Stubborn hair algae

[asondhi]

As shown in the photo below I've been struggling with this persistent hair algae for almost the lifetime of this tank. Pardon the cloudy water as removing algae from the substrate disturbed a good bit of detritus

It had started to starve out a lot of my plants which prompted me to do a heavy trim back and dose some topical H2O2. The photos show what is left after heavy mechanical removal. 

Unfortunately, it is impossible to remove it any further without uprooting my carpet

 

Tank info:

~ 10g water volume w/o decor/substrate

Low bioload w/ just a betta, some amano shrimp and 6 pygmy corys

20ppm nitrate, 0 nitrite, 0 ammonia. 

Daily dosing of easy green and easy carbon- 1 pump of each per day

6.5pH with lower KH and GH

74°-76° F

6hr lighting period from a medium intensity light

No CO2 injection- I had used it previously but it just made it harder to balance the tank. 

Edited January 21, 2023 by asondhi
Details

[Wes L.]

Wow, I think daily dosing of Easy Green could be a major contributor. If you have a medium light tank the instructions read just dose twice a week. I can't tell what your plants are from the photo, but they look like root feeders, meaning they will be getting most of their nutrients from the root tabs in the substrate. Root feeders don't take in a lot from the water column, so you could easily be over doing the dosing. I'd lay off dosing any fertilizer for a while and see if that helps.

[PaigeIs]

I have had amazing luck with APTFix  to kill off stubborn algae. It's a bit pricey but, to my mind, worth it.  I tried Easy Carbon for a couple of months but I could not seem to get ahead of it.  The APTfix has to be spot dosed, but every area I treated, died within a couple of days without any damage to either plants or animals.  At the same time I was using APTFix, I turned my lights down to only 40% intensity for 6hrs a day. 

That said, you also need to figure out what is out of balance so the algae doesn't keep coming back.  Based on your comments, I am guessing that you may be overdosing fertilizer.  The Easy Green bottle says to dose only twice a week for a medium light aquarium.  From the image, I don't see any high-light or super fast growing plants.  If the plants can't use up all the ferts in the water, the algae will gladly step in to do the job.   You may also want to look at your lighting.  A 10g tank is pretty shallow, depending on the light, you might try dialing it back even more.   

Good luck, I know how frustrating it is when it seems like the algae is winning.  Keep up the good fight!

[asondhi]

On 1/21/2023 at 6:01 PM, PaigeIs said:

I have had amazing luck with APTFix  to kill off stubborn algae. It's a bit pricey but, to my mind, worth it.

Good to know- something to keep in my back pocket. Financial situation isn't the best at the moment so I'd like to dial back on spending on my aquariums for now but if all else fails it'll be a good option!

 

On 1/21/2023 at 6:01 PM, PaigeIs said:

Based on your comments, I am guessing that you may be overdosing fertilizer.

On 1/21/2023 at 6:01 PM, Wes L. said:

Wow, I think daily dosing of Easy Green could be a major contributor

So you both bring up a great point. I was initially only dosing 2x a week but was unable to get nitrates to detectable levels whatsoever. Even now, if I drop off on dosing for 2-3 days the nitrates drop right back down to 0. I was under the impression that ferts should be dosed to 20-40ppm nitrate (depending on fish sensitivity and plant-load). 

Thinking about it now, however, I am realizing that easy green definitely includes more than just nitrogenous chemicals and while nitrate levels may be sufficient, I may be overdosing other compounds. 

I'll try dialing back and see how things go and update. Thank you for the advice!

[asondhi]

On 1/21/2023 at 6:01 PM, Wes L. said:

I can't tell what your plants are from the photo, but they look like root feeders

I've got 3 bushes of crypt lutea - definite root feeder that benefited from the aquasoil and later root tabs. There was a dense carpet of dwarf baby tears but a lot of it melted back d/t the algae- I've noticed those benefit more from column feeding than root feeding, I'm assuming it's because their roots are very superficial and don't seem to reach the depth of root tabs. Lastly, there was some ludwigia natans and a few rotala varieties along the back that I had pulled out of the tank to thoroughly rinse algae off them and trim dead/dying leaves. They are temporarily in another tank to strengthen before going back in here.