Re: Inducing Algae Growth
Emc2 said:
I'd like to give this a try.
I have two tanks.
One 55 gallon, high-tech tank with 260 watts of lighting and pressurized co2 and one 26 gallon tank with no co2 and about 2 watts per gallon.
I am following EI on both tanks.
Which algae would be the easiest to start out with?
Do you own a UV?
If so, use NH4 to induce green water.
Add lots of cheapy fish, shrimp etc to a planted tank to over load the system with organic NH4 waste.
Parameters to measure:
NH4 with a very sensitive kit many times in the first 6 hours and then every 6 8-12 hours thereafter till gone.
O2, meter is the best thing, they cost 220$+.
GW is easy to get rid of, a flip of the UV light and it's done in a few hours.
BGA is another, easy to kill, fairly easy to induce by lowering the NO3 with a fair amount of organic matter(clogged filter or over grown tank=> leads to more NO3 being used up=> more plant biomass).
BBA is problematic, hard to remove.
GS is fairly easy by limiting PO4. Few other algae will grow then.
Staghorn often appears with too many fish as well as BBA.
Regards,
Tom Barr