black tufts of algae

[jack dempsey chan]

ya its on my terracotta pot in my tank but do i have this because of high phosphate levels?

 

[tankboi]

I actually like it when it is on wood or rocks especially in the tanks where I can't grow plants. I once had a royal pleco that ate the stuff before but I'm not sure if that is normal!

 

[packer43064]

^^^
Agreed. I like the look of it.

 

[jack dempsey chan]

ya but do i have the algae because of high phosphate levels?

 

[cichlid_starter]

Yeah thats definitely a possibility. Get some phosguard and stick it in your filter. Amano shrimp and flagfish will eat black beard algae. What is your tank stock? You dont want those in with most cichlids. It WILL take over a tank if you dont take measures to keep it down.

 

[OllieNZ]

BBA is caused by flcutuating co2 levels unless you heat and degas you water before adding it or doing WC's at lights off time then it will always appear. Spot dosing seachem excel will kill it.

Regards

Ollie

 

[cichlid_starter]

BBA is caused by flcutuating co2 levels unless you heat and degas you water before adding it or doing WC's at lights off time then it will always appear. Spot dosing seachem excel will kill it.

Regards

Ollie

ive never heard of any of that. how would spot dosing excel help anything?

 

[GhostShrimpMan]

Could take over tank

 

[OllieNZ]

Excel makes a good algae killer put in a syringe and squirted directly onto the algae may take a couple of aplications just make sure you dont overdose the tank tho. A good algae article is this one: http://www.theplantedtank.co.uk/algae.htm BBA is fist on the list

Regards

Ollie

 

[OllieNZ]

ya but do i have the algae because of high phosphate levels?

In short no, nitrates and phospates will feed algae once it has grown but arent normally the cause of it. Also algae only require traces of nutrients to survive compared to plants so removing phosphate or nitrate wont really do much to the algae but if you have plants they will starve.

Ollie