Algae and tank balancing

[AquaAggie]

I know that balancing a tank is a long and tedious process but I have never been able to get my really dialed in. I’m sure part of it is lack of consistency. But I have been having a big problem with a fine green algae lately, I’m guessing Green Hair algae????  

I have Val, anubia, Java fern wendelov, crypt wendetii red, a crinum, red tiger lotus, crypt parva, and hornwort. 
Nitrates practically never get above 20. 
Try and dose east green once a week ish. 
Light is an AquaSky 2.0 with the settings shown,
Tank is 60g and 24” high, and just turned 3 years old. 

Any ideas on what my biggest problem might be and where to start?

Thanks

[Wes L.]

How many hours a day are your lights on? I was looking at your light settings and from what I can tell it looks like the white light goes on around 9am and off somewhere around 11pm? Is that accurate? If so, that's probably your issue. Best to keep the lights on 8 hours or less. It looks like you have black beard algae growing as well, which is something I've been battling with lately. Spikes in my nitrate levels has caused it. It seems to like nitrates. If you keep your nitrate levels lower, so more water changes, that really helps eliminate the BBA. I've finally got my tank under control and the BBA is disappearing finally after a lot of water changes to keep the nitrates around 5. That seems to be solving my problem.

[Rube_Goldfish]

In addition to what @Wes L. said, do you have any algae eating animals in there? Plecos or Amano shrimp or something? Usually hair algae is pretty low down their list of preferred algae to eat, but they will eat it.

But I think I might try turning the light's intensity down before shortening the photoperiod. The Aqua Sky is not the Planted 3.0, but you still might want to take a look at the thread discussing programming for the 3.0:

Full disclosure: I have two Finnex lights and haven't used any Fluval lights.

[Mmiller2001]

Lowering your nutrient dosing would be a mistake, that said, you want your 20ppm of nitrates to come from your dosing and not from nitrification (ideally).

If this was my tank, I would lower the light intensity schedule down to 50% at 11 hour duration. Make sure there's no mulm hiding and clean it out if you find some. I'd improve flow throughout the tank and shoot for a 5 to 10 times water turnover per hour while maintaining fertilization. 

Algae is triggered by general instabilities throughout the tank , ammonia, too much light, high levels of organics and low or fluctuating CO2.

Should you choose to lower the light intensity, this will be a disruption and your plants will need time to reprogram. This will be temporary but you should see improvement after about a month.

[AquaAggie]

@Wes L. thanks for the advice. Often times my nitrates are undetectable so maybe they problem is not enough nutrients?  Also here is a better picture of the timing white light starts ramp up at 9 and is off by 10. Still 13 hours of light so I get that this is a problem but I want to be able to see my fish 😂😂😢. And yes there is some BBA that comes and goes from the crinum. I would like to trim ot back a bit which would help with this I think but I hear that if you cut crinum leaves they die?!?!

@Rube_Goldfish  thanks. There are nerite snails, MTS, and balder snail and a amano shrimp. My super red bristlenose disappeared on me several months ago. I’ve looking for a replacement or a blue eyed lemon but have seen any recently. I have 5 otos in quarantine to go in to help and have been thinking of some more Amanos. Any other suggestions?

@Rube_Goldfishand @Mmiller2001  I have turned down the intensity once before and that helped for a while. I guess it is a fluctuating thing with tank load, plant load etc. my concern is getting enough penetration for the crypts (wendetti red and parva) down at the bottom Of the tank. Would your suggestions still provide enough penetration at 24” for these. My parva hasn’t died, but it hasn’t grown in Months which I know can be typical. 
 

thanks all for the suggestions. 

Edited January 22, 2023 by AquaAggie

[Mmiller2001]

On 1/22/2023 at 10:46 AM, AquaAggie said:

Often times my nitrates are undetectable so maybe they problem is not enough nutrients?

100%, you want to keep a stable nutrient load at all times. The biggest wives tale is that too much fertilizer causes algae. This is completely untrue. No amount of nutrient reduction fixes algae problems, you only starve the plant and cause more algae. Algae will win this battle every single time. You must have healthy plants and a healthy plant load and this requires dosing nutrients.

I'm coming to realize there's serious misconception over what low, medium and high light means. Here's my Wendtti India at 21 inches and light at 44%. The GSA on it is from transition damage when I swapped the substrate, not from too much fertilizer. It also came from a very high light tank to this one, these transition periods will cause some weak leaves to form algae.

Parva is without a doubt a true slow grower. I gave up on it a while ago. What's the point? I would sub it out for Lucens.

Edited January 22, 2023 by Mmiller2001

[Rube_Goldfish]

On 1/22/2023 at 10:06 AM, Mmiller2001 said:

you want your 20ppm of nitrates to come from your dosing and not from nitrification (ideally).

I've heard this before (probably from you, haha!) but I've never heard why before. Can you elaborate on this at all? I guess not all nitrates are equivalent?

[Mmiller2001]

On 1/22/2023 at 12:40 PM, Rube_Goldfish said:

I've heard this before (probably from you, haha!) but I've never heard why before. Can you elaborate on this at all? I guess not all nitrates are equivalent?

It's the same, but tank generated Nitrates can be unpredictable. By dosing extra, you know it's always there and in non limiting amounts.

[Patrick_G]

I agree, Parva is beautiful but it grows at a glacial pace even with optimal lighting. Wendetti seems to grow well in low light so you should be ok reducing light to help with the algae problems. 

[AquaAggie]

Thanks all for the recs and responses. I’m going to be more consistent with easy green dosing and tracking nitrates. I also dropped the light intensities by 15% across the board. Shortened total light by 45 minutes and shortened the peak light duration by an hour…..I think. Hopefully this helps. 
old - 101622
new - 012223

light profiles below 👇 

[Nanci B]

I’m curious about the percentages of your blue light use. I have heard bad things about how it can really encourage algae growth, so I keep mine at zero. Though, I’m probably doing it wrong. 🫤

[Mmiller2001]

On 1/28/2023 at 11:56 PM, Nanci B said:

I’m curious about the percentages of your blue light use. I have heard bad things about how it can really encourage algae growth, so I keep mine at zero. Though, I’m probably doing it wrong. 🫤

Blue light does not cause algae. Too much light does though.

[Scapexghost]

Considering that the algae isnt completely out of control you might be able to eliminate it with just some algae eaters