I'm almost giving up....:(

[GreenTea]

have been battling with BGA for the past few months... followed Tom Barr's instructions very closely by doing a blackout followed by dosing KNO3... but to no avail... BGA keeps coming back...

pls give me some advice on what i should do...

tank dimension: 6x2x2
lighting: 4x55w + 4x36w
CO2: abt 20ppm
KH: 4-5

fert regime:
lushgro aqua weekly
lushgro micros weekly
KNO3 5-6tsps every alternate day
MGSO4 8tsp 2 times a week
PO4 1/2 tsp 2 times a week

have been adding more PO4 as i also have green spots on the glass....
also, im having BBA on the surface of the lapis gravel....

experts, pls give me some advice... im really depressed as i cant seem to get my tank to be algea free....


thanks alot...

[wong1979]

I'm no expert in algae extermination but I can just give some basic advice. It's also best to post your tank pics for assessment. Usually, algae outbreak is caused by 'instability' (a very vague word) of your tank parameters. Lighting, and nutrients being the most important determining factor imho.

You mentioned your lightings and fertilization for your 6 feet tank. Lights seem to be on the high side. As for dosing 8 teaspoons of kno3 every alternate days seem too much to me.

I would suggest you do a 80% water change and at the same time sucking up all those algae manually. Reduce your lighting to half of what you are using. Then dose your tank everyday but with very small amounts (I can't tell u how much, u have to gauge for yourself). Changing the water by 80 % is very important, as this helps to reset most of your nutrient levels and then you can play around with it.

You haven't encounter the worst case scenario yet. The green dust Good luck!

[hii]

it depend on what plant you keeping, slow growing plant will hit by BBA & BGA easily. My tank experience before and I have no choice to use H2O2 for once to clean BBA on leave surface.

Reduce your light and dosing will help....yet you need to provide detail of what's plants you keeping and etc so bro here can help you out.

[lorba]

Try anti-botics, dosage every day. It will clear up beautifully after 4-5days.

[benny]

Try anti-botics, dosage every day. It will clear up beautifully after 4-5days.

I was going to suggest that too. Very effective against BGA, which is some kind of cynobacteria (if I recall correctly).

Cheers,

[fishgoogle]

Hi Lorba,
Any recommendation on the brands? n the estimate price?

Cheers!

Try anti-botics, dosage every day. It will clear up beautifully after 4-5days.

[bclee]

Green Tea, how long did you blackout your tank? Immediately after the blackout, did all the traces of BGA go away? If not, you need to blackout longer, probably up to 5 days. During this period, you need to fully cover the tank such that no light leaks through to the tank. Do a large water change immediately after that follow by dosing of fertilisers.

If you are seeing BBA also, you might also need to tweak your CO2 a bit more. Try pushing it up more. Check your diffusion method, you have a large tank and you need to have a pretty efficient diffusion to get the CO2 distributed.

Make sure you have a good circulation. I find good circulation helps keep BGA away. BGA seems to like stagnant and low O2 areas.

Your fertilising regime seems ok. OTOH, how frequently are you changing water? How much do you change?

BC

[mordrake]

BC is on the right track.
i had some BGA problems in my 6ft a couple of months back.
followed Tom's method and added an eden 228 for better circulation.
no more BGA problems so far.
your co2 should be upped to at least 30ppm.
don't worry too much about your discus at that co2 level.
i have 9 wild discus and 3 domestics in the tank with co2 levels definitely more than 30ppm. no health problems (snakeskin and tefe green spawned a few days ago - eggs eaten up) if you increase co2 level gradually over a few days. need not via increasing bubble rate cos it could be co2 diffusion efficiency issues.

[GreenTea]

I was going to suggest that too. Very effective against BGA, which is some kind of cynobacteria (if I recall correctly).

Cheers,

where can i get the anti biotic? and how much does it cost?

[GreenTea]

Green Tea, how long did you blackout your tank? Immediately after the blackout, did all the traces of BGA go away? If not, you need to blackout longer, probably up to 5 days. During this period, you need to fully cover the tank such that no light leaks through to the tank. Do a large water change immediately after that follow by dosing of fertilisers.

If you are seeing BBA also, you might also need to tweak your CO2 a bit more. Try pushing it up more. Check your diffusion method, you have a large tank and you need to have a pretty efficient diffusion to get the CO2 distributed.

Make sure you have a good circulation. I find good circulation helps keep BGA away. BGA seems to like stagnant and low O2 areas.

Your fertilising regime seems ok. OTOH, how frequently are you changing water? How much do you change?

BC

i have done a 5 day black out but after the 5 days, i could still see some BGA, thus i siphon them out of the tank... 3-4 days later, i see them coming back again... i tot that BGA is mainly due to lack of NO3 thus i added more, but still dont seem to have any effect...

i change 50% of water every week...

[bclee]

i have done a 5 day black out but after the 5 days, i could still see some BGA, thus i siphon them out of the tank... 3-4 days later, i see them coming back again... i tot that BGA is mainly due to lack of NO3 thus i added more, but still dont seem to have any effect...

i change 50% of water every week...

Did you totally cover up your tank? With 100% darkness, they should go away after 5 days.

No, not only NO3. Check CO2 and cirulation as I have mentioned.

BC

[PeterGwee]

Clean the filter well (mechanical section only) and up the CO2 like what Bclee has mentioned. Nothing will work well if the CO2 is not well taken care of with CO2 enrichment methods.

Regards
Peter Gwee

[hii]

where can i get the anti biotic? and how much does it cost?

I think he need the anti biotic to try so, why don't someone solve his question since he try almost all the method...

[wong1979]

It took a look at the 6 ft tank you posted. Your plants are too little and your fertization and lightings are definitely an overkill.



As for the blackout techniques that others suggest, I've not tried it out before but I think it'll work somehow. But then again, I feel that it isn't the most appropriate way of controlling algae. You black out for 5 days and your plants will look kinda weird and stringy, unhealthy looking but it won't die. Doing a large water change is the sure thing for you now.

I see you also have discus, have you been feeding frozen food to your discus? Ever measured your nitrate levels? I suspect you will see a deep red if you test it now

[barmby]

Dont give up. Push the CO2 to high level = 30ppm during illumination. Improve the water circulation. Continue to add the nutrients back to the tank.

However, you need plants to beat the algae. BECAUSE YOU DOSE ALOT OF PO4 in there. But its ok. You need plants to feed on them not BGA. Balance is everything. For this reason, we also ask you add alot of NO3 too. BALANCE!!

Add more plants. Grow plants and not the algae. Make sure the healthy plants out complete the algae by giving them suffient CO2, NPK, and traces.

[GreenTea]

will be in reservist for next 2 weeks

will get back to my tank once im back..

[rocketshrimp]

In this hobby...you never can give up....like they say in the song
"You can check out any time you like, But you can never leave."

Tear down your tank for a while. put in the storeroom....very soon, you will get the itch all over again. I have been keeping fishes for as long as I can remember...comes and go.

[GreenTea]

Try anti-botics, dosage every day. It will clear up beautifully after 4-5days.

does anyone know where can i get the anti biotics? will try to get it on the weekend...

[toledosun]

Hi Green Tea,

I had the same problem with BGA before using Lush-gro. In my case, when I had 3 watts/gallon and about 3 bubbles per second in my tank, BGA kept appearing even after the blackout method. I changed tactics and after a blackout, I used seachem's fertilizer instead and BGA did not appear. I tried for a month, reverted back to lush gro with strong lights and high CO2 and guess what, bga came back!

Now, I've changed to low light plants, am using less light, less CO2 with lush gro and no bga.

I'm not saying the product is no good but it may just be that we're using too much or it's so concentrated that it causes an imbalance.

try the black out method again but after that, try not adding lush gro. Perhaps it works for you too.

[juggler]

tank dimension: 6x2x2
lighting: 4x55w + 4x36w
CO2: abt 20ppm
KH: 4-5

fert regime:
lushgro aqua weekly
lushgro micros weekly
KNO3 5-6tsps every alternate day
MGSO4 8tsp 2 times a week
PO4 1/2 tsp 2 times a week

I think better cut down on the fertilisation.

KNO3: say you have added 18 tsp per week, you are hitting 90ppm NO3. Too high. Can stop it for the time being until the water change has lowered it. Note that Lushgro-Aqua has N as well.
MgSO4: 16 tsp per week gives 12.6ppm Mg. Too much. I think our tap water has sufficient if you are doing weekly water change. In fact, Lushgro-Aqua has Mg already. So i think can stop adding MgSO4.
KH2PO4: 1 tsp weekly gives 5.55 ppm PO4. Can stop it for the time being until the water change has lowered it. Recommended is 1ppm - about 1/5 tsp.

Links to refer:
Estimative Index by Tom Barr
Chuck's dosing calculator.
Lushgro dosing calculator.

Good luck. And don't give up!