algae issue cant seem to get a hold on

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M

moneysink

Candiru
MFK Member
Jan 16, 2010
121
3
48
Surrey
So I have recently started having very bad algae issues that just dont seem to go away, I have had my tank running fine for a few years now with just 2 T5 HO lights for the fish
(210 gallon cichlid tank 72Lx24Wx30H) and I got the idea of adding plants to give it a better look. now my tank has every kind of algae known to man (Brown, green spot, and the dreaded BBA)I have dropped the lighting period to 6 hours per day I do bi weekly water changes and scrape/scrub the glass and even went out and got a UV sterilizer, but while it isnt getting much worse it is still very bad and it keeps coming back very quickly.
Obviously somthing is very wrong here, Im not sure if this is really the correct forum but I figure if anybody knows a solution for algae it will be the planted tank folks, and Dammit I WANT PLANTS IN MY TANK!!! lol also should I be following the 1 WPG rule? becouse that will be very expensive lol, I am cool with just some low light plants like anubia and amazon swords, and will the fact that my tank is 30 high affect the light getting to the bottom?
cheers.
 
Hello; I had an algae problem in a tank some years back. The tank was densley planted. Algae became thick and sheet like. I could peel it off of plants and structure and also had a lot of the stringy type. I treated the sheet stuff with an antibiotic as it apparently was a type that was algae and bacteria combined.

The biggest difference was the lack of snails in the tank. I had set it up with very old gravel that had sat in a bucket long enough for all the snails to die, so I had no snails in the tank. (When cleaning it I washed out a lot of shells. That gravel had sat for years and was dry. I have had the snails survive in gravel that sat in buckets for many weeks, apparently they can live a long time if there is moisture. I started keeping my extra gravel in containers that have a drain on the bottom, like an old picnic cooler, when I can. This also makes the container a bit lighter after the water drains out.) I went to a couple of fish shops and acquired some trumpet snails and ramshorn snails. Once they established a decent population the algae problem is no more. I have set up a lot of planted tanks and always had good results with plants in tanks with these snails.

I am able to keep a 12+ hour photoperoid for the plants and do not have an excesss of algae. Very little to none on the plants and small amounts on the glass which is easy to scrape off from time to time.
 
snails you say huh? will certainly give it a try but becouse of the cichlids they may end up becoming a meal. worth a shot though.
 
No animals are going to control algae for you when it is that out of control, also not many creatures will eat live black brush algae not even SAE. When you added plants with those high output lights without properly fertilizing and adding CO2 you've created an imbalance of some sort and that has allowed the algae to take hold. Your choices are to lower the light intensity down enough (raise them or put a screen between them and the surface) or to go balls to wall high tech including pressurized CO2 and fertilizer dosing. You can try to mess around with excel and light fertilizing but that is tough to get a handle on.

In a high tech tank one approach to controlling algae is to add excess of everything (except light). You add more CO2 and fertilizers than are needed so there are no imbalances. Every week you do a large water change to reset things and start over with overdosing.
 
Get rid of the UV sterilizer, it is not helping at all. As said above, you have a major imbalance. What size T5 bulbs do you have?
 
lipadj46 said:
No animals are going to control algae for you when it is that out of control, also not many creatures will eat live black brush algae not even SAE. When you added plants with those high output lights without properly fertilizing and adding CO2 you've created an imbalance of some sort and that has allowed the algae to take hold. Your choices are to lower the light intensity down enough (raise them or put a screen between them and the surface) or to go balls to wall high tech including pressurized CO2 and fertilizer dosing. You can try to mess around with excel and light fertilizing but that is tough to get a handle on.

In a high tech tank one approach to controlling algae is to add excess of everything (except light). You add more CO2 and fertilizers than are needed so there are no imbalances. Every week you do a large water change to reset things and start over with overdosing.
Click to expand...

the lights are about a foot above the water screwed into the top of the stand. is two 48 inch T5 HO bulbs to intense? or not enough?
I would really prefer to keep it low tech without the C02 and fertilizers if I can help it.
 
Sand substrate does not provide much for nutrients other than silica, which causes algae growth. You need to start dosing and testing your NPK values.
 
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