# *Updated 11/21* Help! Growing an algae farm! (pics)



## ringram (Jan 19, 2005)

I should also add that I've been cutting back on KNo3 a bit recently as the tank is a platy breeding farm -- until I drop them all off at the lfs -- my wife also likes to feed them. I think they get fed up to 3x a day sometimes. There's usually tons of waste when I use the gravel vac.


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## awrieger (May 12, 2005)

So that's 5ppm NO3 4-5 days after a 50% water change then? Not enough. Perhaps the algae's consuming it all, so I guess the first step is to wipe all the algae away as much as you can, then:

Increase NO3 to just over 20ppm.
Double PO4 to 3ppm.

Basically try and keep them in a rough 7:1 ratio. Your current 1/8th teaspoon dose of KNO3 is only 5.27ppm, so you're never attaining that ratio needed for good plants and no algae. You're basically trickling it in every second day at a ratio that just feeds the algae. So I suggest a big 1/4 tspn dose to get it up to 26 (21 + the already 5). Then test 3-4 days later and dose accordingly to keep it at that level and a rough 7:1 ratio.

But what I find odd though is the 1/8 tspn doses of KH2PO4 you're giving is a whopping 6.5ppm of PO4. Every second day when you dose! So your reading should be way off the charts, not 1-1.5ppm. After one week it should be well up over 20ppm (the existing PO4 plus what you're dosing). It's fairly unlikely the plants are consuming that much that quickly, so I strongly suspect your PO4 test may be faulty. So I'd get a new one of those first and foremost just in case before doing anything actually because that may be your main problem.

Oh, and also reduce the CO2 back down to 30ppm or less. 

Hope that helps. It works for me. 

PS. I won't suggest anything about reducing the massive 5.5 watts/gal light you have because I had that too and still managed to get the algae under control, so I think you can too!

_EDIT: Typo - should be add a big 1/2 teaspoon of KNO3, not 1/4 sorry._


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## Georgiadawgger (Apr 23, 2004)

While I'm in agreement with awrieger's suggestions...the only one I don't agree with is reducing the co2...I would recommend increasing it. 

5+ wpg is a whole lotta light you have there so the plants are probably chewing through the nutrients in a hurry...hense you may have a quick imbalance in your NO3/PO4 ratio after a couple days. I too am a bit skeptical about your PO4 readings...it doesn't get assimilated that quickly. Up that NO3 to 20 or so...no need to worry about the fish. 

Get rid of those babies asap. 

You can probably have the same growth and success with just one set of lights rather than the 110 watts. 55 watts will still give you a "high light" tank.


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## Bert H (Dec 15, 2003)

> PS. I won't suggest anything about reducing the massive 5.5 watts/gal light you have because I had that too and still managed to get the algae under control, so I think you can too!


 OK, but I will.  That's a lot of light! If it were me, I would cut back on the lights to half until I got the algae and nutrients under control, then crank it back up to 110 gradually. 

You can have high lighting, but keep in mind that it gives you a lot less 'wiggle room' when things go off kilter than lower lighting would.


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## Wö£fëñxXx (Dec 2, 2003)

To much light...

With that much light. the margin for error is very large, it does not take much to go oooop's, that is why it is consuming you're nutrient's so fast, you will need a little more of everything, KN03, P04, Trace, and then you will have to stay on top of thing's, constantely.

You are a glutton for punishment eh...lol

You do know that you could grow anything you wanted in that tank with only 1x55.

I would suggest either 1x55 or raise the fixture off tank more.


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## BSS (Sep 24, 2004)

It appears a lot of the algae is green spot algae. If so, during a water change, use a paper towel to wipe off as much GSA as you can above the water line. That way, it helps remove those spores from the tank. I did that in combination with upping my PO4 (though that might not be your issue) and after a couple of weeks, the GSA really cut back.

Good luck!


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## ringram (Jan 19, 2005)

awrieger said:


> So that's 5ppm NO3 4-5 days after a 50% water change then? Not enough.


No, that's 5ppm No3 at night after adding 1/8 tsp (roughly) that morning.


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## ringram (Jan 19, 2005)

Thanks for the replies. I'm going to try getting it balanced with the existing light before I consider downgrading it. The way the lights are currently setup(front, back), I'm not sure if the front bottom of the tank would receive adequate light if I removed the front bulb, and vice-versa. In other words, the spread seems like it would be messed up. 
Anyway, I just finished dosing 1/2 tsp KNo3, 1/2(perhaps a tad less) KH2Po4 and I added about 1/4 tsp K2So4. I'll see what it looks like in a day or so to tell if I'm just feeding algae. The reason being, the tank ha been in (better) balance before and I'm not sure what I was doing differently. I know one of the main fascets of this hobby(which makes it fun!) is learning what works and what doesn't, and learning from your mistakes. 
Thanks again for the advice. I'll keep my fingers crossed :icon_conf 

-Ryan


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## awrieger (May 12, 2005)

ringram said:


> Anyway, I just finished dosing 1/2 tsp KNo3, 1/2(perhaps a tad less) KH2Po4..


Gulp! 1/2 is not a typo is it? You do realize that you just added almost 26ppm of PO4, don't you? (Check the Fertilator to confirm this). Which not only means you now have a 1:1 ratio of NO3O4, but you should definitely test your water immediately now and if your PO4 result is not so dark blue that it's almost black and way off the chart, it means you've definitely got a faulty PO4 test kit.

Good luck!


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## Georgiadawgger (Apr 23, 2004)

You may want to adjust your light schedule if you want to keep both of them...its still going to take some time to get your dosing right. 

Try this: 

10am back light on 
1 pm front light on (both on for now)
5 pm front light off (back light still on)
7 pm back light off.


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## dissident (Oct 15, 2003)

ringram said:


> Anyway, I just finished dosing 1/2 tsp KNo3,
> 1/2(perhaps a tad less) KH2Po4
> and I added about 1/4 tsp K2So4.


[based on 20gal, chuck's calc, real values will be higher since you don't have 20gal of water in the tank]
KNO3 = 24ppm (high IMO) -aim 15-20ppm
PH2PO4 = 27ppm (OMG HIGH) -aim 2-4ppm
K2SO4 = 9ppm (LOW) -aim 20ppm

I would do a big waterchange (clean algae), test, and aim for better targets. 27ppm PO4 can kill. What are you using to measure out ferts, personaly I like the 1/16, 1/32, 1/64, measureing spoons and a digital scale. Hopefully


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## ringram (Jan 19, 2005)

Thanks for the advice. I actually used to run it on a 12 hr timer, but changed to a 10 hr timer a couple months back. As for the previous person talking about the Po4...its been my understanding that overdosing Po4 and upping Co2 is the sure-fire way of wiping out gsa. My Po4 test kit always seems to read green/blue (kind of the 1-1.5 range) no matter when I test it. I've had those dark blue readings before, but its been a while. It is a possibility that the test kit is faulty. It's also a possibility that my entire test kit is faulty. Everything is Aquarium Pharmeceuticals, except the Po4, which is Red Sea. I've had them all for about 10 months and the No3 test kit is coming close to the end.
I like the idea you have of alternating when the lights come on, but unfortunately, with my setup, I have both lights hooked up to the same ballast and there's no way I know of to have them come on independantly. Of course, I'm no electrician, so maybe there's a way. I *have* heard that have an off-time in mid-day, or just have a short (few hours) in mid-day where they're both on, can strangle algae a bit to make it back off.



Georgiadawgger said:


> You may want to adjust your light schedule if you want to keep both of them...its still going to take some time to get your dosing right.
> 
> Try this:
> 
> ...


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## ringram (Jan 19, 2005)

dissident said:


> [based on 20gal, chuck's calc, real values will be higher since you don't have 20gal of water in the tank]
> KNO3 = 24ppm (high IMO) -aim 15-20ppm
> PH2PO4 = 27ppm (OMG HIGH) -aim 2-4ppm
> K2SO4 = 9ppm (LOW) -aim 20ppm
> ...


Thanks. I'll try to do that tonight and perhaps get new test kits over the weekend. As for measuring spoon, I just use a standard, plastic 1/4 tsp from our silverware drawer. If I measure 1/8 tsp, I measure....ohhh...about half. I know its not exact, but I figure its *close enough*.


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## Georgiadawgger (Apr 23, 2004)

ringram said:


> I *have* heard that have an off-time in mid-day, or just have a short (few hours) in mid-day where they're both on, can strangle algae a bit to make it back off.



no....don't to that...its just a myth  There has to be some way we can figure this out!!


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## ringram (Jan 19, 2005)

Georgiadawgger said:


> no....don't to that...its just a myth  There has to be some way we can figure this out!!


But even the alternating lighting periods, as you suggested in an earlier post is true, I'm not certain I can do that in my current setup. If not, would reducing the photo period from 10 hrs to 8 or 9 be a good start? I could, perhaps, re-wire the enclosure to allow just one bulb and move it to the middle, so the light distribution is more centered/even. That may be something I look into if the algae doesn't clear up with the dosing change and other suggestions.


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## awrieger (May 12, 2005)

dissident said:


> [based on 20gal, chuck's calc, real values will be higher since you don't have 20gal of water in the tank]
> ~
> KH2PO4 = 27ppm (OMG HIGH) -aim 2-4ppm


That's true. There's not actually 20g of water. And then also taking into account the other already dosed 2 x 1/8th tsps since the water change, the PO4 is now likely closer to 40ppm. 

So it'll be interesting to see whether the test kit still reads 1-1.5ppm. Are Red Sea PO4 test kits any good? Or do they go out of date quickly perhaps?


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## dissident (Oct 15, 2003)

awrieger said:


> That's true. There's not actually 20g of water. And then also taking into account the other already dosed 2 x 1/8th tsps since the water change, the PO4 is now likely closer to 40ppm.
> 
> So it'll be interesting to see whether the test kit still reads 1-1.5ppm. Are Red Sea PO4 test kits any good? Or do they go out of date quickly perhaps?


I think getting CO2 and ferts ballanced is the biggest step before you change your lighting dramatically. I have 5wpg over my 110 and get some spot algae on the glass, mostly because it sits by a window and gets some sun in the mornings. 

You may want to make a base solution to test your kits. Test your tap PO4, then mix .5tsp into 250ml water and then fill a 5gal bucket with tap. Each ml of the po4 solution should raise the 5gal by .35ppm, so 10mil of the po4 solution should give you ~3.5ppm PO4.


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## ringram (Jan 19, 2005)

*Weekend Update*

Well, I'm starting with some of the suggestions that were given. I dosed yesterday(Sunday) with the following:
KNo3 - 1/4 tsp (fish load is fairly high with the babies, so that adds to this)
K2So4 - slightly more than 1/4 tsp (more like 3/8)
KH2Po4 - ~1/8 tsp
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Then, I tested the water parameters last night (before lights out) and got the following:
pH = 6.4
Kh = 5 dKh
Co2 ~ 60ppm
Po4 = 1-1.5 ppm
No3 = (at least) 20 ppm --- hard to tell the diff shades of red
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I also turned the Co2 down just a touch, so if the ph goes up to around 6.6, it should be about right. The last water change I did was about 3 days ago now(Thursday night). I noticed the GSA gathering on the walls of the tank again...and on leaves a bit, so this problem has not corrected itself just yet(it takes time).
I'm also considering changing the lighting around to allow just 1 tube, instead. 55w would give me around 2.75 wpg and if I wanted to upgrade to a single 65w bulb, I'm pretty sure the ballast would allow that. Anyway, just wanted to give an update. Thanks for any and all replies.  

-Ryan


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