I'm starting to lose the battle

aquabillpers

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Jan 24, 2005
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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

GreenStuff,

You have a great looking, healthy tank. A while ago pretty women used to affix "beauty spots", little dark spots, to their faces to enhance their beauty; maybe your algae is like that.

A question: Since your plants seem to be growing quite well, what benefit do you expect from Onyx Sand or Flourite?

Bill
 

GreenStuff

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Feb 11, 2005
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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

I'm thinking, if nothing else works start over with new substrate.

Funny thing is, my plants have always had good growth to them.
 

Tom Barr

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Jan 23, 2005
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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

I would not mess with the sub.

You live near the Vac Aquarium society and Seattle's group, there are quite a few folks in that area that keep plants.

Might be worth it to go to a meeting there.
The plants are cheap to free.

The tank does not look particularly problematic.
You just need to keep adding good CO2, dosing the nutrients like I suggest and make sure your KH/GH are stable.

Your tap water is likely extremely soft, treat it like RO water.
Variations in KH will cause havoc with the CO2, GH are both plant nutrients also.

Light can be reduced also, 2-3w/gal is plenty for any plant.

So just check the KH/GH good, keep after the nutrients, the tank shoould balance out, power through with the CO2/Nutrients and back off the light some.

Weekly, even 2x a week water changes will re set the tank well.
Blackout if you absolutely need to.

Those are easy to prune stem plants, so work each group carefully and pick and clean them well before returning and replanting.

You can do this, don't be a quitter unless is drugs or cig's.

I'll keep adjusting advice to see if you can get results, at this point it's likely something you might be overlooking or perhaps expectations etc.

Just don't give up just yet.
It'll fall into place if you keep after this and check and re check things, you are basically learning right now and will know later when or if it happens to you, but things will go much easier later once you get the tank to do what you want.

It'll happen, be patient.


Regards,
Tom Barr
 

chubasco

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Jan 24, 2005
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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

Hummm, PEI sits off of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. Beautiful place, wife and I took a week's vacation there in 2000 when I was stationed in Brunswick, Maine. Greenstuff, do you islanders have the same pastimes as Mainers? Moose-tipping and cutting crop circles? :rolleyes: Just kiddin'.....

Glad you're sticking with it,

Bill
 

GreenStuff

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Feb 11, 2005
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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

We prefer the crop triangle here on the Island. :)

Tom, Seattle might be a bit far for me. PEI is on the east coast.
I wish I could say my water was extremely soft. People here refer to our water as being liquid rock. These are my well water readings from the water company.

pH 8.3
Alk 5.3
Hardness 7.9
Nitrate 7.1
Phophorus 0.07
Potassium 1.27
Iron 0.1
Chloride 18.4
Calcium 30.73
Magnesium 15.5
Manganese 0.02
Sodium 6.24
Sulfate 4.43
Zinc 0.02
Thanks for the encouragement. Excuse me now while I go clean things up and remove a light.
 

GreenStuff

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Feb 11, 2005
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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

Just pulling my head out of the tank long enough to let everyone know that the battle goes on.....

I've cleaned the glass and removed leaves every night now for eight days. I also did a major cleaning on the weekend and even cleaned the filter hoses. I have nothing but fast growing stem plants covering the entire tank now.

How's the algae? The green dust seems to have subsided a little. The bba still persists on the edges of the hygro, but I think it may be getting weaker. The staghorn still appears here and there but I've been right after it. The bga is still forming on the tips of leaves. (I may have to do the black out.)

I did lose another fish, ....a molly, so I had to turn the CO2 down a speck. Hard to tell if I've lost any others because the tank is so full of plants. There are some ottos that I haven't seen in a while, but they always surprise me and show up at some point.

I will keep after it.
 

chubasco

Guru Class Expert
Jan 24, 2005
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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

Sorry to inform that Greenstuff is no longer with us: while cleaning one of his
tanks a virulent form of algae got on his skin that has a voracious appetite
for human flesh! Yeah, what a way to go.... :rolleyes:

Bill
(huhuhuhuh)
 

travdawg

Guru Class Expert
Feb 2, 2005
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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

HA!

With the poor guys luck, that might be true!
 

GreenStuff

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Feb 11, 2005
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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

The algae that you speak of, Bill, left me with green hair, but I assure you I am still alive. :p

I've been very busy doing water changes and removing leaves. I also did a high-nitrate/three-day blackout with 60% water changes before and after, which got rid of the bga, thankfully. I've also rid my tank of bba.

Unfortunately I'm noticing a pattern that's been going on for, probably years. Senior leaves get a fuzz algae on them. Every leaf in the tank that would be more than 6 weeks old is covered in fuzz. (Looks like my hair, only shorter and thinner .....like a brush cut.) I've been cleaning it off the glass every other day for weeks now, but there no way to get it off the leaves.

I'm going to try less light. Right now I've lowered the lighting slightly by adding a couple of extra pieces of glass between the bulbs and the water. I think I'll try removing one of the light bulbs.

We'll see now what that does to my hair. :eek:
 

chubasco

Guru Class Expert
Jan 24, 2005
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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

GreenStuff said:
I'm going to try less light. Right now I've lowered the lighting slightly by adding a couple of extra pieces of glass between the bulbs and the water. I think I'll try removing one of the light bulbs.

We'll see now what that does to my hair. :eek:

Well, good luck with that, Greenstuff. You might consider the possibility that PEI lies in some sort of Bermuda Triangle for planted tanks. :D Keep us informed!

Bill
 

defdac

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Re: I'm starting to lose the battle

Run your hand/fingers through all the plants, perhaps even shaking them a bit to whirl off any eventual debris/spores etc.