# general thoughts about BBA in a low tech tank..



## sketch804 (Mar 2, 2011)

So in general what is a good way to get rid of and/or prevent black algae from taking hold on a low tech, no CO2 tank?? I have a few good tanks and only one is high tech with CO2 and all, but only one has a little bit of BBA and it is a small 10 gal river tank. Now in my opinion it has to do with over feeding a bit and/or having those and other organics in the water causing it to take hold. A lot of the info that I see about preventing BBA has to do with low CO2 levels, but in a low tech tank that is not a possibility, so how else is there to prevent this highly annoying algae??

But this is just my thoughts, what does everyone else think? it is so cut and dry or might this one depend on many different factors?


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## cradleoffilthfan (Jan 19, 2009)

For me personally, in a low tech tank, I have never had BBA even appear. I keep a nice flow in the tank, not too powerful and with the low lights, usually the fish respiration seems to be enough for slow growth, but I sometimes add excel(if I have the extra money to spend) to my low tech tanks just to provide that liquid carbon source along with "Root tabs" as my substrate fertilizer. I test nitrates once a week and if I need to, I add flourish nitrogen or something, but for the most part, the fish waste, and respiration along with the plants keeps a nice balance and I think that's the important part. Balance. Keep a healthy amount of plants and don't overdo it on the number of fish. To be honest, I don't use any fertilizers in my low tech tanks beyond the flourish root tabs in the substrate and that seems to be fine. I never really see any nutritional deficiencies and when I test my water, if I find I am running low on nitrates, I add nitrogen. Maybe I am just lucky, but until I went high tech, I never experienced BBA....


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## Hilde (May 19, 2008)

sketch804 said:


> How to get rid of and/or prevent BBA from taking hold on a low tech, no CO2 tank??
> In my opinion it has to do with over feeding a bit and/or other organics in the water.


I use to have chronic problems with BBA. I use to overfeed my fish for my favorite had problems getting food before the other fish did. I added a siesta period in my light period (On 5hrs/ Off 3hrs/ On 8hrs). When I didn't have algae eaters (otos) ligts were on totally 8hrs. Been told that the siesta period helps Co2 natually in the tank to increase - Diane Walstad book.


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## Soujirou (Jun 16, 2008)

Looking in your 10 gallon thread, are you confident you have enough light and that it is evenly dispersed? I have a low light/low tech tank where I'm getting 35-40 PAR and it looks brighter than your picture. I used to have some BBA too but that was when I only had 10-15 PAR.


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## sketch804 (Mar 2, 2011)

cradleoffilthfan said:


> For me personally, in a low tech tank, I have never had BBA even appear. I keep a nice flow in the tank, not too powerful and with the low lights, usually the fish respiration seems to be enough for slow growth, but I sometimes add excel(if I have the extra money to spend) to my low tech tanks just to provide that liquid carbon source along with "Root tabs" as my substrate fertilizer. I test nitrates once a week and if I need to, I add flourish nitrogen or something, but for the most part, the fish waste, and respiration along with the plants keeps a nice balance and I think that's the important part. Balance. Keep a healthy amount of plants and don't overdo it on the number of fish. To be honest, I don't use any fertilizers in my low tech tanks beyond the flourish root tabs in the substrate and that seems to be fine. I never really see any nutritional deficiencies and when I test my water, if I find I am running low on nitrates, I add nitrogen. Maybe I am just lucky, but until I went high tech, I never experienced BBA....


I think one of my issues in general is that I did upset the balance by adding 6 CPD's. This tank has had nothing but one danio and 2 hillstream loaches for months now, but I do believe this started before the addition. I do add N P K and micro's but just not but every week or two (if I can remember) I dose above or right on EI values basicly but just do it once instead of every day.



Hilde said:


> I use to have chronic problems with BBA. I use to overfeed my fish for my favorite had problems getting food before the other fish did. I added a siesta period in my light period (On 5hrs/ Off 3hrs/ On 8hrs). When I didn't have algae eaters (otos) ligts were on totally 8hrs. Been told that the siesta period helps Co2 natually in the tank to increase - Diane Walstad book.


yes I think that might help me as well, the only reason I run my lights 9.5 hrs is to promote any (good) algae growth on the rocks for the fish. maybe I will cut the time back first and see if that works, if not siesta period it is..I think it might be trueish because I do that siesta period to my other low tech tank and it has responded well and has very little algae but used to have a bunch of BBA on the Anubias' that was irritating to say the least.



Soujirou said:


> Looking in your 10 gallon thread, are you confident you have enough light and that it is evenly dispersed? I have a low light/low tech tank where I'm getting 35-40 PAR and it looks brighter than your picture. I used to have some BBA too but that was when I only had 10-15 PAR.


Now why would you say too little light will do this? my light is evenly spread out for the most part but the places that don't get much light aren't the problem areas, mostly it's what is under the light on the ground and up to the top of a small rock. I really need to get another fixture and will be doing so here at some point soon. Oh and that picture on the journal is a lot darker than it really is in real life. I have to turn down the exposure value to compensate for the lights on any tank I take a picture of, but that one was just a little to dark.


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## Soujirou (Jun 16, 2008)

I had no idea how to figure out the PAR value of your bulb so I just guessed based off of that picture. Perhaps a better question would've been, "How is your plant growth?".

Since you said the problem is under the light perhaps it's the reverse? This may also explain the hole in the sekadau leaf.


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## HD Blazingwolf (May 12, 2011)

ehh.. i have a 10 gallon low tech. i run lights for 12 hours. marineland singlebright LED. with two extra SMD led strips inside. "self mod"

i did see some bba at first but as plants grew in and plant biomass increased. i trimmed off old leaves and bba never returned. i add NO co2 to this tank


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