Hair algae??

[Skyfish]

Hi

I’m on my 3rd week of the EI. Things we going well until a week ago when I started seeing clumps of green algae, which I think is hair algae. This is the picture of what it looks like, which I got from the Ghori article:

It is on my carpet of hair grass, glosso and parts of the uncovered gravel. I am also seeing it on my Eusteralis Stellata. I can hand pick them out like wool blobs. I keep taking them out but they keep coming back. My dosing is as follows:

Even days 3 times a week.
3/4 Tspoon KNO3
1/2 Tspoon K2SO4
Fleet Enema 3ml

Odd days 3 times a week
TMG 15ml.

Day off after the TMG dose.

50% water change on reset.

PH 6.6 to 6.8
KH 6
GH 10
Tank is 80 gallons.
Light NOFL 368 watts 10 hours photo and 1 hour morning and 1 hour night, low light, 114watts.

I’m running 2 canesters, a CO2 internal diffuser, pressurized CO2. UV after water change for 24 hours.

The dosing is good and the CO2 seems fine. So I don’t understand why this is happening. I’m using a PH pen to test, which is calibrated every week. I am also noticing a little beard algae.

Any ideas why this is happening?

 

[Tom Barr]

Re: Hair algae??

Do you have good biomass in the tank?

Amano shrimps will eat this algae rather fast.
You'll need like 50 of them.

It's Rhizolclonium.
Do you have good plant biomass in the tank?
Add as many plants as you can stuff in there and trim the algae off as best you can. Blackouts can beat this one back as well as Excel additions.

Reduce the K2SO4 to once a week only.
Make sure you add a little bit more CO2 and have some surface movement.

Regards,
Tom Barr

 

[Skyfish]

Re: Hair algae??

Hi Tom,

Sorry for the late reply here. Been blocked out of this site since 7/21 due to some weird DNS problem. Seems to be working again now.

My tank is pretty much packed, but I do have some open spots, specially the foreground. I had glosso but removed it because algae had over taken it. I have since put in about 10 more plants and have ordered more. And hair grass for the foreground. (Pic of tank in gallery)

I have tried a 3 day blackout, but the algae is still there. I lost some cardinals too. I have now reduced my lights from 10 hours photo to 8 hours. I have also reduced it from 368 watts to 300 watts. Skipping K2SO4 for a week now. PH is at 6.7 to 6.8 with KH at 6.

I had added some Seachem root tabs a month ago, I suspect it might be leaching out of the gravel. My gravel is basic 2-3mm, but it's light, I'm sure the tabs are leaching out. Also perhaps 368 watts maybe too much for the 80G? Anyway you would know better to correct me.

I can't think of anything else. Fish load is fine, 40 odd Tetras, SAEs ect. can't get any shrimps here, but I've ordered. Have also ordered Excel from the US.

Regards

 

[aquabillpers]

Re: Hair algae??

Amano shrimps will eat this algae rather fast.
You'll need like 50 of them.

I bet they will, but isn't this treating the symptom rather than the problem?

Bill

 

[Tom Barr]

Re: Hair algae??

Yep.

But there was also other advice in there, not just this.
Shrimps are very good at tougher species to get rid of that persist when environmental conditions are good for plants.

Moss, Riccia and other plants often get hair algae tangled up in them, trimming them and removal etc can really help lick this algae, so do good cleanings and pickings.

Once beaten back good, if the conditions are done right, they do not reappear often

Regards,
Tom Barr

 

[Skyfish]

Re: Hair algae??

Thanks Tom, yeah my riccia looks more like algae moss now. I have started cleaning and purning, see what happens.

The last time I had put shrimps in this tank and the one before, they all died! I find that if the CO2 is over 30ppm my shrimps die. So how come people are keeping critters in planted tanks with CO2? I believe they need high O2?

 

[Tom Barr]

Re: Hair algae??

Add surface turbulance, never have the water surface still etc.

Also, remove the Riccia moss etc, just toss it and pick out a small non infested piece, don't worry, it'll grow back fast.

It's almost impossible to pick clean a large amount.

So toss it and grow out fresh non infested plants.

The algae is a bit like a weed, a plant you do not want.
So you may find it useful to attack it like a weed, prune it out!

It can be beaten back and generally gives up if you get most of it.
The critters keep it supressed till it's life cycle stops.

So the shrimp, while not entirely the solution are a good part afterwards.

These higher green algae tend to grow well once established much like plants.

So you need to change gears and think about them more like Utricularia gibba, duckweeds, etc.

Regards,
Tom Barr

 

[defdac]

Re: Hair algae??

Add surface turbulance, never have the water surface still etc.

Why is this important?

I try to minimize the surface turbulation to avoid CO2-loss och have good circulation in the tank for the nutrients/CO2 to swirl around. Maybe I should crank the CO2-rate instead and have some surface agitation..

 

[Tom Barr]

Re: Hair algae??

If you over do the CO2 and have fish, you'll find out why.

Soem surface movement is good, I've done min and no movement, I think over all, some is better than none, it's easy to add more gas even if some is lost, but with movement, there is some degassing of excess at night when there is no O2 being added/no CO2 being consumed.


Regards,
Tom Barr