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green algae on the glass in my newly planted tank

15K views 12 replies 3 participants last post by  Byron 
#1 ·
I have a 29 gallon tall aquarium that i recently converted to a live plant setup. My plants are growing fairly quickly as i add co2 from a DIY setup. My lighting is catalina 2x25 watt solar T5, with one 67k and one 10k bulb. I've noticed some string algae on my amazon sword, but i removed those leaves. My concern is the hard bright green algae that loves the back glass of my tank. I'm not sure whats causing this growth. I have removed some of it with tank wipes that i got from the LFS. I'm most interested in preventing the growth, but i'd love to know some techniques for it's removal. I've considered straight edged razor blades to scrape the algae from the glass, is this a good idea?
 
#2 ·
Does it look more like a lot of lil green spots or is it slime?
How long per day (hrs) do you run these lights?

Easiest in my opinion: Eliminate factor causing it and safe the cleaning headache :) I;ll be more then glad to help on algae if you like.
 
#3 ·
thanks

Thanks for your help, the algae is little green spots, and i run the lights 12 hours per day. I have 3 striped otto cinclus, but am planning on 3-4 more to help reduce algae. I do regular water changes every week(20%). I planted pretty heavily also, and the plants let off streams of oxygen bubbles.
 
#4 · (Edited)
Sounds like green dot algae. Nothing will eat it that I know of, I see it now and then and remove it with a good stiff scraper, it can be very tough. One trick I find works is to thoroughly scrape the front and side (and what I can of the back) glass walls with a stiff sponge scraper every weekly partial water change, even it I don't see anything on the glass. This green dot algae appears minutely and is hard to see but cleaning the glass every week seems to prevent it, although periodically I miss a spot and by next week there it is.

One caution on otos, they will only eat certain algae, common green and diatoms (brown). Unless you are plagued with common algae, I wouldn't have more than your present three otos in a 29g just for algae control. If you really like the fish and want more for that reason, that's different of course. And there are other interesting fish that perform the task just as efficiently, like Whiptails (Rineloricaria) and twig cats (Farlowella). I have a trio of the latter in my 90g, no oto's or anything similar, and they are more than effective; busy as the proverbial beaver, and very neat fish.

Depending upon your fish load, you might consider increasing the pwc to around 40% weekly. In a planted tank the number of fish govern the pwc [I suppose they do in non-planted tanks as well] but you can never change too much water. Not suggesting this as an algae control [though some advocate it is], more just general fish health.

Byron.
 
#5 ·
Thanks for the advice. I'm going to have to check out the fish you mentioned to add some variety to my tank. Also i'm hoping that with the regular cleaning and continued plant growth; I won't have to worry too much about algae and can focus on all the fun stuffl, llike various fish, plants, and aquascaping!
 
#6 ·
Thanks for the advice. I'm going to have to check out the fish you mentioned to add some variety to my tank. Also i'm hoping that with the regular cleaning and continued plant growth; I won't have to worry too much about algae and can focus on all the fun stuffl, llike various fish, plants, and aquascaping!
Absolutely, algae will always be present, but in a planted tank that is biologically balanced, algae rarely becomes problematical. B.
 
#7 ·
Spot algae. I'd also suggest to do larger w/c then 20%.
Are you using a liquid fert for the plants?
Its a 29g would you say its heavily stocked with fish or only few fish (wondering over CO2 level, this will influence it too)?
I often see spot algae occur when the tank is not balanced properly (or in new set ups, same issue).

If you get your tanks balanced properly between Lights-CO2-Nutritious and a good water maintenance your plants will quickly outrun the spot algae, no doubt about that.
 
#8 ·
I'm not doing any liquid ferts yet. I used flourite black as a substrate and was told by lfs that i wouldn't need any for 6 months. Although i hear that flourish excel is good, and will use that if i need to. I'm pretty heavily stocked. I have 7 hatchets, 4 rasbora espeis, 3 kuhli loaches, 6 cardinal tetras, red tailed shark, lots of tiny ghost shrimp and some snails, 3 striped ottos. I think that if i heavily stock with fish the co2 output will rise allowing me to have a very heavily planted tank. The tank has been established for 3 years before i switched to the planted setup, taking caution to preserve my beneficial bacteria. It seems that now i will be doing a 40 percent water change instead of 20. Should i be using ferts? Should i be lighting more than 12 hours a day?
 
#10 ·
Flourite ONLY helps plants that are root feeders, such as Sword; So if you have your whole tank full of Swords, you're all set.
Now if you have Stem plants and floating plants, I hate to break it to you buy then you just wasted a few $ on flourite for no reason. Most all plants incl stem plants feed off liquid ferts only and only require normal fine gravel to grow properly.
Excel is Carbon, that is NOT to be mixed up with the other 17 nutrition plants need. If you have a decent stock in your tank, your CO2 is covered right there by the fish (what you list this is sufficient CO2 there) , no need for add Carbon. What you'd need is something like Flourish Comprehensive, a all in 1 liquid fert added 1x week.

No don't turn you lights on more then 12hrs, if anything I'd turn them down to 10-11 was this my tank.

Yes I'd do something like a 30-40% w/c each week.

The string looking stuff is Hair algae, also very common in new set ups, also only develops well when the balance is outta wack; lack of nutrition.

Therefore was this my tank, lil more w/c each week. Buy Flourish Comprehensive ferts and maybe turn the lights down a lil.

But all this said, you will need to be patient, algae does not magically vanish over night, you'll need to give this 1-2 weeks before starting to see results. And pleaseeee while you're at the store do NOT fall for these anti-algae products, not for a planted & stocked tank that'll only make matters worst
 
#12 ·
I just looked over your pictures but figured its better too add the algae comments here for your convince...

I also see Staghorn algae developing a little on the last picture posted. That often occurs in areas first where there's little to no flow from your filter - Any chance you can adjust your filter outlet to circulate the whole tank more?
Also this very algae type is often seen in overfed tank and or clogged filters. So the question would be how much do you feed? Do you have any feed breaks (like only feed every 2nd day)? When you do your water exchange and have 'dirty' tank water in the buckets rinse out your filter pads in there every once in a while, not to get them sparkling clean, but to get the big 'chucks' dirt off, know what I mean?
When you do w/c do you just take water out of your tank or do you use a gravel vacuum?

Sorry my 'help' involves so many questions, I would just like to give you all info I can on the algae matter based of YOUR very tanks rather then a standard blah blah :)
 
#13 ·
Those plants will grow and fill in nicely, it takes a couple months in my experience for a newly planted tank to settle and really start growing.

You have CO2 diffusion plus the fish, you do not need Excel. You will need a lioquid fertilizer to balance the light and CO2, as minerals will be lacking otherwise and plants will only grow up to the nuytrient that is no longer available to them, what we call the limiting factor. In your case it will be minerals, so a good complete/comprehensive lioquid fert added once or perhaps twice a week will provide these. And I would limit the light to 10 hours. It always takes a couple weeks for any changes to lighting, ferts, etc. to be reflected in plant growth, so be observant; it is a bit experimental at first, since not all aquaria are the same and there are many factors involved.

Byron.
 
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