Matt F.;122586 said:
I don't know for sure, but it seems like you're able to dial things in almost intuitively. You have great plant biomass, you have the appropriate amount of light and gas, and you have a good algae clean-up crew.
In my case, I think I was overdoing EVERYTHING (too much gas, too many nutrients, too much light, too little plant biomass, too few fish and inverts). I'm not sure as to which of these is the cause (I'm guessing all of them contributed to my GDA problem), but now that I have adjusted the light from 12--->16" above the water surface, reduced CO2 significantly (at least the injection part, not sure about water column levels), increased plant biomass significantly (by adding lots of stems), cut out adding the ferts, increased the fish and shrimp load, and kept the photoperiod to 7.5 hours with two water changes per week, the GDA hasn't made an appearance. I can go one week without any GDA.
Let's see if I can maintain this for a longer period of time w/o ferts. Right now the plant growth/health is doing well. But my ADA aquasoil is fairly new.
My CO2 ppm's are 45 in the lower light tank up to 70 ppm in others.
This is measured using 2-3 methods. Then comparing. I wasted 3 batches of dry ice doing the dry ice reference method.
New ADA AS= you really do not need much for hair grass as far as ferts, or a few stems.
Rather than chasing thy tail, measuring carefully the tanks that provide falsification, that provide good examples of optimal plant health..this is what folks should focus on testing.
Then you have a comparative baseline, a standard reference to compare to.
I use the plants as my test kit, but if you don't know what optimal plant growth and health looks like.......well.........sort of tough then.
So my test tend to be done after things are going nice.
This way if I use a test kit, I know what range I should be at.
Or if I see data, assuming that it's correct, I can tell quickly if it's something I can falsify and rule out as a cause.
I think unlike most Algae discussions, I put forth more hypothesis as to why they grow, how to test and measure things than just about anyone else I've ever met or seen on line.
And when I do this, I'm not looking to find the root cause most of the time, I'm just looking to rule out the more likely causes.
So Green water via NH4, seems to work still also, but NH4 alone does not seem to be the root cause, so this is false.
I am tentatively accepting of organic matter loading being a potential cause for BBA, COD or BOD could be used to measure general trends.
So it might not be entirely CO2, but.............95% of the algaes I've seen over 20+ years, CO2 related.
Sometimes it's just general care. Sometimes it's the filters and the need to clean, too much degassing, or not enough, KH is not all bicarb, always something.
And I get burnt a lot with CO2.
CO2 Tank runs out and now that I have a toddler, I have to keep the tanks under the cabinets out of sight. So smaller gas tanks and less likely to check the pressures etc.
Client's often can be out for a week at a time.
Automated Water changes mitigate CO2 issues on those client's with that set up.
Other client's missed tank run outs? BBA, plant responses, you see it over and over and over.
Not really intuitive, and my other tanks are low biomass, few algae eaters etc, the 70 Gallon Buce tank example.
The older version with hair grass had virtually no plant biomass.
So that's
an exact tit for tat example for your same tank. Soil was older, tank was a 70 Gallon vs yours at 17 Gallon, but the same tap water, good lighting(50 umols at the grass), I use a wet/dry filter, CO2 mist etc, frequent water changes.
Rarely had any algae issues.
Today
Let's show the hair grass:
Gerry's 220 is another example, new ADA, nice filter, water changes done a lot in the start. Same plant and even less biomass.
If Gerry can do it, so can you.
I've been telling folks for near 20 years that more ferts = not the cause of algae.
It's been falsified 10,000X, but folks still fall for it.
Many other issues can be causing the problems. But..........I can say with certainty, what is not causing the algae independent of other factors.
That dependency is the root issue for you and others falling for this. You fix that and give in to focus of growing plants, then none of that monkey business is needed.
Plants get nicer and larger, you can prune aggressively, the 120 is a high light example, the 70 Gallon is a moderate to low light example with the opposite type plants(slow growth Rhenophytes vs high growth rate aquatic weeds).
The 180 is the most resistant tank I have. It can get mucked up and take a beating, but does well. Neither tanks have any issues. I've taken plants and algae infested cuttings from other folks, added it, it does not survive. So I'm certainly getting repeated exposure of the pest algae. But it does not establish or colonize and spread.
No tricks, no magic potions. I can certainly get away with less dosing on the 70 Gallon Buce tank, less light, less demanding plants for the ferts.
I cannot get away with that much abuse on the 120 however. But the tank pays for itself well also. So the labor and trimming = significant $.