Fluval Stratum helped me grow this gorgeous algae

[Cyndi]

Ok, so here's the story. Last November (4 months ago) I added Fluval Stratum substrate (aquasoil) and Eco-Complete to my BBS substrate. Instead of the phenomenal plant growth I had been getting with just my BBS and Easy Root Tabs, I now grow this awesome algae with Rapunzel like hair. I can also grow BBA . But not crypts or anything else. Except Rotala. I am very frustrated.

Question: I'm ready to call this substrate quits. Should I remove it or can I cap it with more Eco-complete or Black Diamond Blasting Sand? Anything I do is going to be expensive as this is a 90 Gallon tank, but capping it would be more economical, so I hope that is the answer. Any help would be much appreciated!

[Cyndi]

Or opinions for that matter!

[Kurt Brutting]

I just setup another 40 breeder with Fluval Stratum and I capped it with a lot of sand. I also used fine media bags for the stratum so I can re-use it. In the media bags the holes are perfect size for roots to penetrate but not leak the stratum.  
What is your water parameters, light, and light schedule? 

[Cyndi]

On 3/31/2022 at 8:38 PM, Kurt Brutting said:

I just setup another 40 breeder with Fluval Stratum and I capped it with a lot of sand. I also used fine media bags for the stratum so I can re-use it. In the media bags the holes are perfect size for roots to penetrate but not leak the stratum.  
What is your water parameters, light, and light schedule? 

Media bags would have been an awesome choice (🙄 ). I wish I'd thought of that- it would literally save me $$$$$ 100s! 

Lights: Cool White and Pure white at 75% - 8 hrs not including ramp up and down. See picture. I also use a Stingray but since the tank is so deep I think it probably only adds color.

CO2: Non-injected

Ferts: That substrate only

Aquarium Co-op Test strips: Nitrate: 10-25 ;Nitrite 0 ;Hardness 150 ;Buffer 40

Water Change Schedule: Weekly 50%

Tank was fully planted before substrate change, all growing medium well. Only change was the substrate.

 

Edited April 1, 2022 by Cyndi

[Streetwise]

That is a lot of blue. I only run 1% blue for the final hour of my schedule, when all the other lights are off.

[lefty o]

thats some serious hair algae. for sure cut out the blue light.

[nabokovfan87]

On 3/31/2022 at 3:27 PM, Cyndi said:

Question: I'm ready to call this substrate quits. Should I remove it or can I cap it with more Eco-complete or Black Diamond Blasting Sand? Anything I do is going to be expensive as this is a 90 Gallon tank, but capping it would be more economical, so I hope that is the answer. Any help would be much appreciated!

Does the tank have any amanos?

On 3/31/2022 at 7:46 PM, Cyndi said:

Tank was fully planted before substrate change, all growing medium well. Only change was the substrate.

 

Turn the blue down to 1% (all it does is grow algae) you can also turn UP warm white, and slightly turn down cold white (5% or so).

I would recommend checking this one out if you need any tips or advice. Let me show you what mine is at for comparison.  You're running a really long exposure time which isn't an issue if you control it in the tank with algae eaters or amanos.
 

 

Edited April 1, 2022 by nabokovfan87

[nabokovfan87]

Before I added "more" amanos

 

After adding Amanos (3-4 days later, sorry about the dirty glass)

This is on my smaller tank (not the one above) grows Anubias and so the lighting is much lower %.

 

Hopefully this helps

 

[JoeQ]

First let me say: I am truly jealous of that hair algea, second 75% is wayyyyy too much light for a non co2 40 breeder. I'm at 18" from the substrate and I stay between 35% ~ 40% growing stems, crypts, and an anubis with tight Lilly (in my darkest corner). When I go over 40% I cause troubles (like the status of my tank now)....... Watch the Bentley video, it has probably the best 3.0 light setting around. Then look to the 3.0 thread, I created a spreadsheet that helps a user easily manipulate the percentage of his DaySim settings. 

[Cyndi]

Hey guys! Thanks so much for the great advice - I'll get back this afternoon to fine tune my settings- which I think is a really good stop-gap measure.  And I'll turn down the blue right now!

So to clarify (I know things get really confusing in a long thread) this tank is a 90 Gallon (25" deep). And the only thing that changed was the substrate. So I think we have established that I have too many nutrients and too much light and not enough CO2. All was well until I CHANGED THE SUBSTRATE (not yelling, just emphasizing for those who skim) 😃. 

Question: DO YOU THINK capping the current substrate (Blend of Stratum, Eco-Complete, and BBS) would effectively contain the excess nutrients?

Again, thank you for all the great responses - I'll go back and review that Bentley Pasco video. And just because I like humiliating myself I've included a pic of the entire mess. Consider this a "before" picture.

Note: almost an entire 5.5 gallon bucket of substrate has already been removed at the time of this pic.

On 4/1/2022 at 8:19 AM, JoeQ said:

First let me say: I am truly jealous of that hair algea, second 75% is wayyyyy too much light for a non co2 40 breeder. I'm at 18" from the substrate and I stay between 35% ~ 40% growing stems, crypts, and an anubis with tight Lilly (in my darkest corner). When I go over 40% I cause troubles (like the status of my tank now)....... Watch the Bentley video, it has probably the best 3.0 light setting around. Then look to the 3.0 thread, I created a spreadsheet that helps a user easily manipulate the percentage of his DaySim settings. 

That spreadsheet sounds awesome! I'm on that thread somewhere, so I should be able to find it 

On 4/1/2022 at 2:12 AM, nabokovfan87 said:

Before I added "more" amanos

 

After adding Amanos (3-4 days later, sorry about the dirty glass)

This is on my smaller tank (not the one above) grows Anubias and so the lighting is much lower %.

 

Hopefully this helps

 

Those amanos did some amazing work! Mine were an expensive snack 😑

Edited April 1, 2022 by Cyndi

[JoeQ]

@Cyndi The spreadsheet is toward the end somewhere. Bentleys settings are fantastic once you get them dialed in. Just keep in mind, IMO erroring on the side of less light is better than, erroring on the side of too much light! That and blue light causes BBA, i usually use the calculator to tone down the blue, such as the main percentage set to 35% with the blue spectrum at set at 25% ~ 30%. Good luck, let us know how you make out! 

Edited April 1, 2022 by JoeQ
Cleaity

[Cyndi]

On 4/1/2022 at 10:12 AM, JoeQ said:

@Cyndi The spreadsheet is toward the end somewhere. Bentleys settings are fantastic once you get them dialed in. Just keep in mind, IMO erroring on the side of less light is better than, erroring on the side of too much light! That and blue light causes BBA, i usually use the calculator to tone down the blue, such as the main percentage set to 35% with the blue spectrum at set at 25% ~ 30%. Good luck, let us know how you make out! 

Hi JoeQ - So I found that spreadsheet and I'm reposting it here for convenience - this looks really helpful -THANK YOU!! . I've also reprinted it. One of the issues I'm having is that even now the light is not "bright" enough for my enjoyment, but of course all that algae is also severely hampering my enjoyment, so there's that. I'll go tinker for a bit and report back!🙂

 

 

Edited April 2, 2022 by Cyndi
Clarity

[JoeQ]

@CyndiYou are welcome, I've also made a percentage calculator for Bentleys Aquasky settings, but I still need to toy with some finishing touches. As far as hosting, im not sure how long it'll be on that site, I am only able to host on account of being a beta tester. 

As far as the light, remember less is more! I bumped mine back down to 33 percent (my original percentage), upon the first water change my plants are pearling like crazy and I seam to have a more stable NO3. Now, I just need to find how to get a stable KH and ill have it made! 🤣

 

 

Also don't make too many changes too soon, give it a good 2 weeks before tinkering! 

[Cyndi]

I wanted to give an update - I got a lot of good advice from this thread! Per @Kurt Brutting I got some huge 5 gallon size media bags and filled them with the old substrate. (I didn't use it all). This was a mixture of BBS, Statum and a little Eco-complete. This gave me the height I was looking for. The project was stalled because I needed some big rocks. I went to a rock yard - and after much awkward explaining and wandering around like a fool in the heat, I finally convinced the guy in charge to let me grab three rocks from the top of an unbroken pallet. And they were free! Yay! They are strangely patterned, but I feel an odd affection for them. The one underneath the log is named Raphael after my rock yard friend 🙂

@JoeQ I also studied that video and turned my lights WAY down. I  found Bentley's suggestion to gradually increase the lighting to be very helpful. Today was the first day for my white lights to be at 50% - up from 33% (This is a 90 gallon deep tank). I'm watching carefully for algae. I do have about 25 ppm  nitrates, but after watching Irene's video, I added potassium instead of doing a WC.

On 3/31/2022 at 11:41 PM, Streetwise said:

That is a lot of blue. I only run 1% blue for the final hour of my schedule, when all the other lights are off.

I also had cut the blue completely off and all the plants melted. None of the stem plants survived my little experiment. Now my blue is very minimal.  Luckily I had more cuttings, and hooray, I can buy more plants! All in all I am very happy with the results and I think this will be good long term tank. Thank you everyone for all your help! 🙂

[Kurt Brutting]

It looks awesome, great job!

[JoeQ]

Looks great! But so hurt to see that beautiful algea go! 😢 Rip oh great hair algea! 🤣 On the potassium im dosing pretty much nothing but potassium and iron with great results! Potassium, powerful stuff! 

[Minanora]

On 5/19/2022 at 7:32 AM, JoeQ said:

Looks great! But so hurt to see that beautiful algea go! 😢 Rip oh great hair algea! 🤣 On the potassium im dosing pretty much nothing but potassium and iron with great results! Potassium, powerful stuff! 

That's pretty much where I'm at these days. Micros, potassium and iron.

That was a beautiful hair algae wall though. So whispy and lush.

[Cyndi]

On 5/19/2022 at 10:32 AM, JoeQ said:

Looks great! But so hurt to see that beautiful algea go! 😢 Rip oh great hair algea! 🤣 On the potassium im dosing pretty much nothing but potassium and iron with great results! Potassium, powerful stuff! 

Awe, yes, let's sing a sad song for the algae. As soon as I stopped providing it optimal care, it died out. It was surprisingly delicate. At least I have a record of it here!

Do you dose with Equilibrium? It seems like it would be cheaper than bottles of Potassium. I'll post Irene's video that talks about it just in case anyone wants to know!

Thanks for the engaging discussion - its fun!

 

On 5/19/2022 at 11:48 AM, Minanora said:

That's pretty much where I'm at these days. Micros, potassium and iron.

That was a beautiful hair algae wall though. So whispy and lush.

Wow, I wonder where I've been that I didn't realize this??

[JoeQ]

On 5/19/2022 at 11:48 AM, Minanora said:

That's pretty much where I'm at these days. Micros, potassium and iron.

For full disclosure im also dosing no3 because im so lightly stocked. As far as micros go ill probably start dosing FlorinMulti weekly instead of just after water changes. Not to put down eazy green but lately my thoughts have been there's just too much 'stuff' in there that we don't need! 

[JoeQ]

On 5/19/2022 at 11:52 AM, Cyndi said:

Awe, yes, let's sing a sad song for the algae. As soon as I stopped providing it optimal care, it died out. It was surprisingly delicate. At least I have a record of it here!

Do you dose with Equilibrium? It seems like it would be cheaper than bottles of Potassium. I'll post Irene's video that talks about it just in case anyone wants to know!

Thanks for the engaging discussion - its fun!

 

Wow, I wonder where I've been that I didn't realize this??

I don't dose Equilibrium, my water (east coast) already has enough 'stuff' in it (except for calicum) . Im just not sure what that stuff is. I'll have to check out the video you speak of. But interestingly enough, since my dosing has changed to Potassium and Iron I haven't needed to suppliment baking soda to raise my KH. I'll try to post a picture update in my journal so you can see the incredible root growth in just 10 days! 

Edited May 19, 2022 by JoeQ

[Minanora]

On 5/19/2022 at 8:52 AM, Cyndi said:

Awe, yes, let's sing a sad song for the algae. As soon as I stopped providing it optimal care, it died out. It was surprisingly delicate. At least I have a record of it here!

Do you dose with Equilibrium? It seems like it would be cheaper than bottles of Potassium. I'll post Irene's video that talks about it just in case anyone wants to know!

Thanks for the engaging discussion - its fun!

 

Wow, I wonder where I've been that I didn't realize this??

I sang a sad song for the algae. 🤣 My water is super hard with high KH and GH so I don't dose equilibrium. I have a jar of it though. Just in case.

Don't stress it, I feel the same way! I thought you needed to dose all the macros. I am new to taking proactive care of my aquatic plants. I had a battle royale with a wall and carpet of algae. I just did a huge mental download of fertilizing submerged plants over the last two months. It's a lot more like my terrestrial plant gardens than I thought it was. Easier than my garden at this point.

[JoeQ]

On 5/19/2022 at 3:46 PM, Minanora said:

I sang a sad song for the algae. 🤣 My water is super hard with high KH and GH so I don't dose equilibrium. I have a jar of it though. Just in case.

Don't stress it, I feel the same way! I thought you needed to dose all the macros. I am new to taking proactive care of my aquatic plants. I had a battle royale with a wall and carpet of algae. I just did a huge mental download of fertilizing submerged plants over the last two months. It's a lot more like my terrestrial plant gardens than I thought it was. Easier than my garden at this point.

Its about the same, i always thought dosing had to be precise as to not OD your fish. I'm starting to realize its more based on the look and an educated guess on what the plant needs

[Cyndi]

On 5/19/2022 at 3:46 PM, Minanora said:

I sang a sad song for the algae. 🤣 My water is super hard with high KH and GH so I don't dose equilibrium. I have a jar of it though. Just in case.

Don't stress it, I feel the same way! I thought you needed to dose all the macros. I am new to taking proactive care of my aquatic plants. I had a battle royale with a wall and carpet of algae. I just did a huge mental download of fertilizing submerged plants over the last two months. It's a lot more like my terrestrial plant gardens than I thought it was. Easier than my garden at this point.

Yeah you don’t have to water it! 

[nabokovfan87]

On 3/31/2022 at 3:45 PM, Cyndi said:

Or opinions for that matter!

Congrats on getting things in control.  Awesome work for sure and it definitely is an amazing looking tank!

On 4/1/2022 at 6:28 AM, Cyndi said:

Question: DO YOU THINK capping the current substrate (Blend of Stratum, Eco-Complete, and BBS) would effectively contain the excess nutrients?

Again, thank you for all the great responses - I'll go back and review that Bentley Pasco video. And just because I like humiliating myself I've included a pic of the entire mess. Consider this a "before" picture.

I ran a tank with sand / the stratum and after a bit of flow from the HoB I ended up with sand mixed with black knobs all over it.  Probably the corys having fun thinking it was some kind of sporting event!  I don't think capping it would've done too much to stop the issues you were having.  Some of those leech out a TON of nitrates/ammonia and the only way to resolve it is just high volume water changes and time.  After a few weeks and the tank is "cycled" it should stop leeching as bad, but that's something where you wouldn't want plants and stuff in there.  I know there's a lot of guides and videos on youtube of people starting up a tank right away and just doing 1 or 2 water changes.  I usually do 4-5 based on testing results. 

Based on the photo, my apologies for the delay and just now seeing it, I would've used a scraper and scraped it out as best I could and then done a massive water change (75-90%).  It's one of those things where you want to manually remove it as much as possible and then fight it with balancing the light and nutrients.  Again, I don't think the substrate is the "root cause" of the issues, but it definitely didn't help the situation.

On 5/18/2022 at 6:56 PM, Cyndi said:

I also had cut the blue completely off and all the plants melted. None of the stem plants survived my little experiment. Now my blue is very minimal.  Luckily I had more cuttings, and hooray, I can buy more plants! All in all I am very happy with the results and I think this will be good long term tank. Thank you everyone for all your help! 🙂

 

On 5/18/2022 at 6:56 PM, Cyndi said:

 I also studied that video and turned my lights WAY down. I  found Bentley's suggestion to gradually increase the lighting to be very helpful. Today was the first day for my white lights to be at 50% - up from 33% (This is a 90 gallon deep tank). I'm watching carefully for algae. I do have about 25 ppm  nitrates, but after watching Irene's video, I added potassium instead of doing a WC.

It appears you have a lot more plant load this iteration, and the tank itself is absolutely awesome. I will be excited to see how you trim the plants and shape it once everything is grown in. You do have some stems, so if you do run into slow growth or lackluster growth, it might simply be a matter of boosting up your white LEDs and getting some PAR down deeper in the tank.  I posted my settings for my 29G in the lighting section, but I think it's important to mention the plant load as you monitor the % you're operating at.

I recently swapped out my 24" planted for a 36" planted (on a 29G) and it's really doing so much better despite the severe algae issues I was showing earlier.  Sometimes we see the light and thing it's "enough" but there's a lot of refraction and loss as a result when you're going that deep in a tank.  A lot of this is based on what kind of lights the plants want at the location they are at. Just a note.  I'm not trying to say that your settings need adjusted or anything like that, but just something to be aware of as you monitor the algae.  One of Bentley's other videos that's pretty useful is the one where he breaks down a few studies on light spectrums and what each one does for plants.  I have used that (and so has he) to set the different ratios he recommends for certain types of tanks and plant growth.  Some plants want a bit more blue, some need red, some might just want PAR.  Based on those tweaks you can control a bit how the plants fill in the tank as well.

I wanted to just pass on some advice Bentley gave me on his stream.  I asked him what he keeps his nitrates at.  He said on his plant for profit / heavy planted tanks he's usually 5-10 ppm.  For his other tanks, community setups, he does have "some algae" and he is again, trying to target that 5 ppm range.  There's a bit of fluctuation because of the fish load.  I mention that because it's something I'm seeing promising results in my tank, dropping from the 30-40 range as my base down to 10 and I am FINALLY seeing the growth I expected to see.

I'm working on repairing a bit of hardscape and plants in my QT tank and starting from a place of hair algae exactly like what you had going on.  I'm definitely hoping I can manage half as well as you did with the adjustments I'm making.

With time you'll be able to get that light on 100% load with the plants you have in the tank, it's going to be AWESOME!

I'm glad you got it sorted and are finally happy with your results. It shows.

[Cyndi]

On 5/20/2022 at 2:30 AM, nabokovfan87 said:

Congrats on getting things in control.  Awesome work for sure and it definitely is an amazing looking tank!

I ran a tank with sand / the stratum and after a bit of flow from the HoB I ended up with sand mixed with black knobs all over it.  Probably the corys having fun thinking it was some kind of sporting event!  I don't think capping it would've done too much to stop the issues you were having.  Some of those leech out a TON of nitrates/ammonia and the only way to resolve it is just high volume water changes and time.  After a few weeks and the tank is "cycled" it should stop leeching as bad, but that's something where you wouldn't want plants and stuff in there.  I know there's a lot of guides and videos on youtube of people starting up a tank right away and just doing 1 or 2 water changes.  I usually do 4-5 based on testing results. 

Based on the photo, my apologies for the delay and just now seeing it, I would've used a scraper and scraped it out as best I could and then done a massive water change (75-90%).  It's one of those things where you want to manually remove it as much as possible and then fight it with balancing the light and nutrients.  Again, I don't think the substrate is the "root cause" of the issues, but it definitely didn't help the situation.

 

It appears you have a lot more plant load this iteration, and the tank itself is absolutely awesome. I will be excited to see how you trim the plants and shape it once everything is grown in. You do have some stems, so if you do run into slow growth or lackluster growth, it might simply be a matter of boosting up your white LEDs and getting some PAR down deeper in the tank.  I posted my settings for my 29G in the lighting section, but I think it's important to mention the plant load as you monitor the % you're operating at.

I recently swapped out my 24" planted for a 36" planted (on a 29G) and it's really doing so much better despite the severe algae issues I was showing earlier.  Sometimes we see the light and thing it's "enough" but there's a lot of refraction and loss as a result when you're going that deep in a tank.  A lot of this is based on what kind of lights the plants want at the location they are at. Just a note.  I'm not trying to say that your settings need adjusted or anything like that, but just something to be aware of as you monitor the algae.  One of Bentley's other videos that's pretty useful is the one where he breaks down a few studies on light spectrums and what each one does for plants.  I have used that (and so has he) to set the different ratios he recommends for certain types of tanks and plant growth.  Some plants want a bit more blue, some need red, some might just want PAR.  Based on those tweaks you can control a bit how the plants fill in the tank as well.

I wanted to just pass on some advice Bentley gave me on his stream.  I asked him what he keeps his nitrates at.  He said on his plant for profit / heavy planted tanks he's usually 5-10 ppm.  For his other tanks, community setups, he does have "some algae" and he is again, trying to target that 5 ppm range.  There's a bit of fluctuation because of the fish load.  I mention that because it's something I'm seeing promising results in my tank, dropping from the 30-40 range as my base down to 10 and I am FINALLY seeing the growth I expected to see.

I'm working on repairing a bit of hardscape and plants in my QT tank and starting from a place of hair algae exactly like what you had going on.  I'm definitely hoping I can manage half as well as you did with the adjustments I'm making.

With time you'll be able to get that light on 100% load with the plants you have in the tank, it's going to be AWESOME!

I'm glad you got it sorted and are finally happy with your results. It shows.

@nabokovfan87 I really appreciate your insights - AND the wealth of info and detail. I think you're right that capping is not a solution - I still have 25 ppm with no dosing.  When I first added the Stratum and for months afterward, I was doing massive WC's - Which is quite a burden on a 90 gallon tank. I have no idea what the nitrates were because my API liquid test kit would never register them.  But the massive BBA and beautiful algae were testament to things being way off balance.  I wish I had thought to turn down the lights! I guess I thought I needed to get PAR down to the bottom of the tank. The new iteration has plants planted on much higher hills, so I hope that helps the PAR situation.

I'm surprised about Bentley's super low nitrates. So many variables...

Finally, after MONTHS of WC with no results, I knew I had to take drastic action. I need to confess that I got the tank under control by completely draining and letting it sit dry for a month.  Sometimes you have to nuke it from orbit.

Today - and this seems to be turning into a Tank Journal, I added DIY CO2 and a drop checker (I'd purchased the AQ COOP diffuser months ago). For fun, here's a pic of the awesome bubbles!