Where Do I Go From Here?

[AndyR]

Hey everyone,

I’ve been having a lot of trouble getting my plants to grow since I start this tank 7 months ago. I’ve been fertilizing twice weekly, changing the water (30%) 1x a week and started using root tabs a month ago. Fluval grow light is on 7hrs daily. I’m also getting this funky moss on the gravel as well that rows back incredibly fast. Any help here would be amazing! 

[JE47]

the stuff on the gravel is not moss looks like maybe an algae/sludge kind of growth. What kind of fertilizer are you using? I will tag @JoeQ @nabokovfan87

[JoeQ]

Looks like blue green algea to me. 

https://www.aquariumcoop.com/blogs/aquarium/blue-green-algae

As far as your plants not growing, I am will to bet it's because they are under fertilized and/or require a longer photo period. 

[nabokovfan87]

The stuff on the substrate is cyanobacteria.

As for plants, you definitely can adjust some things to be able to help the ecosystem out and "reset the balance" so to speak.  When it comes to algae, water changes are your friend. 

1.  What are your water parameters in the tank compared to the actual tap where you get your water change water from?

2.  Manually removing everything can be really difficult.  Start with a blackout (details below) and consider dipping the plants during that time as well.

3.  Up your water changes from once a month to bi-weekly or weekly.  See if that helps.

4.  Let's review light settings, filtration setup, and make sure that is cleaned out. Check the pump and make sure it's working properly as well.

Blackout+deep clean method:
This is courtesy of Bentley Pascoe and a question he had taken on one of his live streams.  Most times you hear blackout and people will simply cover the tank in towels or blankets while turning off the light for X amount of time.

A.  Clean out the filtration, check everything, verify the pumps work well.
B.  Deep clean the substrate and make sure you don't need to repeat this process.  If you do, just fill the tank up again like you normally would and repeat the deep siphon after 24 hours.
C.  After you have things clean, then you would black out the tank normally as mentioned above.  Normally for 7 days.
D.  Every day, do a 30-50% water change and continue the process.

This should get things back to normal...

That being said, you can also do a treatment on the plants.  This is a 3-4 day process, but I've done it over weeks and it works fine.
A.  Setup a bucket with an airstone and move the plants to that bucket.  Cover it with a lid or heavy towel and keep it in a dark place.
B.  Follow this video for the 3-day treatment to remove algae or follow the video by mark's shrimp tanks for treatment with hydrogen peroxide.

Gluteraldehyde treatment:

Hydrogen Peroxide treatment:

For the hydrogen peroxide treatment, I'd run anywhere from 2-3 treatment in the bucket.
For the gluteraldehyde, it's a 3 day (2 dose) treatment.

That would get your plants back on track and you just give them fresh water and keep them in the bucket for anywhere from 7-14 days.

You can also try dosing the tank itself with the hydrogen peroxide to try to kill off the cyano, but I am not sure if that will be effective. 

[AndyR]

Thanks so much everyone! I’ve been using 1 pump of EasyGreen every 3 days along with a 30% water change weekly. Would it be worth trying a different fertilizer? 

[JoeQ]

On 11/2/2023 at 11:01 AM, AndyR said:

Thanks so much everyone! I’ve been using 1 pump of EasyGreen every 3 days along with a 30% water change weekly. Would it be worth trying a different fertilizer? 

Best thing I ever did was Graduate to Nilocgs premixed macro/micro. It's not that the all-in-ones are bad but you come to a point where you are chasing deficiencies. Changing to EI dosing ends the mouse on a hamster wheel which chasing eventually leads to. The only downside is the weekly 50% water change. 

[AndyR]

On 11/1/2023 at 2:53 AM, nabokovfan87 said:

The stuff on the substrate is cyanobacteria.

As for plants, you definitely can adjust some things to be able to help the ecosystem out and "reset the balance" so to speak.  When it comes to algae, water changes are your friend. 

1.  What are your water parameters in the tank compared to the actual tap where you get your water change water from?

2.  Manually removing everything can be really difficult.  Start with a blackout (details below) and consider dipping the plants during that time as well.

3.  Up your water changes from once a month to bi-weekly or weekly.  See if that helps.

4.  Let's review light settings, filtration setup, and make sure that is cleaned out. Check the pump and make sure it's working properly as well.

Blackout+deep clean method:
This is courtesy of Bentley Pascoe and a question he had taken on one of his live streams.  Most times you hear blackout and people will simply cover the tank in towels or blankets while turning off the light for X amount of time.

A.  Clean out the filtration, check everything, verify the pumps work well.
B.  Deep clean the substrate and make sure you don't need to repeat this process.  If you do, just fill the tank up again like you normally would and repeat the deep siphon after 24 hours.
C.  After you have things clean, then you would black out the tank normally as mentioned above.  Normally for 7 days.
D.  Every day, do a 30-50% water change and continue the process.

This should get things back to normal...

That being said, you can also do a treatment on the plants.  This is a 3-4 day process, but I've done it over weeks and it works fine.
A.  Setup a bucket with an airstone and move the plants to that bucket.  Cover it with a lid or heavy towel and keep it in a dark place.
B.  Follow this video for the 3-day treatment to remove algae or follow the video by mark's shrimp tanks for treatment with hydrogen peroxide.

Gluteraldehyde treatment:

Hydrogen Peroxide treatment:

For the hydrogen peroxide treatment, I'd run anywhere from 2-3 treatment in the bucket.
For the gluteraldehyde, it's a 3 day (2 dose) treatment.

That would get your plants back on track and you just give them fresh water and keep them in the bucket for anywhere from 7-14 days.

You can also try dosing the tank itself with the hydrogen peroxide to try to kill off the cyano, but I am not sure if that will be effective. 

Thanks so much! I’ll give this a shot. I did a test strip earlier today and here is what the tank reads as well. What do you think?

[nabokovfan87]

On 11/2/2023 at 12:41 PM, AndyR said:

Thanks so much! I’ll give this a shot. I did a test strip earlier today and here is what the tank reads as well. What do you think?

It's tough to say.

It might be 40 KH, might be 50.

GH 30-60 looks very similar to me as well.

PH looks like 7.2-7.5.

Nitrite and nitrate are really low. So that's good. May just indicate needing to add fees for the plants. (Might just be fert day)

Can you run another test on your tap water?

Edited November 3, 2023 by nabokovfan87

[AndyR]

Sure! This is the water from the tap

[AndyR]

Weeell…this might be my most embarrassing move yet. I went to check the filter and media and realized I never took off the plastic bags from any of the media. So, I imagine a lot of my issues could be simply from that alone. I’m going to try the blackout method this week. 🫠 🤯

[Tanked]

On 11/3/2023 at 1:06 AM, AndyR said:

Weeell…this might be my most embarrassing move yet. I went to check the filter and media and realized I never took off the plastic bags from any of the media. So, I imagine a lot of my issues could be simply from that alone. I’m going to try the blackout method this week. 🫠 🤯

The beneficial bacteria is everywhere, even on the plastic bags.  Removing them is definitely going to help

[tolstoy21]

Dosing the water with API Erythromycin or Fritz Maracyn appropriate to the volume of water in your tank once, and then maybe a second time mid-week, and then performing a water change at the end of the week should kill off any cyanobacteria (aka blue-green algae).

This is the method I use when cyano gets out of control. Both of those meds are known to kill cyano as they are both antibacterials.

Edited November 6, 2023 by tolstoy21

[AndyR]

Thanks everyone! I did a blackout last week and finally sorted out the media in the tank. It’s looking crystal clear