# Please help me to end this algae attack



## Gamezawy (Apr 3, 2012)

Hello all

I have an algae problem please help me to ID it and how to end it

i suspected it is fuzz or Oedogonium algae i don't know really

This is my tank info

My tank is 120P and i made a diy vero led build to light it 

The Led build is a 4 clusters every cluster contains the following 

1x Bridgelux vero 13 running at 750mA

1x Bridgelux vero 10 running at about 500mA 

1x CREE XTE Royal blue running at 700mA

1x CREE XPE blue running at 700mA

1x ledgroupbuy H Violet 430 running at 700mA

1x ledgroupbuy Cyan running at 700mA


The tank is 2 months old and still under construction and doesn't have much plants. 

Filtration thru a sump 

Substrate is MTS Dirt covered with coarse sand there is no leaking

CO2 : i just bought a pressurized co2 system from 3 days, i was using diy co2

I am using EI dosing method

water parameters :

GH : 13

KH : 9

Ammonia : 0

Nitrite : almost 0

Nitrate : about 80 or more

pH : 7.2

TDS : 330 

pics of the affected plants

big baby tears 















































Creeping Jenny




















The substrate and the Dwarf hair grass are affected with some kind of algae too 




























Please look at the substrate it is covered with algae and by the way the light is much brighter than the pic it is just my photographing And please don't mind the drop checker on the left i don't trust it now


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## Raymond S. (Dec 29, 2012)

Plain and simple...serious overkill on the light.
The new CO2 will help. But the more plants you add the more you need the light.
The current theme of the tank suggest to me that you don't intend much if any in the way of taller stemmed type plants ? Regular Fissidens would be too long, but the mini might look great on a couple of the limbs. Pellia behind the rocks.
But the very low plant mass is killing you right now on the algae.
A dimmer would be the best option. Raising the light till a few plants are growing would
do this also. Since you did the light this should be easy. 
This is an E-bay part number. I'm sure the dealer will have other dimmers that work/w your type of bulbs.
131438700299
Hard to tell the type of algae on the bottom. Looks the same as the GSA that started
on the gravel in one of my tanks.


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## Gamezawy (Apr 3, 2012)

Thank you Raymond S. and yes i don't intend any taller stemmed type plants

but i still need to know the algae on the plants and what to do other than dimming the lights ? and how to end this GSA on the substrate ?


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## klibs (May 1, 2014)

You need like 100x more plants than that. IMO it doesn't even matter what type of algae you intend on battling... You're screwed if your hitting 3 plants with that much light all day. Nothing is competing with the algae at all.

+1 to Raymond's post.
Dim the light and get a ton more plants. CO2 will not help you if there are no plants to use it. CO2 helps control algae by giving your plant mass the ability to uptake more nutrients that algae may otherwise take advantage of. If you don't have the plants to begin with then it won't do anything. It's not like CO2 is some kind of algaecide that prevents it from growing. Your healthy, growing, plant mass is what keeps algae at bay. Everything should contribute to that goal (light, CO2, ferts, etc)


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## Raymond S. (Dec 29, 2012)

There are probably 700 different kinds of algae so exact identification is just
taking up time you could have spent on removing the algae.
I'd need a much closer picture of that on the bottom, but I think it's the same as I had when I had two T8 bulbs in a 10g for 10 hrs per day.
It goes away on it's own when you reduce the light.
Don't know what effect it would have on any plants to use very much more than recommended, but dumping lots of algae rid in any form you like may work.
I would never use any of that. Don't know what effect it has on the rest of the tank.
Fairly high numbers of plants combat algae when they are growing well.
Especially certain kinds. But if you keep that very low amount of plants(even though you add just a couple more) you need to lower the light to be rid of the algae
or use some kind of algae poison which may do anything to the tank.
The CO2 doesn't directly harm the algae. It gives the plants that balance between light/ferts/CO2 that they need to grow their best/fastest. Right now you are way out of balance with the light being way too high for the amount of plants in there.
Light specifically is energy. The plants need that energy to grow. But with very few of them, what is going to use the energy...algae.
If you raise the light so it's dimmer at the bottom of the tank you can gradually
bring it back up IF you add some plants in there. They don't need to be tall ones.
This is a plant that stays very short. The picture on the right is how it looks under water.
http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/m...af_Clover_Water_Shamrock_Marsilea_quadrifolia


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## Steve001 (Feb 26, 2011)

Gamezawy said:


> Hello all
> 
> I have an algae problem please help me to ID it and how to end it
> 
> ...


 You have next to no vascular plants so it should not be any surprise that algae is growing as well as it is.


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