# Algae bloom need help



## Surf (Jun 13, 2017)

I would be helpful to know the water parameters (PH, GH, KH, ammonia, nitrate, nitrite levels). Also what fertilizers are you using, how much are you dosing? Typically for hair algae the cause is a nutrient deficiency or nutrient imbalance. If you are not dosing a fertilizer that is what you will probably have to address first.


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## mtnbikeracer76 (Jan 29, 2017)

I'll check the parameters tomorrow. I do use Flourish occasionally, 1/2 a cap lid, but don't have a set schedule for it.


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## germanblueramlover (Jun 9, 2013)

I think I've heard that irregular dosing schedules can cause algae outbreaks, so that might be a part of it?


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## Surf (Jun 13, 2017)

> I do use Flourish occasionally, 1/2 a cap lid, but don't have a set schedule for it.


Is that flourish comprehensive or Flourish trace? Neither has nitrogen so if your test results show zero ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate, you probably are deficient in nitrogen.


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## mtnbikeracer76 (Jan 29, 2017)

This is the Flourish I use. I also have Flourish Iron and API Leaf Zone that I don't use









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Here are the parameters that I got with my API Master test kit.

PH - 6.8-7.0
Ammonia - .25 ppm
Nitrites - 0 ppm
Nitrates - 80 ppm

Looks like I need to do more water changes to fix the Nitrate issue.


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## kopic (Jul 31, 2017)

Try the 1-2 punch hydroproxide method to get rid all your algae at one go to solve the problem, then u start to balance the water nutrients. For me, I only add Excel after water changing and no other chemical to my tank because I simply have no knowledge on so many types of chemicals. If add wrongly, the damage is too much to solve (happened to my previous tank when I adding all type of chemicals which is necessary for plant growth) and water testing kits are damn too expensive. So for my 2nd tank, I keep easy manage plants and adjust the amount of light. Everything goes smoothly for 2 years and no stress at all. I still have algae appearing on glass, all I do is clean it up weekly. There is no ways to wipe out all algae, but we can only minimize it by cleaning it up weekly. 


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## Surf (Jun 13, 2017)

> This is the Flourish I use. I also have Flourish Iron and API Leaf Zone that I don't use
> 
> Here are the parameters that I got with my API Master test kit.
> 
> ...


For typical aquarium maintenance you need to do a water change once a week. This prevents excess nutrient from building up and helps prevent nutrient deficiencies. I do a 50% water change once a week. For your location the water quality report indicates your water has about 5ppm of nitrate. If your plants had all the nutrients they need the would consume all the tap water nitrate and some of the nitrogen produced by the fish. 

Since your nitrate is 80ppm you either are not doing enough water changes, have a heavily stocked tank (which I doubt since I see only one fish in your provided pictures), or you have a nutrient deficency that is preventing plant growth. 

Algae does very well in water that is deficient in nutrients. Plants don't. However when plants have enough nutrients to grow well algae doesn't do well. So just increasing water changes and using hydrogen peroxide would not help if you have a nutrient deficiency. Now ideally the use of a fertilizer would resolve any nutrient deficiencies. But most fertilizers on the market don't include all 14 of the nutrients need . 

API leaf zone has only 2 and in my opinion is garbage. Sachem flourish has a lot of nutrients but it is poorly balanced (no nitrogen, very low levels of calcium, copper, zinc , and barely enough phosphate, sulfur, magnesium). So for a first step start dosing flourish according to the recommendations on the bottle and do that regularly. If that doesn't work I would recommend getting a GH KH test kit. The GH portion of the kit will tell you haw hard your towns well water is. Hard water is mainly caused by high levels of calcium or magnesium in the water. However if your towns well water is soft you probably will need to supplement calcium and magnesium. This is commonly done with GH booster. Seachem sells Equilibrium and nilocg.com also sells one. Both come in a dry powder and a measured amount is typically added right after a water change. Both are good. Increasing your water hardness by 2 degrees above your tap water levels should resolve any calcium, magnesium, potassium, and sulfur deficiencies you might have. 

Long term I would recommend switching to a better fertilizer such as Nilocg Thrive which is much better balanced than Seachem Flourish.


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## MudLark (Dec 4, 2017)

When I've had hair algae I've had too much light for the level of nutrients, types of plants, and lack of injected CO2. Problem solved by reducing the light and adding root tabs (I still don't inject CO2. Yet). Also, a swarm of shrimp seem to help. Your plants seem to be melting; root tabs might help them put on new growth.


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## Sfirat (Feb 26, 2017)

Looks like your plants are not growing either. You need to remove all dead and decaying leaves and make the plants grow so they can compete with algae. Try to add some easy fast growing stems as well.


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## mtnbikeracer76 (Jan 29, 2017)

All the plants that I have are low maintenance plants. Dwarf Sag, Dwarf Sub, Java Fern, etc. But I will trim down the damaged parts. I will also look into the Nilocg Thrive as well.

Thank you for the insight.


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## Kubla (Jan 5, 2014)

mtnbikeracer76 said:


> All the plants that I have are low maintenance plants. Dwarf Sag, Dwarf Sub, Java Fern, etc. But I will trim down the damaged parts. I will also look into the Nilocg Thrive as well.
> 
> Thank you for the insight.



Thrive has nitrates. Not sure that you want to be adding nitrates when you're currently at 80 ppm (if your testing is accurate).


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