Blue Green Algae

[peteypob]

Hi All,

It has come down to me resorting to my last option on fighting the algae that has taken over my plants.I have tried other methods to try and rid it but have been unsucsessful. From research I have read that using erythromycin (Marcyn) will completly rid the BGA of any come back. I have noticed that this algae has been taking over my java ferns and laces with great speed.All new growth on my laces and fern have come to a complete stop. It has begun to form a thin carpet on the substrate as well. I have read some cases where erythromycin has been used for a sucsessful 8 days without major effect to the biological bacteria. And others where it has had some impact on the bacteria at high doses. I wanted to know if anyone has treated BGA with Maracyn and how well or unwell it went. Besides the water changes during the treatment what should I do to make sure my discus are well taken care of and not harmed. Thanks!

Pete

[angeldoodle]

I'm pretty much a beginner but I guess that means I've had a lot of experience with algae ;) . If I remember right, blue/green algae (Cyanobacter) is a funky organism that is a combo of a photosynthesizing part and a bacterial component. In my experience, it is nasty stuff -- it really covers stuff and then generates nasty waste product under the layer. I haven't had much success using antibiotics but I have read in a really cool site (sorry I can't remember where) that it is a sign of excess P but limited N. I have found I can slowly cut down on blue/green by slowly upping the N(which usually helps the plants too) and I'm always working on lowering the P but that is hard because many of the fish foods add P.

[walk23]

My recommendation is to determine the source of the excess algae growth. In my experience it has been wha ti introduced into the tank, the food source and overfeeding. The next contributing factor was the length of lighting. Once I was able to adjust these two factors algae hasn't been a problem. I would invest in the time to clean the tank of the algae along with any filtration and adjust my lighting. I feed tetrabits and the amount of phosphate that occurs thru the uneaten portion of food seemed to be a major culprit in algae development.
Good luck

[peteypob]

Thanks for your replies angledoodle & walk23!

My lighting is at 9 hours a day. With water changes every other day my phosphates, nitrite and nitrates are at favorable conditions. With discus in the tank meaty foods can be a problem but like I mentioned water changes keep those in check. As of cleaning the algea, that could be a never ending battle. The recovery growth of the algae has a geat advantage over me, blue green can grow within a couple dozen minutes. At the start of my water changes I physically remove as much algae as possible by lights out time new growth is already visable. Like angledoodle mentioned blue green is bacteria and is more of an infection than an algae bloom. Fighting blue green has put me into a situation where getting rid of it is totally different from other algae.
I plan to treat my tank when I come back home from visiting family out of town. My plan is:

Day1: 1tab/10gl of erythro
Day2: 1tab/10gl of erythro
Day3: I should start to see alot of dead blue green, remove the floating stuff as much as possible to aviod a peak of ammonia.
Day4: Most should be dead now, clean up the floating stuff, then a 50% WC
add 1tab/10gl of erythro
Day5-7:Monitor nitrite, ammonia, nirtrate. 50% WC if nessesary. Washing the filter once a day.
Day8:50% WC and add 1/2tab/gl
Any problems anyone sees, suggestions please feel free! Thanks!

Pete

[angeldoodle]

Oh and I wanted to mention -- I found when I did a LOT of water changes the N would be extremely low (which you would think would be good ;) ) but what it did was really get the balance of N and P off (P is always SO hard to control due to the high P content in food (have the same problem here in Iowa on the fields when hog poop is used as a fertilizer)). So with my Angels (but I realize they are NOT discus) I changed the water a little less (I think I was up to every other day to try to control the cyano and green algae) and upped the plant supplement that contained N. This has slowly started to beat back the cyano. I think the long term secret is to have the higher order plants doing better --which is hard when the cyano and greens are doing well --- catch 22. Good luck, that stuff is so icky!!! and its totally useless -- at least some of the green algae is eaten by fish and it can look pretty in small quantities (at least that's what I tell myself ha ha).

[Terrybo]

Pete - How old are your light bulbs? The spectrum of most flourescent bulbs deteriorates over time - after about 1 to 1 1/2 years of use my tanks tend to get algae - new bulbs fix the problem.

Terry

[peteypob]

Hi Terybo,

They are about 5 months old.I was considering changing but figured it was too soon.

[RAWesolowski]

Pete,

Good plan for eliminating BGA. Tried the other methods in a tank that I had and finally used the erythromycin. Did a great job. I dosed at the recommended rate then waited three days without a water change or addition of additional meds. At the end of three days, I gave the planted tank a thorough vacuum job and did a 50% water change. Then repeated the dose followed by a 50% water change in three days. Haven't had a problem since.

Some people have concerns about their bio-filter but I noted no problems when I tested the tank on a daily basis.