# Need help confirming algae types...



## jfynyson (Apr 15, 2013)

You surely have several kinds of algae including staghorn, maybe some hair, what seems like the start of black beard (BBA) but hard to tell from the photo (could be diatoms) & some green spot (GSA). 

It would help to us to understand your tank parameters such as how long have you had it set up, is it fully cycled, what's the ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, & phosphate levels. My best guess is that it's a nutrient imbalance. Plant load & uptake via overall plant health plays a role as well. Please also provide a full tank pic to help understand total plant load. Sometimes you have the right amount of flow, light, CO2, & ferts but the balance would be for a higher plant load instead of a lower load this could yield your issues as well.


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## ACFishTank (Jul 26, 2004)

jfynyson said:


> You surely have several kinds of algae including staghorn, maybe some hair, what seems like the start of black beard (BBA) but hard to tell from the photo (could be diatoms) & some green spot (GSA).
> 
> It would help to us to understand your tank parameters such as how long have you had it set up, is it fully cycled, what's the ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, & phosphate levels. My best guess is that it's a nutrient imbalance. Plant load & uptake via overall plant health plays a role as well. Please also provide a full tank pic to help understand total plant load. Sometimes you have the right amount of flow, light, CO2, & ferts but the balance would be for a higher plant load instead of a lower load this could yield your issues as well.


Thanks for the follow up! 

The tank has been setup for over a year. Here are the tank parameters as of an hour ago:

pH: 6.6
Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 100 ppm 
KH: 36 ppm
GH: 179 ppm 

Looks like my nitrates are on the high end. Tomorrow is my day for a water change, but still I think that should be 60-80 ppm tops.

Here's a full tank picture. Sorry about the quality..


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## FishTankExpert (Aug 31, 2013)

ACFishTank said:


> Thanks for the follow up!
> 
> The tank has been setup for over a year. Here are the tank parameters as of an hour ago:
> 
> ...


Check your nitrite and ammonia levels. That could be part of the problem.


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## ACFishTank (Jul 26, 2004)

FishTankExpert said:


> Check your nitrite and ammonia levels. That could be part of the problem.


Both ammonia and nitrites where at zero. However, the nitrates were pretty high when I tested on Saturday. Yesterday was my day to do a water change and I decided to do a good trim. I think I may have found the root cause...

The crypts in the midground have been there for a year and have gone from five very small plants (out of one pot) to what you see in the picture. It seems that they were collecting a lot of detritus being such a compact grouping.

I removed all the plants, gave them a good trim, and put everything back in. Nitrates now read at 40ppm and I will continue to test throughout the week to see if they creep back up to the 100 range. In the meantime, I have a phosphate test kit on order to see if that is within a reasonable range.

Here's hoping...


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## jfynyson (Apr 15, 2013)

ACFishTank said:


> I think I may have found the root cause...
> 
> The crypts in the midground have been there for a year and have gone from five very small plants (out of one pot) to what you see in the picture. It seems that they were collecting a lot of detritus being such a compact grouping.
> 
> ...


Be careful & I hope you didn't doom yourself with the removal & trim. The reason I say that is b/c I had a very similar situation late last year / early this year when my tank was low tech. My crypts were insanely large & taken over. They seem to really love that stuff (mulm). So, as long as you're not seeing any detectible ammonia and the mulm is out of site then leave it alone. Moving crytps can cause them to melt. Also removing plants (if a lot) can greatly reduce your plant load while also kicking up ammonia from under the substrate. If you didn't do so next time make sure you're vaccuming around the roots of the plant when removing it. This will help suck up potential for ammonia spikes & thus helping mitigate algae blooms. Since your plant load is reduced the nutrient uptake will be reduced (you didn't have gerat uptake anyway with 100+ ppm nitrates).


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## ACFishTank (Jul 26, 2004)

jfynyson said:


> Be careful & I hope you didn't doom yourself with the removal & trim. The reason I say that is b/c I had a very similar situation late last year / early this year when my tank was low tech. My crypts were insanely large & taken over. They seem to really love that stuff (mulm). So, as long as you're not seeing any detectible ammonia and the mulm is out of site then leave it alone. Moving crytps can cause them to melt. Also removing plants (if a lot) can greatly reduce your plant load while also kicking up ammonia from under the substrate. If you didn't do so next time make sure you're vaccuming around the roots of the plant when removing it. This will help suck up potential for ammonia spikes & thus helping mitigate algae blooms. Since your plant load is reduced the nutrient uptake will be reduced (you didn't have gerat uptake anyway with 100+ ppm nitrates).


Thanks for the insight! Basically I just trimmed the older leaves that seems to be most affected by the staghorn algae and spread the crypts out a little bit as opposed to be all packed together. So far they all seem to be fine and I haven't seen any signs of distress. I'll be monitoring the water parameters closely this week to see if anything changes (good or bad).


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