When algae is scraped off the side of a tank, does it typically die, or does it reattach to another surface?
Does scraped algae reattach to surfaces?
- Thread starter JackEmerson
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If light and nutrients such as high nitrate the algae will grow back where it was scraped.
yes, eventually it will grow back, but I am more asking about the pieces of algae that scrape off. Do those pieces just die off, or do they take root in other parts of the tank?
I personally just remove it from aquarium. If it dies just adds to unwanted nutrients. It doesn't attach to other things from my experience.
Have no clue but have wondered about that. Now, I just scrape, scrub, then do a huge water change and no longer worry about it.
It might depend on the algae, but most should not since you drastically change their status (light, waterflow, physical structure) and damage them.
The ones that grow on my glas curl up and die, I have never seen them reattach. I once scrapped my back glas aswell, which gave me larger and thick peaces, the ones I didnt fish out got stuck to plants, browned, and died aswell, just very slow and ugly. My snails also did not bother as long as they were green.
The ones that grow on my glas curl up and die, I have never seen them reattach. I once scrapped my back glas aswell, which gave me larger and thick peaces, the ones I didnt fish out got stuck to plants, browned, and died aswell, just very slow and ugly. My snails also did not bother as long as they were green.
Generally speaking, when you scrape algae off it will die, although certainly hair algae seems largely unaffected and can continue to grow.
Again speaking generally, algae growing in a tank is usually harmless and is utilizing nutrients and improving general water quality, like any growing green plant. Scraping it off and then just leaving the debris to die and decompose in your tank is about the worst course of action. If you feel you have too much algae, that it is unsightly or choking your plants, etc. then by all means remove some; harvesting it from your tank removes the nutrients from the tank and again improves water quality. Killing it without removing it looks even worse and fouls the water.
If you had a mouse in your house and set a trap to catch and kill it, what would you do with the body? Dispose of it...or leave it to rot on the floor?
Again speaking generally, algae growing in a tank is usually harmless and is utilizing nutrients and improving general water quality, like any growing green plant. Scraping it off and then just leaving the debris to die and decompose in your tank is about the worst course of action. If you feel you have too much algae, that it is unsightly or choking your plants, etc. then by all means remove some; harvesting it from your tank removes the nutrients from the tank and again improves water quality. Killing it without removing it looks even worse and fouls the water.
If you had a mouse in your house and set a trap to catch and kill it, what would you do with the body? Dispose of it...or leave it to rot on the floor?
Although algae will probably not reattach.....
There are thousands of algal spores in the algae scraped off the glass, that spread throughout the tank, and start new growth.
After scraping, to reduce those spores, its a good idea to vacuum up the scraped remnants.
Although I don't like it on the front glass, as jjohnwm said, algae uses up deleterious nutrients, and I promote its growth everywhere else.
There are thousands of algal spores in the algae scraped off the glass, that spread throughout the tank, and start new growth.
After scraping, to reduce those spores, its a good idea to vacuum up the scraped remnants.
Although I don't like it on the front glass, as jjohnwm said, algae uses up deleterious nutrients, and I promote its growth everywhere else.
I’m not positive but I think it depends on the type you of algae. For example I’ve heard that scraping coroline algae helps it to spread quicker
Last weekend I installed a fresh UV lamp inside a fixture that had a lamp that was a couple years old and had long since stopped being effective. When I did that I yanked a bunch of the algae in the tank out, scraped the glass and then called it good. There was still an easy handful or two of algae in the tank that was unattached but moving in the current. I thought I'd let the poret sponge on the FX6 intake catch a bunch of it and then I'd wring it out in a week or so.
The algae that's now stuck to the poret is vibrant green, healthy as a horse and it's the exact same material that I cut from the plants and hidey-holes last week.
Whatever kind is common in my old stainless tank doesn't seem to be harmed by getting yanked off of whatever it had been attached to.
The algae that's now stuck to the poret is vibrant green, healthy as a horse and it's the exact same material that I cut from the plants and hidey-holes last week.
Whatever kind is common in my old stainless tank doesn't seem to be harmed by getting yanked off of whatever it had been attached to.