# Brown/rust colored algae



## Seattle_Aquarist (Jun 15, 2008)

Hi sevenyearnight,

Nice thicket of Ceratopteris you have there! It looks like Brown algae, which are actually organisms called Diatoms. I use Otocinclus catfish to eliminate Diatoms from my tanks; they are a key component of my cleaning crew. I start with 1 per 10 gallons.


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## sevenyearnight (May 1, 2011)

Seattle_Aquarist said:


> Hi sevenyearnight,
> 
> Nice thicket of Ceratopteris you have there! It looks like Brown algae, which are actually organisms called Diatoms. I use Otocinclus catfish to eliminate Diatoms from my tanks; they are a key component of my cleaning crew. I start with 1 per 10 gallons.


Thanks! It needs trimming often for certain! Lol
Ok, My residents in the tank are 3 flag fish, 2 south american algae eaters, 7 odessa barbs, and a bristlenose pleco, some nerites, and a few ramshorns.
Are the otocinclus cats diatom specialists? Because 1, I hoped my current residents would eat it, 2, I'm afraid to buy more fish :/
Is there a non fish way to manage diatoms?


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## Seattle_Aquarist (Jun 15, 2008)

Hi sevenyearnight,

Otocinclus are the best species I have found to control Diatoms; some snail species eat Diatoms as well, but I keep my aquariums snail-free. The other method I have used is manually removing it, but it is very time consuming. My experience has been: Pleco's like soft, flat algae; Siamese Algae Eaters (SAE) seem to enjoy thread/hair algae as do Flag Fish. SAE and Flag Fish also will go after BBA, especially if it has been weakened with Excel/glutaraldehyde. Otocinclus are from South America, is that what you meant by "2 south american algae eaters"?

Some people say that Diatoms occur when there is too much silica in the water, but cannot confirm that. I just know what works for me.


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## sevenyearnight (May 1, 2011)

Oops. No, I meant SAE, the ones that get fairly large, they are about 3" right now. Torpedo shaped body, tiny non-sucker frowny mouth, tiny whiskers.
I can't manually remove it from the little tiny thread like leaves.
Sigh. I'll see if I can pick some up somewhere. 
Thank you for the advice


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## 150EH (Dec 6, 2004)

SAE's will never out eat an Oto, and SAE's get lazy really quick and show up to feeding time with everyone else, plus they can get 4 inches or better.


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## Seattle_Aquarist (Jun 15, 2008)

Hi 150EH,

I have read on several forums that SAE "get lazy" with age and size. That has not been my experience; mine are a little over 4" and still "graze" my plants and hardscape all day long.


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## 150EH (Dec 6, 2004)

Mine graze too, but my Oto's really clean large areas that you can see and with their small size I still think 1 Oto will out clean about 5 SAE's, so if you have a fleet of Oto's your going to get better results, IMO. My lonley SAE had 4 brothers and is very old, maybe as old as 6 or 7 years and almost 5 inches, but I prefer smaller fish and when I first got them they were tiny but many only think of their problem and later have a school of larger fish they really don't want. The only problem with Oto's as I see it, they may clean your tank so well they run out of their natural diet (algae) and you'll have to start feeding them, so 5 for 150 gallon tank keeps them busy but 10 or more may run out of algae in a 150 and I really don't want feed blanced veggies, etc.


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## willbldrco (Mar 24, 2007)

Another thing with large SSEs: They will eat your shrimp. They slowly took out even my largest cherry shrimp. 

Will


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## astrosag (Sep 3, 2010)

You mean to say that SAE's do indeed eat shrimp!

That is not good news for my plan to keep some cherry shrimp!


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