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Algae on Anubias


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Anubias always seems to pick up algae in my tanks. It’s the slow growing green spot algae that I have trouble with. I can tolerate  a certain amount but after a while the older leaves start to get pretty ugly. What methods have you folks developed to get this under control. 

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Well, there are a couple of different options that I would recommend. First, address the source of the problem. I was getting a TON of green spot algae on my anubias leaves and finally got it under control by turning the intensity of my light down and getting my tank in balance. I bought a $10 LED light dimmer on amazon and it worked liked magic to stop new algae growth. I have mostly low light plants in my tank, and all of them actually benefitted from this approach, including my bucephalandra which suffers from the same slow-growth algae problem.

To address existing algae, you can get nerite snails or other algae eaters, but I haven't actually noticed mine making much of a dent in the problem. For leaves that are too-far-gone and completed covered, I would probably just clip them off altogether. The more you clip off existing leaves, the more your plant will put out fresh new leaves as a replacement. If you get your algae growth under control (again, probably lighting), then you should get new leaf growth without the new algae buildup. If you don't want to take that approach, you can also manually take out the anubias plant and hand scrub each leaf. Anubias leaves are surprisingly sturdy, so if you have some finesse, you can remove the plant from the tank, take a knife, and scrape all of the algae off the surface of the leaves one by one. Sounds crazy, but I actually just did this last week and my anubias looks good as new. If your plant is firmly fixed to your hardscape, though, and can't be removed from the tank, then clipping the algae-covered leaves and waiting for regrowth is probably your best option. My anubias looks significantly healthier after I pruned off the old, sick leaves and forced new growth.

Edited by Ragnarok1200
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Thanks for the tip! I intentionally did not post the measures I’ve already taken to solve the problem but they pretty much line up with what you’re advising. At some point I’ll crack the code but for now it’s more manual scrubbing and trying to outcompete  the algae. 

Edited by Patrick_G
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Do you have any floating plants? I place a bunch of water lettuce over my anubias and they take care of any extra nutrients in the water and shade the anubias enough to prevent new algae growth (while also leaving plenty of light for my higher-light plants). I have a little bit of staghorn left that my nerites and amanos are finally eating, but the green spot isn't growing on my anubias at the moment.

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I think I’ll try some pond snails and some Ramshorns. 
I just gave the anubias a good cleaning with a toothbrush, it didn’t remove all of the green spot but after I  put the plant back in the tank the Otos attacked it like a sizzler buffet. 

Edited by Patrick_G
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On 8/3/2021 at 9:36 PM, Patrick_G said:

I think I’ll try some pond snails and some Ramshorns. 
I just gave the anubias a good cleaning with a toothbrush, it didn’t remove all of the green spot but after I  put the plant back in the tank the Otos attacked it like a sizzler buffet. 

I had this on my one Anubis and co-op soft algae eraser did much better than a tooth brush for me. Glad your otos enjoyed the buffet..😁

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