# Thread algae. Let the war begin. (winning as of 4-01-09)



## iantan05 (Aug 24, 2008)

Honestly i think the best way for temp fix is amano shrimp. my tank ad quite a few strands of thread algae. Added one amano shrimp and it was gone in 2 hrs. You would still need to find a fix for it. I crank up my co2 and then with proper dosing. Btw dose according to the amount of plants in ur aquarium. EI method works best for my aquarium.


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## btmarquis (Feb 15, 2007)

iantan05 said:


> Honestly i think the best way for temp fix is amano shrimp. my tank ad quite a few strands of thread algae. Added one amano shrimp and it was gone in 2 hrs. You would still need to find a fix for it. I crank up my co2 and then with proper dosing. Btw dose according to the amount of plants in ur aquarium. EI method works best for my aquarium.


Thanks for the comment. Looks like I may be going for a drive to get some amanos.


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## dthb4438 (Nov 12, 2007)

Look at the post on the swap and shop for "mgamer2000" has amano for sale. He only wants $20 for 10 of them. Can't beat that at the pet shop. And it comes right to your door in the mail. No driving necessary!

I am buying some myself.


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## btmarquis (Feb 15, 2007)

dthb4438 said:


> Look at the post on the swap and shop for "mgamer2000" has amano for sale. He only wants $20 for 10 of them. Can't beat that at the pet shop. And it comes right to your door in the mail. No driving necessary!
> 
> I am buying some myself.


cool, thanks for the tip


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## Avalon (Aug 14, 2004)

Amano shrimp are not the answer. They _may_ help, are nice critters, but they won't solve your problem. After looking at your journal, the problem is with the light: it's too much.

I was battling with the same problem of thread algae. First, I upped the CO2 and made sure it could circulate properly within the tank. That helped slow it down. Second, I increased the water changes. Over time, dissolved organic compounds can build up. Green algae is a strong indicator of nutrient problems, which is good because that makes it easier to deal with. Three large water changes at twice a week later with my normal nutrient dosing, it's taking a beating. On my last water change, I raised my high light fixture 6" above the tank. There has been no new algae growth, and I'm letting the plants beat the remaining algae at its own game. Problem solved.


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## btmarquis (Feb 15, 2007)

Avalon said:


> Amano shrimp are not the answer. They _may_ help, are nice critters, but they won't solve your problem. After looking at your journal, the problem is with the light: it's too much.
> 
> I was battling with the same problem of thread algae. First, I upped the CO2 and made sure it could circulate properly within the tank. That helped slow it down. Second, I increased the water changes. Over time, dissolved organic compounds can build up. Green algae is a strong indicator of nutrient problems, which is good because that makes it easier to deal with. Three large water changes at twice a week later with my normal nutrient dosing, it's taking a beating. On my last water change, I raised my high light fixture 6" above the tank. There has been no new algae growth, and I'm letting the plants beat the remaining algae at its own game. Problem solved.


Thanks for the info. That 80W fixture is resting on the glass, about 1/4" from the water. I think I will put the legs on the fixture and do some water changes. The increased c02 and excel did halt the thread algae. There is still some fuzzy stuff growing in the dwarf hair grass though.


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## Homer_Simpson (May 10, 2007)

If raising the light and or reducing the photoperiod does not work, I would suggest running only one fixture if possible until you get a handle on the problem. You can have the other come on for a noonburst for one or two periods. Even with one fixture, you would be at 4 watts per gallon. As crude as the watts per gallon rule may be, 4 watts per gallon on a 10 gallon with appropiate c02 via pressurized c02 should be more than enough to grow most plants. I had a 15 gallon high tank with only 2 23 watt compact spiral fluorescent bulbs in a canopy with mylar sheeting. Plants did excellent, and riccia grew like a weed and formed mats on the surface. And I only had DIY c02 with that tank. Once you have light and c02 which are interdependent(reducing light intensity will make it easier to target appropriate c02 levels without putting your fish in harm's way) in balance, then it may become easier to get a handle on the issue.


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## KentCurtis (Jan 22, 2009)

I have some hair/thread algae in my tank as well but I believ eit is due to the fluctuation in my co2. I don't know what my problem is, but whenever I turn up my co2 even slightly my fish throw a fit and gasp at the surface. I have a slight ripple on the surface of my tank from my eheim 2213 spraybar. It is a 20g high tank, 2x24watt t5h0 current usa fixture, co2 pressurized, dosing EI. Any pointers? I use a DC ( a ghetto one that broke and I siliconed it back together ) that usually reads a darker color of green, but to get it to ideal my fish cant seem to handle it. Any pictures of the xolor i should shoot for?


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## Complexity (Jan 30, 2008)

Thread algae is almost always caused by too much light. Either too high watts per gallon as Homer said or too long of a photo period. Whenever you see thread algae begin growing, cut the lights back.

Kent, if raising the CO2 causes the fish to gasp, then it doesn't matter the color. That is the most you can dose without harming the fish. Having said that, you are most likely dosing 30ppm or more. Check the change in your pH from tap water (assuming you use tap water in your tank) and the CO2 enriched water in your tank. If it drops about 1 full point, then you're where you want to be.

The problem is not CO2, but lighting. Cut the lights back. Move them further away from the tank, run fewer bulbs, and/or shorten the time the lights are on. Use Excel/H2O2 to kill the existing algae, but fix the lighting to solve the actual problem long term.


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## KentCurtis (Jan 22, 2009)

Hmm that makes sense. What do you suggest as far as cutting the lights back in my situation - its a 2x24 watt t5ho fixture and I already have it on the supplied mounting legs. Should I take out one of the bulbs? Seems like just 1x24 t5ho over a 20g high may be too little.


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## btmarquis (Feb 15, 2007)

Thanks for the advice guys. I put the lights on the legs, and I am running only one of the lights for now. The algea seems to have stopped growing, but there is still some on the dwarf hairgrass.


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## Complexity (Jan 30, 2008)

KentCurtis said:


> Hmm that makes sense. What do you suggest as far as cutting the lights back in my situation - its a 2x24 watt t5ho fixture and I already have it on the supplied mounting legs. Should I take out one of the bulbs? Seems like just 1x24 t5ho over a 20g high may be too little.


Cut the number of hours your lights are on. See if that helps.



btmarquis said:


> Thanks for the advice guys. I put the lights on the legs, and I am running only one of the lights for now. The algea seems to have stopped growing, but there is still some on the dwarf hairgrass.


Yeah, there's two stages to getting rid of algae. First, is to correct the imbalance that's causing the algae. And then, second, you have to actually kill/remove the existing algae. It seems that once it's grown, it doesn't die on its own even when you've corrected the imbalance.


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## btmarquis (Feb 15, 2007)

After a few days of raising the lights, and only running both bulbs together for a few hours, the algea is receding. Some of algae that was in the dwarf hairgrass isnt going away on its own, but I have been removing it little by little, and its not coming back. I think another part of this was not providing enough co2. My bubble count is about double what it was in the beginning, and the plants are really taking off. Thanks for help everybody! 
04-01-09


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## hcldoser (May 31, 2009)

*Light Shading and Green Algae*



Complexity said:


> Thread algae is almost always caused by too much light. Either too high watts per gallon as Homer said or too long of a photo period. Whenever you see thread algae begin growing, cut the lights back.
> 
> the first and immediately effective thing really seems to be light reduction. I cut the photoperiod from 11 to 6 hrs for about a week, thread algae already completely gone but fuzz on the leaves is still there (maybe otos will go after them now that they are weakened). *Light shading (9 days !) is used as a large-scale communal water treatment against algae*:
> http://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...serid=10&md5=a44d7ecab5cb49a7e0ceefda54b2ca80
> ...


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## goatdemon (Apr 13, 2009)

I found this post very useful. My only problem is I have a much larger tank (120 gallons) and need to figure out how long my lights should be on in the first place. Thanks for all the good advice everyone gave this guy. Now off to mess with my timers!


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## plantbrain (Dec 15, 2003)

Avalon said:


> Amano shrimp are not the answer. They _may_ help, are nice critters, but they won't solve your problem. After looking at your journal, the problem is with the light: it's too much.
> 
> I was battling with the same problem of thread algae. First, I upped the CO2 and made sure it could circulate properly within the tank. That helped slow it down. Second, I increased the water changes. Over time, dissolved organic compounds can build up. Green algae is a strong indicator of nutrient problems, which is good because that makes it easier to deal with. Three large water changes at twice a week later with my normal nutrient dosing, it's taking a beating. On my last water change, I raised my high light fixture 6" above the tank. There has been no new algae growth, and I'm letting the plants beat the remaining algae at its own game. Problem solved.


Good advice.

Frequent water changes beats up on most species of algae and shocks most species. Adds lot of CO2 also, removed spores etc. 

I also have used a 3 day blackout and it all died(Spirogyra, Oedogonium and Rhizoclonium- each individually in separate tanks), and added Excel there after.

Combining several things like careful CO2 tweaking, reduced light, more frequent water changes, good care/cleaning, filter cleaning/changes, Blackouts, Excel dosing etc..........adding Amano shrimp etc.

These all add up and "many little hammers" beating the algae down are much better than a single big hammer.

Cladophora can be beaten this was as well if you prune the places it gets infested in often and remove some things like moss etc where it tangles until the tank gets better etc, then add the algae free plants like the moss back.

Most every algae.


Regards, 
Tom Barr


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