.htm

thanks i normally had my lights on for about 7hrs but at the moment it as low as 4, but the black stuff was there at 7hrs so would that be low or high light tanks??
and am i right with in wanting to increase the flow???

 

[ian]

again, i have had bba in high flow areas, flow doesn't really seem to make a difference to this type of algae. Are you using the T5's in your 180?? I presume thats where you have the BBA? Are you dosing any easycarbo or excel? The ways i have ridded of this algae is, take water changes down, or do water changes after lights out, this way the C02 in the water can 'gas off' before lights come on. You can also start to dose some liquid carbon, as the T5's in the Juwel are quite high lighting. Adding the carbon, will give your plants a head start. You will need to manually remove most of the BBA though.

 

[Tonyb111111]

Spurry, BBA has nothing to do with high nitrates or phosphates. It is brought about by fluctuations in C02 in the water. Believe it or not but to many water changes doesn't help BBA as the fluctuations are more so. Algae is born not of N03 and P04, it is born of Ammonia and light. In a none planted tank high PO4 and N03 won't help, but i don't think that is your problem. Are you using any Excel or Easycarbo?

http/www.theplante...co.uk/algae.htm

Hi Ianho, mine was definitely stag algae not BBA, and all I can say is the only change I made was to reduce the PO4 and it died. Having said that, it am now getting an algae growth on the glass and some leaves. So don't know how to combat that, all parameters are, I think, ideal. So at a loss what to next, any suggestions

 

[ian]

Green spot algae (on the glass) is also atributed to low P04, again it can be remedies by upping P04. I'm looking at things from a planted tank keepers point of view. We tend to add PO4 and N03 to our tank to keep the plants healthy. I wouldn't advocate people adding P04 or N03 to tanks without plants. How did you reduce the P04 Tony? are you using any C02?

 

[Spurry]

no my rio is a older one with T8
yes its the 180
yes that's where the BBA is
im not using any easycarbo or excel
when the BBA started i was ill and only water changing 10/20% every 4/6 weeks
its not growing where the plants have a flow
its only growing on my still anubias plants

will look in to the carbon or excel

 

[Tonyb111111]

Green spot algae (on the glass) is also atributed to low P04, again it can be remedies by upping P04. I'm looking at things from a planted tank keepers point of view. We tend to add PO4 and N03 to our tank to keep the plants healthy. I wouldn't advocate people adding P04 or N03 to tanks without plants. How did you reduce the P04 Tony? are you using any C02?

This is the big question, should I be using CO2? Currently adding daily flourish excel and weekly liquid fert (easylife provito),reasonable level of planting and twin reflected T5's. The PO4 was reduced with an expensive new product with a crap name 'Sparkle', which I am led to believe is used by Sea Life centres??

 

[ian]

@ Spurry, you could up the flow in that area, to see what happens, but i don't know whether it would make a difference. I would probably up the water changes a little.

@ Tony, what is the wattage of the T5's? When you dose liquid carbo you are starting to edge towards a high tech tank. You really should think about starting to dose some macro ferts, like Tropica plant nutrition +. This contains N03 and P04. Because light drives plant growth, and the you are adding the carbon, you should really think about n and p as these are the next in line of what plants need.

this guide is the bible of algae growth, it's used the world over by planted tank keepers. George Farmer uses it as a guide when writing for PFK

http/www.theplantedtank.co.uk/algae.htm

although it is aimed at high tech planted tanks, it can be adapted. You'll see most algaes with thrive in a low nutrients environment. Low C02 will also be one of the main attributes.

 

[Tonyb111111]

@ Spurry, you could up the flow in that area, to see what happens, but i don't know whether it would make a difference. I would probably up the water changes a little.

@ Tony, what is the wattage of the T5's? When you dose liquid carbo you are starting to edge towards a high tech tank. You really should think about starting to dose some macro ferts, like Tropica plant nutrition +. This contains N03 and P04. Because light drives plant growth, and the you are adding the carbon, you should really think about n and p as these are the next in line of what plants need.

this guide is the bible of algae growth, it's used the world over by planted tank keepers. George Farmer uses it as a guide when writing for PFK

http/www.theplante...co.uk/algae.htm

although it is aimed at high tech planted tanks, it can be adapted. You'll see most algaes with thrive in a low nutrients environment. Low C02 will also be one of the main attributes.

Total of 78 watts which if I'm right is 1.77 watts per uk gal, and i've been told that because they are T5's it affectively higher. So with my current set up do you think I should go for CO2 and a different fert, or change something else?

 

[ian]

T5 lighting has a better PAR measure, so it tends to go further than the old T8 lighting. Then there's T5HO, these are high output bulbs, these are very strong bulbs. It's up to you how far you want to take your tank, but i would use some kind of carbon addition in you tank, whether it be Excel or pressurised. I would also start to use some macro ferts like TPN+

http/www.birstall.co.uk/products/tropica_plantnutrition_plusliquid.html

I see you're near me as well. If you are shopping in Lincoln theres the Aquarium shop who sells Excell and TPN+.

 

[Tonyb111111]

T5 lighting has a better PAR measure, so it tends to go further than the old T8 lighting. Then there's T5HO, these are high output bulbs, these are very strong bulbs. It's up to you how far you want to take your tank, but i would use some kind of carbon addition in you tank, whether it be Excel or pressurised. I would also start to use some macro ferts like TPN+

http/www.birstall....plusliquid.html

I see you're near me as well. If you are shopping in Lincoln theres the Aquarium shop who sells Excell and TPN+.

Cheers for this, this is the fert I'm currently using, no Phosphate or nitrate. So if I change this to the one suggest, leave my lights at 12 hrs per day and carry on wil Excell will I avoid the need for CO2?

 

[ian]

12 hours is a little excessive for a planted tank. Eight hours tends to be the standard for a planted tank. There really isn't any need for more hours of lighting. If that was my tank, i'd drop the photo period to 8 hours, carry on with the daily excel, and dose probably around 7mls of TPN+ a day. There is a cheaper way around dosing ferts, but i would always advise to dose the all in ones first and maybe think about making your own later down the line, if you feel up to it.
from the same website.
http/www.theplantedtank.co.uk/allinone.htm

 

[Tonyb111111]

12 hours is a little excessive for a planted tank. Eight hours tends to be the standard for a planted tank. There really isn't any need for more hours of lighting. If that was my tank, i'd drop the photo period to 8 hours, carry on with the daily excel, and dose probably around 7mls of TPN+ a day. There is a cheaper way around dosing ferts, but i would always advise to dose the all in ones first and maybe think about making your own later down the line, if you feel up to it.
from the same website.
http/www.theplante...uk/allinone.htm

Thanks for the advice, will take it down to 10 initially then 8 if no algae improvement. I'll also get some TPN+ and try that