The big clean out...

Well, I have postponed working at getting the algae out of my 55 gallon. I essentially was afraid of partial success only to be staring at it again in a few months because I could not get it all out. I don't want to do that. So, this week I am going to move the fish, pull the plants, remove all the driftwood and rocks and drain the tank. I will dig the gravel out too.

The rocks, drift wood and gravel will be soaked in chlorinated water for a few days then rinsed. The inside of the tank will be cleaned also with a chlorine solution. The one think i hate to lose are the plants. As all of them are covered with algae but still very much alive - what can I do to save them without re-seeding the algae back into the tank? Do I pitch the plants or is there something I can do?

Also, I am going to re-stock the tank with juveniles this time to get the pleasure of watching them mature.

Usil

http://www.aquariums...flourish-excel/

Flourish excel works wonders on many kinds of algae. Some plants are sensitive (most commonly seems to be Valisneria), but most do just fine with it. I have been dosing 3X the Seachem recommended dosage and have not noticed any negative effects besides my Valisneria have slowly (over months) stopped growing and have been slowly fading away. I haven't done the short term bath treatment though.

Algae is everywhere. Your goal should not be to eliminate the contamination of algae because that goal will fail. Instead, try to favor the growth of the plants over the growth of the algae. For example I've got cladophora algae contamination in my tank. Instead of breaking it down and trying to start everything fresh, I turn my lights off after they've been on for 10 hours. I measure the water and note that nitrate never rises above 10 ppm. If the algae was growing quickly I would buy some date palm fiber or PhosZorb™ and add it to the filter on a regular basis.

1. How many hours a day are your lights on?
2. What is nitrate concentration in ppm or mg/L?
3. Have you tried using PhosZorb™?

All tap water has spores of algae in it. You can never sterilize your tank, so don't try. All you can do is to try to favor plant growth over algae, and manually remove the algae when it gets too overwhelming. I don't recommend using chemicals chronically because eventually over time you get crazy resistant strains and the medicine doesn't work anymore.

Edited by EricaWieser, 26 February 2012 - 07:43 PM.

Have you tried flagfish and/or snails? I have heard that both can be useful for algae control in native fish set-ups. Perhaps when coupled with Erica's advice, this could provide you with the one two punch that would keep you from having to remove the algae manually very often. Somthing to think about anyway. Good luck.

Scott

I can definitely second Erica's advice on the PhosZorb or similar products. If you know phosphate is the problem, it does work. Unfortunately, I've not had luck with it lasting very long so it can get kind of expensive. There are also some really good threads in the advanced captive care and native plant forums on using hydrogen peroxide to wipe out algae. Good luck.

Steve.

Edited by steve, 27 February 2012 - 02:52 AM.

I can definitely second Erica's advice on the PhosZorb or similar products. If you know phosphate is the problem, it does work. Unfortunately, I've not had luck with it lasting very long so it can get kind of expensive.

I saw an article on pubmed about date palm fiber working really well to absorb phosphate. It was published in Tunisia where I guess there are lots of date palms. Here in North Carolina I don't have access to date palm fiber but if you can figure out a way to get some and if it's not too expensive for you, it stands a chance at being a really economical alternative to PhosZorb. It also works in two hours. That's pretty fast.

Here's the citation for the paper, if you're interested.
Laboratoire de Chimie & Qualité des Eaux, Département d'Aménagement & Environnement, Ecole Supérieure des Ingénieurs de l'Equipement Rural, Medjez El Bab 9070, Tunisia.
J Hazard Mater. 2009 Oct 30;170(2-3):511-9. Epub 2009 May 14.
Biosorption characteristics of phosphates from aqueous solution onto Phoenix dactylifera L. date palm fibers.
Riahi K, Thayer BB, Mammou AB, Ammar AB, Jaafoura MH.

Edited by EricaWieser, 27 February 2012 - 07:39 AM.

Erica, I read your post last night and wondered what you were talking about with the date palm fiber, so I researched it and came up with the abstract to that article. Very fascinating stuff. When I was growing up in California, I had a huge date palm in my front yard. Kinda makes me wish I would've collected some of the fiber when we trimmed it.

All tap water has spores of algae in it.

Ewww!
Actually by EPA regs, public water supplies served by surface water must be disinfected. That's usually chlorine, ozone or UV. Not much gets by that, lucky for us humans.

Speaking of public water supplies, many public water systems use phosphate products. try using RO or distilled or rain water for evaporation make up and even water changes.

And yah, more plants equals less algae.

Ewww!
Actually by EPA regs, public water supplies served by surface water must be disinfected. That's usually chlorine, ozone or UV. Not much gets by that, lucky for us humans.

Wow, you're right. I tried to find out whether or not tap water was sterile and I found this paper: http://www.ncbi.nlm....les/PMC1472650/ It reached the conclusion that, "No differences were noted in the rates of infection and healing between the use of tap water and normal sterile saline in the cleansing of acute and chronic wounds."
Dang, that's pretty clean.

I guess the contamination must come from somewhere else, then. Maybe the air in our rooms? Or from the surfaces of the live plants? It would be pretty hard to plant a tank with snippings from an aquatic plant without also transferring over an innoculum of algae.

I had no idea tap water was so clean.

Edited by EricaWieser, 28 February 2012 - 07:39 PM.

I had no idea tap water was so clean.

Thanks, that's what I do. People take it for granted, but it's a cornerstone of our quality of life.

As for where the algae comes from, good question. Green stuff seems to grow wherever there is water and light. Airborne?
For what it's worth, I've never seen algae grow in the many jugs of distilled water I've seen around the various labs over the years.