Glutaraldehyde kills chladophora

[paludarium]

I don't know if anyone has done this before.

Chladophora has been bothering me for a long time, regularly manual removal did not solve the problem at all. Seven weeks ago after doing routine maintenance and removing most of the algae on the substrate, drift woods and plants, I decided to take a risk on cidex(2.4% glutaraldehyde). I dosed cidex at 25 ml in the 42 g tank. One Caridina denticulata and MANY Septaria porcellana were killed on the next day, but all fishes remained alive.

This is my NPT infected with chladaphora. 90x45x45 cm with T5 39Wx2.

One week later I found that that remaining chladophora shrinked and withered. I dumped another 25 ml of cidex into the tank, and another week later futher shrinkage of the algae were noted. Althogh chladophora was not eliminated, I was satisfied with the result and stopped dosing cidex.

Unfortunately chladaphora regained its growth 2 weeks later. And last weekend I saw the familiar picutre, the annoying chladophora was back!

Hope my experiment would help others with chldaphora problem.

Regards,
Erich

 

[Tom Barr]

You need to do several things, not one to get rid of it.

You also killed off some critters.

Might be wiser to trim aggressively, clean good, remove the parts they tend to get caught in, add a bit more CO2/consistency etc, and add this at a lower dosing.

Regards,
Tom barr

 

[Dusko]

I had Cladophora problem in one 300 litres tank and I would always get it in the corners with poor circulation. What I did, I added another powerhead just to test and directed it towards that corner with lots of Cladophora, removed all I could (some algae left behind).

The algae didn't thrive any more. After approx 2 month I took that extra power head out and just after approx 2 weeks I got lots of Cladophora in that corner again.

Regards, Dusko

 

[Tom Barr]

Clado always seemed to appear when I had higher light, poor CO2 during the first 1-2 hours of the day light cycle, furry plants THAT WOULD GRAB AND ATTRACT Caldo etc.

Harsh trimming, removal of the plants , like moss etc that became infested, good stable CO2, Excel I guess would help to that end, seem to address the long term issue.

Regards,
Tom Barr

 

[Brian20]

Clado always seemed to appear when I had higher light, poor CO2 during the first 1-2 hours of the day light cycle, furry plants THAT WOULD GRAB AND ATTRACT Caldo etc.

Harsh trimming, removal of the plants , like moss etc that became infested, good stable CO2, Excel I guess would help to that end, seem to address the long term issue.

Regards,
Tom Barr

exactly. In thats conditions also i have clado. In my tanks grow very hard and it is good because I take it all with hand. Also i make a ball of clado and is like marimo ball but very soft. I trow it away. when it grew again I make the same. It only grow where the tank receive a lot of light. I dont have Co2 on these tanks and also I dont make w/c for a long time!!! (3-4 months) there are only guppies and plants also snails.