Adam H Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 Hello all, I am hoping you could help me with identifying this algae I've recently noticed in my 120 gallon tank. It is very fast growing and within a day or two of my removing it from the glass, substrate and plants, it is right back where it was. It is slimy and comes off very easy almost in a sheet when I use my glass scrapper. My water parameters show: iron:0 copper:0 Nitrates:50 Nitrites:0 GH:75 KH:120 PH:6.4 I have included my light program to help with suggestions on things I can do to help prevent future growth. Thank you all in advance Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoeQ Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 That is not a typical algae, it is cynaobateria or BGA. https://nilocg.com/blogs/news/algae-common-causes-and-solutions-for-different-types 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony s Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 On 8/19/2024 at 8:16 AM, JoeQ said: That is not a typical algae, it is cynaobateria or BGA. @Adam H that is what it looks like. You’re going to need a source of erythromycin. Maracyn will be the best. But be very careful when treating this. Both the meds and the bacterial die off will seriously reduce the amount of available oxygen. Put at least one extra airstone in. Watch the fish for deprivation. I fight with this stuff. I believe it’s from cross contamination between tanks. I can’t seem to get rid of it. But, I also can’t afford to get new equipment for every tank either. Just be prepared for it. Have a place to put fish in an emergency. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoeQ Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 (edited) This should not be treated with medication. That is only treating a symptom the source is poor water quality. As seen above, if you only treat a symptom you will have a constant 'fight' with that symptom. Edited August 19 by JoeQ 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony s Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 On 8/19/2024 at 9:45 AM, JoeQ said: As seen above, if you only treat a symptom you will have a constant 'fight' with that symptom. Okay, I'll bite, once you have it how do you eliminate it The only thing I have ever seen is to use erythromycin, or products like slime out Even the LFS says use a medication product Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoeQ Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 The biggest part (IMO) is flow, GBA likes to grow in places with no or low oxygen. You might have to do something as simple as moving structure. Having critters to disturb the substrate is also a plus, but if not (when I had BGA) I would take a pick comb and poke holes in my substrate. Of course keep up with routine maintenance, water changes, removing dead debris, ect. But your main focus with fighting BGA is concentrating on growing good aerobic (oxygen loving) bacteria. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony s Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 On 8/19/2024 at 12:16 PM, JoeQ said: Of course keep up with routine maintenance, water changes, removing dead debris I can see that. At the time i was trying to do 150 gallons of ro and remineralizing everything. Which took days, and I was always 2 weeks behind. In my 75g It covered everything with a gray/brown coating. It even coated the snails. tried everything. Finally hit it with erythromycin and completely crashed the tank. The cycle was/is fine. But the dead bacteria consumed all the oxygen. Lost a few fish. Then got everybody else into a different tank. Too small. Same problems but left it untreated and everybody is fine. Finished the med, removed all the hardscape, plants, added 2 more inches of substrate. Rebuilt with new hardscape and plants. Wasn't going to take the chance of bringing it back. Ditched the ro water, too time consuming. Trying out the softened tap. (well water with too much iron). Hopefully this works. @Adam H I think I would start by removing what's been infected. Plants and hardscape. Maybe you can clean the hardscape, maybe not. I gave up on mine. Plants are even harder to clean. I had huge crypts that I tossed. Really sort of discouraging. I honestly think this stuff feeds more on excess bioload in the tank. Which you really can't measure (well, maybe with a tds meter). I never saw an issue with parameters at all. Although this was the tank I had a large mystery snail population in. Which increased my organic load. Here is coops article about it https://www.aquariumcoop.com/blogs/aquarium/blue-green-algae Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam H Posted August 19 Author Share Posted August 19 Since reading these replies I've increased the return flow from my filter to max, and ordered a filter/powerhead to place in the 1 corner of the tank that i don't see much movement of the plants. Prior to posting on here I had ordered some plecos to help with getting into the substrate, plus more cleaning crew mates(cherry shrimps, octos and such). I also ordered that fritz slime out. Any suggestions with the lighting? Would making any tweaks to that do anything to help with my new tank friend? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony s Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 On 8/19/2024 at 1:17 PM, Adam H said: Any suggestions with the lighting? Sorry, but no. I run the fluval 3.0 on the 75g. But I'm not smart enough yet to figure out where all the setting should be. Hoping the slime out works for you. That's the one product I hadn't tried yet. I'd still throw in an extra stone. That's a lot of bacteria dying at one time. I'd kind of think of this as infection. Any little bit left and it's coming back. Good Luck! It's just insidious. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoeQ Posted August 19 Share Posted August 19 (edited) On 8/19/2024 at 1:17 PM, Adam H said: Any suggestions with the lighting? Would making any tweaks to that do anything to help with my new tank friend? As far as the light I would not do anything. You don't want to make too many changes at once. If im not mistaken you are also using Bentleys Day Sim settings which I am using as well. (check out my spreadsheet in my signature) 😁 For now concentrate on water quality, clean what you can by hand and trim leaves that are covered in BGA. For the rocks/scaping materials remove them and scrub by hand. You can use peroxide to clean just be aware this will kill everything, both good and bad bacteria. With the weather turning colder you might also get some help from cooler water temps; cooler water (74~75 degrees) holds more oxygen. Good luck! Let us know how things go Edited August 19 by JoeQ 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam H Posted August 20 Author Share Posted August 20 Something I didn't think of till just now. I have a UV filter pump in my tank that has been in there for the last 2 years. What are the odds that the light being burnt out could be a reason why suddenly I have this outbreak of BGA, and if so would that help to curb and maybe remedy this? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony s Posted August 20 Share Posted August 20 On 8/20/2024 at 2:01 AM, Adam H said: What are the odds that the light being burnt out could be a reason why suddenly I have this outbreak of BGA If it was all of a sudden, yeah, could be the reason. But you would have to have had a sterilizer pump and not just an algae control one. Not sure a green killing machine would do much to blue green algae. Could be wrong though. Have actually been thinking of getting the sterilizer that hooks inline to the fx-series filters Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam H Posted August 23 Author Share Posted August 23 Just wanted to offer an update. After a three day black out period, where the only think I've changed was I added a new sponge filter in prep for using Fitz's slime out, and adding a new UV sterilizer I found my tank to be spotless when I went to add the Fritz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now