Creepy Algae taking over my plants!

Hi

I have a few plants in my tank, mostly vallis and Bacopa monierii which is a stem plant. I light my tank with 2 10 000K lights (sunglo) and i feed my plants Aqua Mater plant food. I do a 30% water change every week. Please tell me how i can rid of this menace??

I have removed one 10 000k bulb, because I think it might have something to do with that. Also my plants are starting to turn see through or brown... I think they might be burning under the lights?

Please look at my other thread for more pix of the plants and tank layout if u need to... ww.tropicalaquarium.co.za/showthread.php?8186-Milamber-s-Community-Tank/page3

I have added one zoomed picture of the algae i really dislike. But there is a second dark bushy type on the plant as well. Please any advice would be appreciated.

 

you can see in the background how brown and unhappy my vallis are.

 

ok, good news is that ive had this algae before and your in luck cos i combattted it! this algae is called STAGHORN!!!!!!! its defn because ur tank water is hard. and defn not your 10 000k lights. this is an apparent myth. i know this cos i love using 10 000k lights for its super bright appearance and i get brilliant growth with no algae.. obviously unless i mess around with the ferts

what i was doing wrong was that i was dosing too much dolomite which caused the water to go hard. Gauteng water is hard already so no need to dose.

is your tap water this hard always? or only when its in your tank? because it can be rocks or substrate ur using that will alter tds in your water!

whaat i did was i stopped dosing dolomite (our waters have an abundance of Ca and Mg already so regular wc you will be dosing this already. Next i got myself a RO water. i use half tap and half RO and this makes my water softer.

Never seen Staghorn ever again!

 

hi milamber
shihr is quite correct,but also take into consideration the hygiene of your tank? many people that have experienced this algae outbreak is due to sudden ammonia spikes that can trigger this algae so check for dead fish,uneaten food,dead plants all contribute to poor water quality and high proteins in the aquarium.you can over dose excel for a few days thats works but watch your fish response to the treatment.also when feeding your fish (just a thought) when i feed bloodworm or artemia i defrost it put it in a syringe switch all my filters off so zero water flow and feed my fish and as soon as 1 piece of food hits the floor i stop the feed then continue to switch on you filters/power heads you will soon notice your fish will get into a routine and as soon as your filters are off they will go CRAZY knowing food is on the way..... feeding imho is overlooked with regard to aquarium hygiene algae outbreak and fish death.

 

yes that will work. Even excel but one should always be interested in the root cause of the problem rather than using something to get rid of it and it coming back..

 

@lc3786455 - I test my tank's NH3, N02 and NO3 every week. They remain stable and under control, so it'd definitely not the hygiene of the tank. I count my fish every day and know exactly what I have - there are no dead fish. I feed my fish so that all food is eaten in under a minute with nothing to spare, once a day.

If anything, it's the hardness of the water and the old lighting system I had. I have a few yellowish rocks in there that I got in my garden (pretty) what i think is raising the hardness through leeching. I am testing the lighting now to see if it's that, and if i dont see a decline in the algae, im going to rempve the rocks and soften my water with Valpre or Bonaqua and see if it's perhaps that. If they still don't die I'll be storming in to Pet Stop, summon @azurekoi and see what he has to say about chemicals that I can use. The algae is killing my plants and I'm determined to get rid of them. There is a dark Algae also in the tank what im still trying to identify, if you would have a look on the pics again, ignore the buckhorn algae and see the dark ones, why is that caused?

 

do a test on the rocks.. Scrape it so u get a powder, use vinegar or pool acid and see if it fizzles. If it does, it contains ca which could be raising the hardness of ur water.

Also, Pls dont add mineral water to the tank, it still contains mg and ca also contains sodium which from what i read is bad for fish.. Try buying some ro water from lps and mix half tap water for water changes..

 

pic 2 on one of the bacopaleaves right at the bottom looks like bba to me. caused by poor circulation and low or unstable co2levels, wolf had bba in his setup and had huge circulation in his tank butstill got it, actually it was worse on his outlet and inlet of his filter soincreasing circulation will help but i dont think that’s what triggers it atall. i would do that test shihr suggested works like a charm as well as theRO/TAP 50/50 combo should sort it out! remove as much as you can will help yourplants as well.

 

@Milamber - storming into Petstop and summoning me wont help as I dont work there no more,but can reiterate what shihr said - Staghorn usualy grows in hard water with an excess od Ca and Mg... Ask me,I know - my river tank out of necesity of growing algae for my Hillstream loaches,often has outbreaks of both Staghorn and hair algae... I want benificial algea,so changing my water parameters to a less algae friendly mix is a no,no...

Currently reverting to half doses of Robalon's Crystal Algae Clear with GREAT results! My sensitive plants are not damaged,my green dust algae that grows under 16 - 18 hours of 10 000k x 2 T5 lights + 2 x 15w T8's springs back and feeds the Hillstreams... No staghorn or hair algae to be seen... + My water is hard as hell because half my substrate is Beach sand/shell gritt...

Algae to me is all about understanding it - once you get the balance you want,it becomes under control.....

PSM me if you want to pop around for some Crystal Algea Clear - got lots and it goes a long way....

 

bba is also because of hard water.. just saying.. but if u want a chem soln, follow azurekoi's advice