Beard Algae.....

[grindman620]

Hey guys!

So I added a fairly large variety of plants into my (future discus) 60 gallon tank. They are doing quite well and i am dosing the tank with a few dry fertz, Excel, and some flourish iron too. It seems that my taller almost valesernia looking like plant is growing lots of beard algae or so I think its that kind. It has lots of little hair like fibers growing on the leaves. How do you guys control that or get rid of that?

-Ryan

[TWA]

Remove the plants and soak in a 1/10 bleach to water solution for 3 minutes, then thorough rinsing. You can also take the easy and use a syringe to dose the excel straight onto the beard algae. This isn't as effective as bleach (will kill and make disappear) as it will take a few days for the algae die. Be careful with excel, as you probably already know it's been known to kill vals just by Dosing the tank.

[judy]

Back off on the iron. and stop using Excel. the combo is candy for black beard algae. The only way to get rid of what you have is to employ a couple of young Siamese algae eaters: they are the only fish that eat it. With the vbal, just break off the ends that have the algae. The plants will recover fine.

[Samsmobb]

I have this same problem on all my anubius and java fern :/ so bleaching it doesn't work b.c i cant take it off my driftwood/lavarock easily.
:/ I'ma just try to change more water with RO water , and see how that helps. I've also just yesterday switched from my dual t5s to my single t8 24watt for my 46 gallon hoping less light will also help.
And I guesS Chinese algea eaters are different then Siamese cuz there's no Siamese locally.

Please tell me of anything works for you.