Liquid co2 for staghorn/hair algae?

[Pizzafan]

My tank is super stable in terms of parameters and all fish are thriving, but this algae is beginning to be a bit much for me to look at. I also find it hard to efficiently remove manually. Has anyone had any luck using the liquid CO2 additives? I prefer not to add too many chemicals in general, but would love to cure this overgrowth!

[Marnol D]

I have found success by spot treating it with a pipet or turkey baster.

[Phantom240]

Excel spot treatments will kill it quick, fast, and in a hurry. Even better is if you drain the tank down real low for a major water change, and pipette it directly onto the algae and let it sit maybe 15 minutes before refilling. It'll be dead by the end of the day.

[Pizzafan]

On 7/14/2021 at 6:43 PM, Phantom240 said:

Excel spot treatments will kill it quick, fast, and in a hurry. Even better is if you drain the tank down real low for a major water change, and pipette it directly onto the algae and let it sit maybe 15 minutes before refilling. It'll be dead by the end of the day.

I will try then! Anything to worry about with safety for fish or snails?

[DannyBWell]

On 7/14/2021 at 6:21 PM, Pizzafan said:

I will try then! Anything to worry about with safety for fish or snails?

As long as you adhere to the dosing instructions you'll be fine I never had an issue with my fish, fry, or snails.

[Patrick_G]

I’ve dosed Excel according to the instructions for the initial dose and that seemed to work for some minor hair/filament algae. For some stubborn green spot algae on epiphytes I painted on straight Excel and it almost killed the plant. 

[Phantom240]

On 7/14/2021 at 6:21 PM, Pizzafan said:

I will try then! Anything to worry about with safety for fish or snails?

Not really, as long as you're not dumping an entire bottle into the tank. I've done spot treatments with an amount of Excel that was up to about 5x the recommended initial dose with no ill effects aside from damage to one of my anubias, but as with everything else in this hobby, YMMV. 

On 7/14/2021 at 6:45 PM, Patrick_G said:

I’ve dosed Excel according to the instructions for the initial dose and that seemed to work for some minor hair/filament algae. For some stubborn green spot algae on epiphytes I painted on straight Excel and it almost killed the plant. 

I've done that before. Not sure if it was the algae (green spot and BBA) that had caused the edges of the leaves to die off or what, but a bunch of leaves on my big anubias ended up pretty ragged after the battle with algae. 

[Lowells Fish Lab]

I've so far killed staghorn and branching cladophora with it. I always worry about its effect on the fish but haven't noticed any obvious signs of stress during treatment.