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Beginner Algae / Fertilizer Help


ChemBob
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Can someone help me identify what is going on with my Anubias? Is this an algae or a fertilizer deficiency? I have a bit of BBA or hair algae on my pothos roots, but it is relatively on control at the moment, only in a few spots. I swapped to Easy Green a few weeks ago, though this has been going on for a while before then. I also reduced lighting intensity and duration a few weeks before swapping fertilizer. I have been using Seachem root tabs for my root feeders. Not a lot of growth in my Amazon sword or crypts, but they don't look bad, just a few bad leaves. I have what I think is an Ozelot sword that is not doing well either. 

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1 hour ago, ChemBob said:

Can someone help me identify what is going on with my Anubias? Is this an algae or a fertilizer deficiency? I have a bit of BBA or hair algae on my pothos roots, but it is relatively on control at the moment, only in a few spots. I swapped to Easy Green a few weeks ago, though this has been going on for a while before then. I also reduced lighting intensity and duration a few weeks before swapping fertilizer. I have been using Seachem root tabs for my root feeders. Not a lot of growth in my Amazon sword or crypts, but they don't look bad, just a few bad leaves. I have what I think is an Ozelot sword that is not doing well either. 

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I just saw a video on this. Its common for anubias to do it. You need lots of snails. Cory's last fish room video yesterday talks about this algae. He uses bladder and Malaysian! I have it on mine too. 

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 I'm not sure. I'm not an expert. I only shared what I saw Cory say yesterday! He totally believes in bladder snails and MalaysianTrumpet for the algae. I guess they love the stuff. Some fish eat it to I just don't know what kind. Steenfott has a live stream going right now you could ask him. Probably get more information about it. 

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  • 4 weeks later...

This is how my algae problem began. I've been treating it with gluteraldrahyde (the ingredient in easy carbon) I've crashed a bunch of plants and when algae overtook an other tank. I'm trying a bit more proactive treatment now so I don't kill more plants. Now that the algae is dying my fish and snails and shrimp are eating it. Before it started dying nothing in the tank would eat it.  I'm not sure yet if it's fixed but I do know left alone it killed/out competed my plants. This is like my 3rd batch of plants. I don't know the name of that algae but it took over the leafs on my plants, first the anubius then the cripts and the the stem plants. As they stopped growing I got a different hair algae and ended up with just algae.

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I feel like it is doing better. It is not perfect, but my plants are healthier. I have done a much better job of dosing fertilizer, including root tabs.

The other thing I discovered is my heater malfunctioned on, so my tank was running at 85F. I had actually just bought a temperature controller to help prevent this, so I reduced the temperature down to 78F. I have not done any Easy Carbon or similar products. 

I think finding the correct balance of fertilizer, lighting, and temperature has helped tremendously. For a newly planted tank, I believe you will go through an algae cycle, and patience is key. I am setting up a 40 gal planted tank, and am having an algae bloom. I added some snails and plan to wait it put keeping my tank conditions optimal for plant growth.

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