Black Tuft Algae

[AlaskaJammin]

I've been keeping fishtanks for over a decade and manage a local fishstore :welcome: , but this one has me stumped. :feedback: I have this algae that grows all over my plants. It grows in small black tufts that are almost impossible to remove. :swear: Also grows on my driftwood, but not on the sides or my filtration. I have a freshwater 210 :headbang2 with double sumps, a 1800 gph flow rate, and a uv sterilizer. I have near zero nitrates, and have tried nitra-zorb with frequent water changes, white carbon, and algae destroyer. My last restort is to throw away all plants, sterilize the driftwood by running it through my diswasher and scrubbing the algae off with a copper brush. :wall: (this is the only thing that seems to get it off) Does anyone else have any ideas at all? I though the uv sterilizer would help, but nothing has helped at all, slowed it down, yes, killed it off... no. Anyone? Anyone at all? :cry: :shakehead :wall: :wall: :feedback:

[Daddyo72]

I've been keeping fishtanks for over a decade and manage a local fishstore :welcome: , but this one has me stumped. :feedback: I have this algae that grows all over my plants. It grows in small black tufts that are almost impossible to remove. :swear: Also grows on my driftwood, but not on the sides or my filtration. I have a freshwater 210 :headbang2 with double sumps, a 1800 gph flow rate, and a uv sterilizer. I have near zero nitrates, and have tried nitra-zorb with frequent water changes, white carbon, and algae destroyer. My last restort is to throw away all plants, sterilize the driftwood by running it through my diswasher and scrubbing the algae off with a copper brush. :wall: (this is the only thing that seems to get it off) Does anyone else have any ideas at all? I though the uv sterilizer would help, but nothing has helped at all, slowed it down, yes, killed it off... no. Anyone? Anyone at all? :cry: :shakehead :wall: :wall: :feedback:

http://www.aquahobby.com/articles/e_algae.php


http://search.netscape.com/ns/boomframe.jsp?query=Staghorn+algae&page=1&offset=0&result_url=redir%3Fsrc%3Dwebsearch%26requestId%3D5 a01179f525b4efa%26clickedItemRank%3D3%26userQuery% 3DStaghorn%2Balgae%26clickedItemURN%3Dhttp%253A%25 2F%252Fwww.otocinclus.com%252Farticles%252Falgae.h tml%26invocationType%3D-%26fromPage%3DNSCPResults%26amp%3BampTest%3D1&remove_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.otocinclus.com%2Fartic les%2Falgae.html (Link)


http://www.floridadriftwood.com/algae_identification.html



http://www.plantgeek.net/article_viewer.php?id=9


Here's a few links to help you ID your algae. It sounds like beard algae but you could ID and be certain with these links. There are many ways to remove it. I wrote the info below in another thread on hair algae. Once you ID your algae, I'll walk you thru some removal techniques.



Otto cats, black outs, APC has some great pieces on Flourish Exell and it's ability to kill it. A fert called tropical master grow I've found seems to kill it. Twirl it into a toothbrush to remove it. I have a siphon I rigged to hook up to a scrub brush so when I scrub algae away, it gets immediately removed. Cutting back on unnecessary organic material with at least a weekly water change(or as needed) until the problem is removed. Add some nutrient absorbing fast growing plants such as Wisteria, duckweed, hornwort, fairy moss, water sprite,Hygrophila, Bacopa mint ( has a few of the same ingredients found in Melafix) and a carnivorous aquatic plant, Utricularia macrorhiza (Bladderwort) is amazing at destroying algae, more specifically the food they use. This plant is amazing being that it actually traps micro organisms as a food source. You can also soak rocks and such in peroxide and do a diluted dip for aquatic plants. The hair algae if not scrubbed off after the dip and placed into the tank will turn pink when it is dead.

Further more I only said that the process of getting hair algae isn't safe or better yet optimum. You can make it safe/ improve the water conditions and still have hair algae. It's hard to kill. I already explained how you get it. Feel free to ask for any more info.

The dip with plants has to be exact in amount and soaking time or it will kill the plants. If you need details on the process let me know.

[AlaskaJammin]

After some carefull research it definatly looks like brush algae. http://www.plantgeek.net/articles/gg_algae_faq/bba3.jpg
Thats the stuff right there. Wont come off for anything. Ive got this thee foot anubias im afraid im going to have to trash. Not shure how to get it completly out of my 210 . Escpecially since my 210 is full of expesive fish. Remove everything except the substrate and bleach the logs? Im not shure what to do here. Any input would be great, because light deprivation and the standard treatments arnt doing squat. Thanks Dude

[d20monsteroscar20]

hey i have the same probably with my community tank. I just was tier of all those algeas growing in the plants and I took the plants out. So now the q is how can I Prevent that from happening?