Black Beard Algae

[DavidR]

Most of the algae that my tanks get I can either tolerate or get rid of. This one continues to cause me trouble in one tank.

Any tips to get rid of it? Right now it is on a few rocks and one or two plants. It would be hard to take everything out to treat at this time. Is there something I can add to the water column by chance?

[Candi]

One option, you can spot treat using a pipette, a small paintbrush, or spray bottle, with hydrogen peroxide. I prefer either the pipette, or a fine paintbrush. I lower the water, spot treat, then fill the tank back up. It will start to change color and bubble this is normal. I treat small areas at a time. It can take some time to get rid of just as it took time to get established. 

[MickS77]

People say that dosing something like Flourish Excel or Easy Carbon works for them but it didn't have any effect in my experiences. I did manual removal as much as possible and got my nutrients under control. You just have to get the plants growing and out competing the algae. You may even add more plants to help. It takes time but eventually it will slow down and stop proliferating.  A picture of the tank would be helpful too. 

[Kriskm]

BBA has been a problem for me as well--I've scoured the internet for ideas. From what I've read, several factors can contribute to its growth: high water flow, an imbalance between light, plants and nutrients, and too little available carbon. I've taken a multi-prong approach in my tank, scrubbing off as much as I could first (a little stiff wire brush, toothbrush sized, works) and lowering the flow of my two HOBs, as well as using plastic cup sections to direct the flow along the surface instead of it shooting down at my decor. I've begun spot dosing Flourish Excel (to add carbon) daily. Like hydrogen peroxide, it will kill algae on contact, so I follow the dosage directions and add it with a dropper directly to the places where I still have BBA. I also measured my nitrates and found they were pretty low for a planted tank (5 ppm), so I've been adding a good all-in-one fertilizer daily, trying to get that up to 20 ppm. To get rid of any excess nutrients, I do a 30% water change weekly. It's a lot of work, but I'm seeing progress. I still have a few spots of BBA, but no new BBA in the last couple of weeks.

[DavidR]

I like these ideas. I believe I will be able to follow your directions in my case Candi. I hadn't thought of a paint brush, that's a great idea.

[Garren]

I have had problems with BBA and string algae. I utilized the methods @Candi suggested and it worked. Did extra water changes to just make sure it did not affect my water parameters to much. 

[FishySituation]

I know this method is disappointing, but in my experience, I simply pluck it off of rocks and leaves manually or completely remove a leaf if it’s bad enough. It seems to have mostly gone away for me. If you’re not comfortable with using hydrogen peroxide like I was then this is a pretty good method of removing it even though it sounds tedious. If it’s growing on plants that could be a sign of not enough nutrients. It stopped appearing on my plants after I started dosing liquid fertz 

Edited October 18, 2020 by FishySituation
Typo

[Green Thumb Aquariums]

Spot treating is effective for the spots you treat. That might sound like a silly thing to say, but if you've got BBA all of the place then spot-treating every spot will be difficult. There are whole-tank treatments, but they carry with them more risk to your livestock. One well-known approach is called the "one-two punch". A Google search will direct you to write-ups about it.

I've personally used 2x to 2.5x the initial dose of Seachem Excel (note I said initial dose and not daily dose). My procedure (based on a forum thread I found) is to do a water change and then dose 2x or 2.5x the initial dose in increments over 30 minutes or so. While dosing I use an extra powerhead to disperse the Excel throughout the tank. Once done, sit back and wait a week with no additional water changes for that week. This won't address the underlying problem, but you'll have a BBA-free tank for a while.

[Marnol D]

So I have recently had this struggle. In my shrimp tank I manually removed the plants that had the worst growth of BBA (just stem plants that I can replace by cutting one in half so it didnt bother me). I have started running CO2 and have not noticed it growing back and the few areas that still had bits of BBA is dying back. 

Now on to my community tank. I have found a few ways that have worked  Hydroperoxide baths work great (taking out plants/decor that has BBA on it and soaking it in hydorperoxide) the BBA turns red and will be dead within a day or two. *I have done the baths with anubis and amazon swords and moneywort the swords were the only ones who showed a negative effect but they quickly recovered (this couldve been due to the BBA hurting the leaf already)

I have also found that direct dosing floursih excel  will kill off BBA aswell. I would take the excel into a syringe and directly spray it on the areas with the most BBA (doses were heavy easily over 10ML an inch not the best for livestock but I havent noticed any deaths or illness from my mystery snails or bottom dwellers). The BBA usually started to clear up with 4 days of doing this.

I have since started running CO2 within my community tank and have seen a decline in BBA, and nitrates.(I was a bad fish keeper and let it creep back into my tank due to neglect)

In my cases of BBA it was due to low CO2 in the water and high nitrates (i guess that plants werent able to utilize the nitrates due to not having the CO2)

[varanidguy]

BBA is caused by an imbalance - typically too much light coupled with too little co2 available to the plants for the amount of light you're running. Another factor is built-up organic waste, such as mulm, old melting leaves, or new plants that are added and subsequently melt when they're adapting to your tank's parameters.

If you're only getting it in certain spots, address those areas and consider adding more plant mass. If you're getting it throughout the tank, consider lowering the light levels in your tank, doing a thorough cleaning of the filter (in tank water, don't kill that precious bacteria), and increasing the plant mass. You want the plants to outcompete the algae. But keep in mind, more plants means more demand for nutrients. 

Don't feel bad, though. Planted tankers have all had struggles with this stuff. In the planted tank world, it's not if you get BBA, it's when. I currently am dealing with remnants after a big rescape.