Balancing a Planted tank

I do gravel vacs more frequently now since I pulled 70% of my repens carpet . I did however notice the BBA in the early stages ,must have come in on a plant .

 

@rsa this is really interesting, I wouldn't of thought excel would of had such a huge effect to the overall tank with only 5ml daily dosing, please keep us updated on the long term outcome of the bba, hopefully you have gotten rid of it, this could be a great solution for people who have chronic bba.

 

My 2c,

As much as this solution works its a band aid for the issue at hand.
Cause and effect; You're preventing the effect without curing the cause.

Cause: irregular Co2 Effect: causes PH swings which in turn causes nutrient lock on plants (Excessive nutrient buildup especially on macro's).
- PH will swing at night regardless of Co2 on or off due to no photosynthesis happening when the lights are off.
Cause: Light Effect: We don't need an excess of light, if we have a nutrient excess then any light amount will aid in algae bloom.
Possible Cause: Irregular temps Effect: causes PH swings which in turn causes nutrient lockup on plants (Excessive nutrient buildup especially on macro's).

Things to do:
1. You have a build up of nutrient so i would stop dosing nutrients.
2. Monitor your PH in the morning, afternoon, eve when you stop dosing and then mid way between Co2 off and on. You can start auto dosing an alkaline buffer slowly an hour after you start noticing the evening PH drops. Follow dosages.
3. Le Châtelier's Principle - Cool your water down by a degree or 2 while the Co2 is off, this wont make a huge difference but will slow down the PH drop. Turn heaters off and monitor temps to get an estimate on how long the heater needs to be off.

light blackouts, interval lighting (On/off multiple times a day) or dropping light power excessively wont do much as algae is a simple structure and needs far less PPFD/Par than a complex structure like a aquatic plant; Your plants will die before the algae does and will only cause more matter build up. However slightly dimming the light will help the plants recover from nutrient lockup.

 

you make some really good points, but how do you determine the levels of nutrients in your tank currently ? i cant seem to find test kits for nutrient levels, or do you go by feel and observation on what going on in tank?

 

Valid points @sub-lime . However the BBA was brought into the tank by a plant . And I found it difficult to completely eradicate it with spot dosing. There will always be some left. I disagree it’s a band aid fix . By dosing excel for a protracted period I feel the bba is being totally eradicated in all areas of the tank .

 

You use a TDS or EC meter if you want to measure all salts, since micro's will never make up a huge amount of salts in your tank you will get a good idea of what NPK is doing. If you look at the makeup of the ferts you're feeding or substrate you will be able to make a fairly good estimate as to what the NPK is.

or use the follwing test kits: nitrate (NO3), phosphate (PO4), Potassium (K). They are all available.

 

Stop the dosing and see if it comes back?
Algae spores are introduced into tanks many ways and generally are present anyway, its how you maintain the tank the stops those spores from flourishing.

I'm not going to try convince you that you're doing anything wrong or right, this is simply my 2c

 

Nirvashen sent me here for some input - I'm glad he did, this has been fascinating to read.

As I see it, there are two questions here.

1. Is nutrient management the way to an algae free aquarium?
2. How do we monitor nutrients in the water?

And here I have to admit, I can't be much concrete help. I'm really not a high tech person. I run my tank mostly according to Walstad (with dirt I literally dug up from a suitable bed in my own garden), and have a flourishing algae wall (tufts of black beard algae and a layer of green algae) on the back of my aquarium that generally keeps the algae happy back there, and not in my viewing room. I guess I keep algae like a background plant?

I think we overcomplicate things a lot by trying to micromanage it (though this may well be at the very heart of a high tech planted tank, my brain supplies, as it conjures up images of a dedicated keeper snipping off individual glosso leaves for a perfect carpet) - algae needs the same things as plants, though at different amounts and time periods.

If your algae is outcompeting your plants, you need to do more of what plants like, and less of what algae likes - this we all know. Is that what we're talking about when we say "nutrient management"? What does that mean? Which nutrients? NO3? Phosphorus - which is pretty darn important? Carbon? Silica? Trace elements? Magnesium? And in which forms - bound up in salts, in ionic form in the water, and with which supportive bacterial colonies?

Tests exist for many of these individual elements, but to make that useful, you'd need a sense of how it fits into the overall system of your aquarium, the needs of your herbacious denizens, and the wants of our common enemy - algae. I know too little to assist. I remember Walstad addressing this, and addressing how much of this relates to soil content, and the ability of soil to both supply, and bind various types of nutrients in various ways. I've never memorised it, and most high-tech folks seem to find that a series of trial and error adjustments sorts their problems out over time (at least, if my friends' chatter is any indication), without direct and careful monitoring of each individual (potential) nutrient. See the above "dose excel for a time and see" as another reference.

But in a "know thy enemy" kind of way, algae is fascinating, and we get several types that us fishkeepers tend to lump - maybe it will help being more specific about the problems we have - I don't have encyclopaedic knowledge, there is more algae species in the world than anyone can reasonably make sense of, but we do tend to see a specific bunch in our aquariums, and I can definitely give a brief overview of them here.

The first two types are not really traditional algae - the first being diatoms, or brown algae.

Diatoms (Phaeophyceae, several species exist) is a single celled organism that feeds on nitrates, phosphates, and requires silica to live. That last one makes it extremely common in new aquariums, as it's often with fresh sand that you get an abundance of silica also. Over time this gets used up and diatoms reduce in number - diatoms are often a self limiting problem.

It's easy to wipe, which is its best feature. Some snails do eat it, though generally not at a fast enough rate to truly be a management solution. If can also be managed by increasing light, which encourages green algae to grow - green algae easily outcompetes diatoms. ...I acknowledge that that may not have solved anything

9/10. Diatoms are a good boy (for an algae). They come, they make everything their favourite colour - brown - and they leave once they've had their fun. If I could choose my algae problem, this would be my choice.

Next up we have Cyanobacteria.

Blue green algae (cyanobacteria spp) is likely an example of the oldest life forms on earth. They make an incredible amount of the oxygen we breathe, also. Like diatoms, they're not a true algae, rather, they're a type of photosynthesizing bacteria. They flourish where there is a lot of phosphates and a lot of light, but not very much water movement and not very much oxygen - though even a little light is enough as long as there is food. They can completely take over an aquarium, and can kill your fish (reducing already low dissolved oxygen levels even more, and perhaps even by poisoning them). Since they are ever present, this can be a true pain in the bum to get rid of.

It seems easy to remove, since it lifts off in big, sickly-sweet smelling sheets... but every little bit that breaks off is a great start for the next sheet. It can reproduce at the speed of bacteria, doubling in size within days. Many types, especially the bright blue-green sheets we see in the aquarium, are cytotoxic, and have killed unfortunate dogs and small children. Don't eat it and wash your hands - this is not spirulina (though that is also a cyanobacterium!). It's also manageable, very susceptible to anti-biotics that treats gram negative bacteria, erythromycin being very commonly used (though, if used incorrectly, can create a resistant strain, leaving you with a much bigger problem than before, so please use anti-biotics for a full course, and don't just chuck some chemiclean in there, which denies even having antibiotics in it). You can starve it, by getting a phosphate remover for your filtration system, or by blocking off all light for a week - neither great options for planted tanks. You should absolutely increase water movement and aeration if this is your problem.

0/10. A crappy problem to have. If this were me, I'd do a double whammy - clean the aquarium of as much of the crap as I can manage, dose antibiotics, and increase water movement/aeration. If you don't clean out the sheets, but do dose antibiotics, the mass death can make an aquarium inhospitable to aquatic life, so be aware, increase especially aeration.

Ah, now we get into the "real" algaes.

Let's start with that most exotic member, staghorn algae (compsopogon spp)! It's grey, it's filamentous... it's your great aunt's feather boa from 50 years ago. Oh how it moved when she danced... oh how tragic it looks now, in the back corner of your cupboard. I'm being silly...
It looks like a tangled mess of greyish hair, or, if you look closely, like a deer antler. Fish and shrimp enjoy swimming through its spindly lengths, if you leave it be. Your plants aren't as much of a fan, though. It can smother them.

It's hard to wipe (not as hard as some others, but definitely more attached than our bacterial friends above). It's not very pretty. Nothing eats it (though most algae eaters will give it a delicate little nibble from time to time). It very often flourishes in a context where plants don't have enough of a source of carbon, but it isn't typically in the environment like many other species of algae - it is introduced, so dipping new plants in a peroxide solution is a lovely preventative method. Increasing available carbon (either via increased CO2 or by dosing excel) will also in short order sort out staghorn algae.

7/10. Cool algae, weird looking, and easy to manage. A pretty neat one to photograph as it dies in your expert fishkeeping hands.

Onwards to hair algae (Oedogonium - various species). You know that green stuff in the botanical gardens' pond? That's this, though in the aquarium, it's more typically a green peach fuzz that grows on surfaces. It's actually quite cute looking, if it would just behave itself. Hair algae is a clear sign of high nitrates and high phosphates (almost always overfeeding, this combo). If this appears before your plants have had time to get going, it's likely going to be self limiting as well, once your stems find their happy place they generally outcompete this (dosing more carbon in whatever your preferred form can help plants get going, which will then use up the nutrients, thus making more CO2 or dosing excel a potential solution here too).

How to manage it? It can be scrubbed off, it's not an easy scrub, but there are harder scrubs. Shrimp love it, mbuna chow it, rainbow cichlids rasp away, bristlenoses chomp it, SAEs slurp it up, otos go OMNOMNOM, nerites eat it, apple snails eat it ... if it grew any slower, it would never manage to grow anywhere. But it can and does grow way fast. If this is a problem, you need to look at your feeding schedule. It's also well worth figuring out your photoperiod - it may be too long, too short, too bright... I just don't know enough about your plants and their needs to give a definitive solution.

6/10. Can be pain, it's redeemable that it's also food for so many things.

Now we have everyone's friend, green spot algae (algaes likely from the genus coleochaete). I'm being sarcastic, of course. This bugger is a bitch to scrub, and just loves growing right where you want to take a picture of your fish. Green spot is flat and hard, and not fuzzy at all. It is environmental, in other words, you have it already, even if it's well controlled or basically unable to grow in your aquarium at all. This is also the sun lover of the algaes, absolutely flourishing when there is bright light... especially if that light spectrum is heavy on the green (as many cheap "daylight" bulbs, or older once-quality bulbs, are). Interestingly, green spot algae prefers environments with very low, or no, phosphates in them.

Brightly lit, low-stock, very lightly fed aquariums can run into this problem. The trouble with this guy is that once you have a spot, you can prevent growth by sorting out your light and your available phosphates, but that spot can stubbornly stay alive without really growing pretty much forever. Nerites eat it, but the best control method here is Mr. Scrubby.

4/10. Pain in the bum. Not the worst pain in the bum, to be fair. Insisting on photobombing every pic costs it heavily here.

Like green spot, but easily "rubbable" is green dust algae. It loves your front glass. Loves it. But it also looks really great on rocks. Really brings in that "oh so natural" look. We don't really know what causes it, likely because there are many different types with likely different specific needs. It's likely that this is environmental.

It's highly wipeable. A UV steriliser can (likely) help avoid an outbreak in the first place. It responds really well to a photoperiod with a break in the middle (by which I mean it dies rapidly). There are also many weird tales about how to fix it - one is that you should let it grow for four weeks, take over everything, then wipe it and it will be gone at the end - if this is true, it speaks to a similar nutrient dependency as diatoms and silica. Bristlenoses love eating this stuff. It may or may not like nitrates, but it's easily outcompeted by other algae types, so, yeah.

10/10. The platonic ideal of algae. I still prefer diatoms, since they just bugger off without you doing much, but this won't kill your plants, can look awesome if deliberately encouraged on some rocks, feed your algae eaters, and while it can be unsightly, is not a terrible curse, over all.

Blanket weed (cladophora or spirogyra) is up next. Hair algae on steriods, with an odour to match. Very swamp-du cologne. This doesn't keep to surfaces (though it can and does attach to stuff), but in stead very happily lives in the water column floating along. It's a feisty wad of matted mermaid hair that needs to be introduced to an aquarium (hello preventative peroxide dip, how have you been?). Once it's in, if conditions are favourable, it grows quickly and can smother plants. The thing is, favourable conditions for blanket weed is also favourable conditions for your plants.

Luckily, like plants, you can rip it up by the handful. And you can spot treat it with peroxide. This is a war, with many battles, once this sets its sights on your aquarium. Luckily, it's also available in well behaved forms ... like marimo moss balls!

3/10. More a pond than an aquarium problem, because of its light needs and that it is rarely introduced, this can be one heck of a fight to resolve. Something for my enemies, I think. Harmless (not to your plants, but ok) and terribly frustrating.

Second to last is green water. Green water is phytoplankton - bright light and nutrient rich water enables the ever present phytoplankton to reproduce and EXPLODE, occasionally turning an aquarium quite green, seemingly over night. Some call this an algae bloom. Some breeders and marine keepers cultivate this (often in a simple bucket in the sunshine) because it can be useful food.

In aquariums, if your water turns green, you have serious maintenance issues. An overabundance of nutrients, in the broadest sense, so much so that it's freely available in your water column, combined with lots of light, gives you green water. Good water change schedules and any kind of light control (as in, don't just leave your expensive LED daylight lights running 24/7 while your feeder continuously dumps in food) keeps this under control. As would a UV steriliser. Or a water polishing pad (ahem... filter floss).

2/10. Not because it's bad for your fish, or your plants, but because you're not doing your maintenance. Bad keeper. Go vacuum your substrate!

Lastly, that darn black beard algae. What is there to say? It's dense, it's dark, it grows in luscious clumps. It's really, really, really hard to scrub off. A piece of wood that you let dry out completely for years, then re-use after a thorough scrub can still host viable spores and re-start an outbreak. The darn stuff survives peroxide and/or bleach. You can kill it by boiling, but you need higher temperatures than is typically manageable without also pressurising the pot. And, in case you don't feel fed up enough, it's environmental. Yay! If it's really happy, it can actually look kinda nice, billowing in the filter outlet current. Or so I tell myself, in that final stage of grief, acceptance. As does everyone that sees their loaches cuddling on their beautifully fuzzy log, or their snail bumbling along, needing a hair cut It can and does kill plants indirectly, by overwhelming them and blocking off their ability to photosynthesize. Poor anubias are especially vulnerable to culpable homicide by black beard.

Rumour has it that CO2 fluctuations cause black beard algae. What causes these fluctuations? Water changes. Time of day. Faulty equipment... this is why dosing excel can help, it maintains a more even available-carbon profile over time. The true SAE sometimes eats it. Shrimp and nerites sometimes eat it - all too slowly to really contain it if it's happy. Good lighting can help, a shorter or an interrupted photoperiod, or a more suitable spectrum of light can help slow its growth. Slightly higher nitrates can help too - if plants grow really well they also help keep it under control. Realistically, you have some of this, somewhere. My management strategy is to allow it to grow on the back glass, where it is quite happy in several tufts, and this keeps it contained for the most part. I could monitor my CO2 profile - there are tests for this - but it's not a problem for me leaving it to grow where I choose for it to grow, in stead of constantly fighting it. If you wish to fight this, play with your CO2 or your excel dosing, decrease your photoperiod (or chunk it in two with a break in the middle), and snip away all affected leaves. If you want to scrub this stuff, do it well away from your aquarium, since every loose chunk can take hold and grow.

1/10. Not as bad as cyanobacteria, but nearly impossible to truly eradicate (though absolutely manageable, many keep it basically invisible). Wouldn't wish it on an enemy. Might start naming the back-glass tufts, as a show of defiance.

If you've made it this far, you'll see that managing all of this needs some kind of record keeping - a booklet where you write down all your test results and all interventions you take, as well as some observations about the aquarium, is worth it's weight in gold in solving most aquarium troubles.

...sorry for the tome!

 

@Nina_W Thank you for your great input , great style of writing

 

As an aside, a question I have is on the relationship between (invisible) biofilm and algae. Can biofilm be the key to algae control? Does algae grow in biofilm, like a substrate? I know that algae is in some cases biofilm (diatoms specifically) but it's also all sorts of other things.

 

I’m at my wits end . After 4 months of dosing excel every day. Weekly 50% water changes for 4 months . I thought I had beaten bba.... put in some nice pieces of wood and after 1 month I see bba coming out . So out of desperation I got a sae ...... so frustrating

 

oh man that sucks i am sorry to hear that @rsa hopefully the SAE can control that pest algae, let us know how the SAE works for you

 

My lighting is on for 6 hours , I dose npk scape ferts at 50% of what is recommended for my volume (200l) . My c02 comes on 2 hours before lights on and is lime green . If anyone has advice I’m all ears .

 

For a balanced tank - stop stressing about your tank(s)

I will comment on what I have been doing for the last while ;-) until I get a bee in my and start messing with things to see what/if anything has changed.

• Regular tank maintainece - Nope - replace water that evaporated
• stable / consistent lighting periods - 100% - but intensity must match the plats you have.
• Keeping low dissolved organics in water column (ties up with tank maintainece) - yeah when I was obsessed with TDS, think it introduced more issues while still trying to dial things in.
• initial plant mass needs to be high (possibly mixing slow and fast growers) - winner - and you need to keep it high - no a full carpet does not equal high plant mass. You need some sort of plant that you can use to export waste - i.e. dump on the compost heap.
• Choosing a main plant fertilizer method and refining it to your aquarium plants needs (dosing nutrients at the root (aqua soil/root tabs)/ or water column dosing (inert substrate/ water column dosing)) - amount of fetrz needed is largely influenced by that number of water changes you do ... in a truly balanced system one tends to approach low fert requirements - depending on your growth speed - ( note - I am ok with very slow growing tanks)
• Fish load the higher the load on the system (lots of fish or over feeding of fish) can cause the tank to go out of balance even though if you have all other aspects in check so this point is a good starting block - I am a low density guy - fish tend to live longer.
• Clean up crew , try to keep animals the eat algae to help with your maintainece of the tank think of them as your tank cleaning employees (shrimp, snails, algae eating fish) - sure helps to have diversify.

microbes - if you are not into loads of tank maintenance /esp water changes - I still use the greywater / septic tank - 100% natural products - but with this 24 x7 aeration helps loads. Current product that seems to work well is the smellaway range.

If you make changes - make small changes and observe if you are seeing the expected result.

Oh > 150l - them small tanks are a pain.

Later Ferdie

 

Great thread with great answers.

I keep mine very simple & basic as it's always worked for me in the past.

1. Plant densely, and make it a hybrid of plant types which can handle the waste as f-fish mentioned above.
2. Consistent photoperiod with correct intensity levels required by your plants.
3. Don't overstock your tank with fish, and adding clean up crew is a huge plus.
4. Try to use a nutrient rich substrate.
5. Consistent CO2 period. (I normally start my CO2 an hour before the photoperiod starts and shut it an hour before it ends). Monitor levels with a drop checker
6. Ferts....often the straw that'll break the camel's back in so many tanks. Fully agree with f-fish's comment on this. I personally err on the side caution when I dose as it's so easy to overdose and then have an excess of nutrients in the water column. Rather dose less if you're not sure and check the results. I use an 'All-in-One' type product such as Scape Complete or back in the day, DSD. Also, with a nutrient rich substrate (especially when newly setup) and CO2, I am reserved when dosing as a lot of nutrients are released into the water column by the substrate alone. Trial & error, and find what works for you.
7. Have a good filtration system. I've experienced that an inadequate flow rate is something algae loves.
8. One water change per week for me. I do between a 30% - 50% each week. I can, however, also confirm and fully agree with f-fish again re just topping up evaporated water; this works brilliantly only when you have achieved balance in your tank and the plants are thriving, and I've done this plenty of times in the past.
9. Have patience...don't make multiple changes at the same time or within a day of each other. You need to know what

That's about it on what I try to do. My core focus and dependency is just getting the plants populated and healthy...they'll do the rest for you once you get to your perfect balance.

 

Thank you @f-fish and @Lord Vader , some really good advice

 

@rsa i see that APT fix from 2hour aquarist is being tested by the epic guys Zubair said that it should be in store end of the month