An old nemesis found

In my last post I mentioned that I’ve been fighting algae for the last six months. That is true. And before my long dry-spell of no posting, I mentioned that I though I had conquered the persistent GDA on the tank walls, that I had been fighting pretty much since the tank went up.

But after declaring victory, I realized that I had been cheating.

Normally I don’t do regular, manual water changes on my tank. The automation on the tank does multiple small drain/fill cycles each night that equates to a 50% water change every three days.  But while I was fighting this algae on my glass, I had been doing a 90% water change every weekend. This allowed me to clean my glass of the algae. And over time, the amount I was cleaning every week became less and less. Until finally I thought I had it licked. But all that changed when I decided to go back to my normal routine of no huge weekend water changes with rigorous glass cleaning. And WOW, the algae came back in a hurry.

And rather than aggressively scrape it off, I decided to let it go a few weeks to see if this really was GDA (green dust algae) as I thought. It virtually brushed off, easy to clean. So I thought I knew what I was dealing with. But I was wrong. After a few weeks of letting it grow, the acrylic tank walls were covered in beautiful green threads, waving in the current. Thread Algae! My own personal algae nemesis returned! Or rather, had never really gone away.

In the Scolley’s Follies category here you’ll see a tank that got badly infested with this stuff. And I mean bad. There were extenuating circumstances in that tank that you can read about in that post, but bottom line was - thread algae was completely out of control in that tank. And now I found out that it is what I had actually been fighting in this tank for a year and a half. Why? Or rather, why my tanks?

I had a very long thread where I battled this stuff in detail, aggressively for months, documented over at plantedtank.net. So I went back and re-read that. And then I started researching other places where I found this algae. And I found it to be a bad nuisance algae in another type of tank - marine tanks. Granted, I’m sure it’s somewhat different on some technical biological level. But fundamentally it looks the same. And everywhere you find this stuff, there are a few things in common, beside the obvious light and water. They are:

1. Strong water current
2. Phosphate
3. Silicates

Strong water current

This seems obvious. Just look at the algae’s morphology. It is long threads, that grow by adding length to the thread - threads that wave in the current, picking up nutrients as they pass by, and growing the thread. You don’t find this stuff in slow or still waters.

Phosphates

I battled this documented in dialogues with well intentioned “experts” over at plantedtank.net. There is a popular belief that by making sure that you have enough of every nutrient your plants need in your tank, then your plants will flourish, and they will somehow magically “out compete” algae, even though there is enough nutrients to go around for both plants and algae. Well that’s bunk. Unfortunately a large vocal group in the planted tank community drinks this particular kool-ade. Not me. I’ve proved it to be incorrect to my own satisfaction, in my own tanks.

It is clear, that if you run out of any given nutrient, opportunistic algaes will take over. So you can’t bottom out of any nutrient. Zero ppm is bad, even for phosphate (in a freshwater planted tank that is). And it is true that your plants flourish in an excess of nutrients. But where the wheel falls off the wagon with this thinking is the belief that flourishing plants will make your algae problems go away. In some tank it will. But in others not. If you, like me, have one of those nasty algaes that will not die while your plants are flourishing, you’ve got to deprive the algae. Or find something that eats it. And for me, in this tank, that has meant managing my phosphate level so that it remains between 0.05 and 0.2 ppm. It’s seems to be enough for the plants, and it appears to seriously limit the growth of the thread algae.

Silicates

This is the real key. I’m not going to say that you won’t find this algae in tanks without silicates present, but you sure as heck will find it in abundance in plenty of tanks with excess silicates. Want to see an example? Just go to your nearest pet shop and look for it in the marine tanks. Chances are very high that you will find in in tanks with silica sand bottoms, but not in tanks with bare bottoms or calcium substrates. And I’ve never had it in a tank that did not have sand on the bottom either. But I’ve got more evidence, and I find this somewhat compelling…

When I was battling this the first time - in my original Big Clear Kahuna tank - it was my first tank with a sand substrate. And because I was doing everything “right” in conventional planted tank wisdom, I eventually questioned my test values of my water, and sent three samples off to be professionally ($$$) tested. One sample was my tap water. One sample was from my Big Clear Kahuna tank that had the awful thread algae problem. And one was from my little “Mickey’s 20″ tank that had no thread algae at all. In fact I was barely ever even doing water changes in that tank, because it was so stable. That should have been a clue. The test results can be found in the chart at the top of this post.

At the time I was focused on my NPK values, and to some extent micros like iron and magnesium. But I was foolish to ignore the silicate readings. They are unusually high for, and they tell a good story. The silicates in my tap water is a very high 7 ppm. They were half that in the Big Clear Kahuna, and were less than 1 in Mickey’s 20g. I can’t explain why it’s so high in my tap water. I gather that some water companies actually add silicates for some “benign” reason. But that number plummets to less than 1 in Mickey’s 20. Why? Because plants (and algae) do use silicates. And with very infrequent water changes, even the very high starting point of 7 ppm got cut down to residual levels over time by being consumed by plants. But the Big Clear Kahuna on the other hand was receiving weekly 50% water changes, which should have boosted the silicates, keeping it up at a near 7 ppm level. And keep in mind, plenty of silicates were also available due to the sand substrate. So why were the silicate being knocked down to 3.5 ppm, when my plants were barely growing they were so covered with algae. What was reducing the ppm from 7 to 3.5? Easy! The algae itself was a major silicate consumer. And the abundance of it - combined with plenty of phosphates and nice brisk water flow - was enough to kick that particular algae into overdrive.

So high water is important. And the presence of phosphates is too. But in my opinion the lynch pin is that excess of silicates. That explains why so many people have “proved” that this is not caused by excess phosphates. It’s not. It’s caused by the combination of all three things; flow, phosphate, and silicates. Remove one and it goes away.

My current problem explained

So, if silicates are so important, why was my current tank getting better - as evidenced by less algae on the tank walls - when the tank remains bathed in excess silicates? Between the sand substrate provide substantial silicates, and the tank is automatically providing itself a 50% water change every three days (of 7 ppm tap water), silicates should  ALWAYS be there in excess. But I’m managing the phosphate level now. As stated before, I’m keeping it between 0.05 and 0.2 ppm, and the algae is staying in check. And the plants are growing.

Unfortunately this means I’m having to do water testing - which I hate - and periodically adding Potassium Phosphate - which I also hate. And all this may get messed up in the spring, when my tap water begins to get influenced by agricultural runoff, and the Phosphate ppm starts to climb. I may have to resort to installing an DI filter. I hope not.

Concluding

All this is my own conjecture, based on my observations. The test here is going to be time. Will my tank thrive, and remain relatively free of thread algae now that I’m keeping my phosphates low?

Here’s a pic of the tank now, so you can get a before and after view. Here’s “before”. You can see the evidence of where the algae was on every leaf, and can even be found in some clumps of moss if you zoom in. And finally, the Hygrophilia corymbosa got whacked back pretty bad. Lets’ see if it can bounce back without me doing the weekly algae cleaning, and tightly managing that phosphate level. Time will tell.

When I set this up, I never really intended it to be an active blog… you know, the kind where I’m contributing every day. Though the fact that this web site is technically run on a Wordpress blog engine allow this site to show the chronological progression of my tank. That’s a good thing I suppose.

Anyway, I haven’t posted in months and months. Have been busy professionally, cutting into hobby time. And have also been sidelined with a little aquarium DIY project. Plus my PC went belly up, and then my little home file server (that I keep my pics on) went belly up. Getting all that rebuilt took time. And now here it is, a good 6+ months since my last post.  So, here’s what’s been going on in my tanks:

• New red discus
• New white discus
• Aggressive thread algae
• Algae eaters

I previously posted pics of my 3R2’s, a type of red discus. These were the first juvenile discus I’ve ever had. In the past I’ve always gotten adults or sub adults. The conventional wisdom is that juveniles are hard pressed to get sufficient nutrition in a planted tank. Well I’m here to tell you that is true. Long story short, I eventually gave away a few of them, and one of them was badly stunted from months in my tank - at a crucial time in it’s development - not getting enough food.

So I got a second batch of red fish. This time they were 3R’s, a precursor to the 3R2 strain. Very red. And I got these as juveniles too, certain proof that I’m a slow learner. They worked out better than the 3R2’s, and went into my tank after a few months in quarantine.

All of this was to provide a little contrast in the tank. The blues of my other fish kind of blended in with the green plants, not enough color contrast. And so in a final attempt at more contrast I got some white discus too.

These are called Show Whites. They aren’t albino, just white. The problem though, is that they eventually begin to get tinted with pigments from their food. I feed my fish frozen blood worms and Tetra Colorbits. Only one of the Snow Whites has developed a taste for the tetra color bits, and that’s good because it’s slowly turning into a Snow Yellow. More amber really. And these were juveniles too, which probably proves that maybe I’m not really a slow learner, just very stubborn.

The Snow White have only been in my display tank - the Son of Kahuna - for a few weeks. But they’ve been mercilessly harassed by the juvenile 3R’s, and they haven’t been getting much food at all. Hiding in the weeds most of the time. They do come out at night, and when the overhead lights are off. But they are coward in the full light, and the harrassment by the red juveniles does not help.

So last night I scooped ouy my most aggressive 3R’s and put them in my quarantine tank. I figure I’ll let them chill out in there with no other discus for a month or so to let the Snow Whites get comfortable, and establish their own place in the pecking order. The 3R’s are feisty enough that I’m sure they’ll integrate back into the pack, but maybe not as the bullies they are now.

And for all the problems with the various red and white juvies beating each other up, my adults are doing great. I’ve got just shy of non-stop breeding going on. Here’s a pair of my hi-bodied leopards, doing what they seem to always be doing… guarding eggs or wigglers.

Next I need to catch you up on my algae woes.

Well the tank is springing back nicely. And my persistent algae problems are massively diminished. So while some of the leaves of plants have algae on them that they acquired several weeks ago, no new leaves have algae. And that is a nice change.

The Hygrophilia corymbosa is slowly filling in and getting bushier. I initially let it grow too tall before I trimmed it. Now I’m topping it off every week so that it will fill in better. The Hygrophila difformis snapping back. And my Cryptocoryne wendtii and Echinodorus ‘Rubin’ are both totally algae free! Only the Echinodorus bleheri - the sword plant - has any algae. But that plant is off the the side and not getting enough light, and it appears to be underfertilized too. I’ll have to look into that…

I’ve put in an Eheim autofeeder to make sure the new red 3R2’s are getting enough food, often enough. The upshot is that ALL the fish are getting more food. I can see them all fattening up, and getting larger. Good for them I suppose.

The overall tank is still unbalanced visually, and improving the aquascape will be the focus of my efforts this year, now that I’ve got this algae licked. Well, I say “licked”… the GDA on the glass is still there. But it is quite manageable - requiring one 15 minute session of glass cleaning every week. And that persistent algae on the sand has stayed away for a few weeks, thank goodness. So it’s all controllable.

The new red 3R2s are still hiding. Three of the five barely ever come out. If anyone is in the room at all, the skittish three hide. So I have no idea of they are coming out to eat. I hope so. I’m just hoping that they will get over this with time.

I made a number of important changes to the tank to get ahead of this aglae. I know you can only change one variable at a time if you want any idea of what does/does not work. But I was desparate to control my algae problem and changed multiple variables. Problem is, I just don’t know which one was responsible for the change, or what combination:

1. Started using a “siesta”, or 90 minutes in the middle of the day with no lights.
2. Reduced the photoperiod to seven (7) hours total time of lights on.
3. Eliminated macro dosing, except potassium.
4. Reduced potassium dosing way back to one tenth of its normal volume.
5. Reduced micro dosing back to one tenth of its normal volume.
6. Reduced CO2 back to around 15 ppm.

A lot of people will tell me some of those things are real “no-no”s. But it’s working, and it’s hard to argue with success. Over time I’ll pick up the CO2 dosing. And I’m sure I’ll be forece to tweak the macro/micro dosing. But for now, I’m happy to have the tank healthy.

Wow. Been a while since I last posted. Sorry.

Things in the tank have been going fairly well, all but the recent CO2 goof up I posted about. And the fact that I massively over-trimmed the plant AND simultaneously did a filter media change. So the tank has been recovering from that. But the operative word is recovering. But the big news is - NEW FISH! I love new fish!

In the first pic you can see two little 3″ (well almost 3″) reddish discus in the background. They are “3R2″s from Wayne Ng, a breeder/importer. My wife was jonesing for some red fish, and these were the best I could do. I got a total of five, and they are expensive little buggers.

I’ve actually had them for seven weeks. The first six were spent in quarantine. They were maybe 1/2″ smaller when I got them. They were healthy as can be. So after 6+ weeks I dumped them in the tank. But before I did that, I took my runt Cobalt out and put him in the quarantine - to see if it had any pathogens they couldn’t deal with, and visa versa. You can see the “runt” in the pic below behind one of the 3R2’s.

But to my dismay, I could not leave the runt in their tank. He is normally the most shy, skittish, beat-up upon fish in the tank. I guess that goes with being the runt. But once he got in with these little guys he decided he was BMOC, Hot Sh*t, Top Dog, and all that! He would NOT let my 3R2’s eat! As far as he was concerned, the food was HIS. Quantity did not matter.

So, knowing I was risking my whole tank - I dumped him back into it, so that the 3R2’s could get some food. About five days later i just tossed the 3R2’s in the main tank… since the cross-contamination test was effectively blown. I figured both populations looked healthy, so dump ‘em in and hope for the best.

As I stated up front, I got five new fish. But these pics only show two. Good reason… these fish are wicked skittish. Two of them will only come out when no one is around. One walks the line, but certainly will not come out for pictures. The two in the pics are pretty “up front”. But as I walked around with the camera they got nervous and retreated. That’s why they are in the background in the first pic. And from the difference you can see between the two pics, they darken up a lot when hiding near the plants.

Apparently 3R2’s are pretty skittish as a breeding line. But that said, my Cobalts hid in the plants for darn near a month when I first got them. So I think this is one of those “time will tell” sort of things.

My wife (and I - truth be told) wanted RED fish. Not orange. But orange is the color discus tend towards. If you see red discus - as far as I can tell - it’s either because they have been fed hormones, unnatural amounts of food supplements, or the tank light has been altered. Failing that, PhotoShop can always redden up your digital fish pics if needed.

I got these fish because I trusted the gentleman i bought them from - Al Sapetta - the owner of www.simplydiscus.com. Al’s a stand-up guy, and he knew my wife wanted red - and he knew of the natural orange tendencies of discus - and he recommended these fish. That is good enough for me.

I’m feeding them frozen blood worms, Tetra Color Bits (now renamed something like Color Granules) and a little bit of NaturalRose red color enhancer. So yes, I’m cheating. But not so much that it jeopardizes the health of the fish. Problem is, my other fish are eating it too! So if my blue Cobalts start looking purple, you’ll know why! LOL

More about the tank itself soon. But all is fairly well. But not perfect. Otherwise… why post?

PS - I forgot to mention! That darned runt is a runt BECAUSE he won’t eat Tetra Color Bits. All the other fish do - they got big, and he didn’t. Well, while bullying my 3R2’s he started eating the Color Bits, aparently just to spite them. WELL… since putting him back in the main tank he has participated heartily in the multiple Color Bit feedings and has grown VISIBLY in just one week. Sounds unbelievable, I know. But true.

Well, as you can see, things are returning to normal after all the aquarium and fish excitement I’ve had over the last few weeks. From the pic below you can see the the fish seem fairly normal after my nearly killing them with a CO2 overdose last week. Two of the high bodied leopard discus actually spawned a couple of days ago. And a couple of the cobalt discus are doing their serious tail shimmy - let’s get it on - dances right now. I take breeding as a sign of health and well being. So I’m happy for that.

The tank is going through some changes. My CO2 tank ran dry, just as I was messing with the pH probe, and I shut off the lights and fert injections for a few days until I could get a replacement CO2 cylinder. So I’m leaving the ferts off for a little while, just to see how the tank (and algae) reacts.

In order to fight the algae problem, I’ve raised my lights by three inches, reduced my temperature to 82 (though lights and pumps still raise it a few degrees during the day), have reduced my total photo period to seven hours, and spit it up with a 90 minute siesta. So that’s three and a half hours light, hour and a half dark, and another three and a half hours light.

Lots of people will tell you that a siesta is bunk. It may be. But I also know my most algae free tanks has siesta. Coincidence? I wouldn’t know. But I know it won’t hurt.

The plants are growning back after my bone-headded huge trim. But with the ferts and lights dialed back, they are taking their time about it. But that’s OK. The algae’s kind of chilling too. And that’s the goal.

Well, every once in a while if you highly automate your tanks, you will dip your toe into the cold, cold waters or highly automated hell. Welcome in! I’m there right now, and going for a swim…

My lack of posting for a couple of weeks is not for lack or desire. Nor has it been because the tank looks like crap, and I’m just ashamed to show it to you. No. The tank DOES look like crap. And I AM ashamed. But honesty and candor require that I show it to you. But I don’t have time now to deal with picture taking, Photoshop, and all that hoowie. But I’m happy to tell you about the tank.

A few weeks ago I was agonizing over the fact that I let the plants go too long without trimming. And that the deep trimming that neglect necessitated was a really bad bedfellow with the fact that I needed to change a filter. Well it gets worse…

I’ve got a pH controller, and a probe for it that I have mounted in-line, so it is perpetually sampling my water for pH and adjusting CO2 injection accordingly. This particular pH probe - Lab grade from Neptune Systems - was both expensive, and also WORTH it because it has been humming along for almost a year without any significant deviation from my other pH meters. In other words, while the probe vendors recommend calibration on a VERY regular basis (say monthly if you are lazy like me) this little puppy has been RIGHT on target for months on end. And being human, I’ve been ignoring it… as if it would be correct forever.

Well the deep algae on every surface in my tank caused me to quickly surmise that something FUNDAMENTAL was wrong. And at the very least, it was my pH readings, and subsequent lack of CO2 injection.

Now that does not mean that I did not cut my biofilter back too far. I did. A major trim of plants coupled with  a massive plant trim was pure foolishness. But following this up with too little CO2 because of an out-of-calibraton probe was just stupid.

So, my tank looks like crap. Pics to follow soon.

That said, I don’t have a lot of progress to talk about. Nor pics to show you. My extra time - for what little there has been, has been consumed with stupid and time-consuming scraping the sides of the tank to clean the MASSIVE quantities of GDA, and trimming the RIDICULOUS amount of plant leaves of the same affliction. All in all, between the trimming, tank cleaning, and pH probe testing, I’d guess that I’ve wasted AT LEAST 8 hours on this crap.

So much for a low-maintenance planted discus tank.

Will post much more later after I dig myself out of planted discus tank hell.

Cheers - Steve

A couple of weeks ago I posted saying I wasn’t going to trim my plants. Big mistake.

The hygro was growing out of the top, and was long overdue for a trim. Unfortunately I let it get too tall - too leggy. So when I cut it last week, I cut it way back. But the leaves that were exposed by that process were too old. When they were exposed to the direct light this week GSA set up on them badly.

That was made worse by the fact that I spent weeks without cleaning the GDA off the sides and let it get too bad. I had it where I could do a quick scrape every few days and the tank was fine. But by waiting weeks it got thick, and when I cleaned it it went all over the tank. Including those old leaves on the hygro. And it hit the wysteria pretty hard too. And because I let it get so out of hand before I cleaned it, it was unusually thick on the tank walls by the end of the week.

All this might have been avoided if I hadn’t neglected regular maintenance.

But I replaced the filter media on one of my OceanClears. Big mistake after a huge trim. The trim removes biomass, and the filter change took out half of my bio-filtration too, Stupid. But I did it. I wonder how long I have to be in this hobby before I stop making newbie mistakes?

So I ripped all the stems out, and the hygro, and cut it way, way back. And I removed the Ludwigia repens too. I hated to do that - I love that plant. But it’s getting warm in the summer weather - 85 degrees in the tank every afternoon - and it is just not dealing with the heat. All its old growth is algae covered, so it’s better out of the tank.

What went back in the tank was only 1/3 the plant mass of what came out. Now my tank has precious little biomass. That’s potential trouble. So I’m anxious to see what this week is going to bring.

Live and learn I guess.

Well, the Green Dust Algae got pretty nasty. I hadn’t touched the tank in weeks, and it looked like it, so I broke down Friday nite and cleaned it. There was so much GDA that after scraping it off gave the water a strong green tint. So I did an 80% water change too, just to get most of it out. And I’m still having trouble with some kind of green algae growing on the sand. So I gravel vacuumed up the top 1/2″ or so, Chloroxed it, and put it back.

I’ll have to go back and check my records I think it had been three weeks since I touched the tank. And doing so created a maintenance effort that was probably 3 hours in total. A good bit of work I’m afraid. Or, I suppose you could say 1 hour a week for 180 gallon aquarium isn’t too bad. Especially with plants and discus.

I obviously trimmed the plants while I was at it. It felt like a pound or two of trimmings were pulled out. Tank looks better now though.

These photos really look aweful. The depth of field - or rather lack thereof - makes the tank look flat. I need to get a better camera, because I can tell you these boring, unidimensional pictures, just don’t show what the tank looks like in real life… where you can see the layers of depth. It also makes the fish look like they’ve got no room, when in actual fact they’ve to all kinds of room. So one day, a new camera. But for now, here’s a few pics of my fish.

I’ve got two types of discus, Cobalts and High-bodied Leopards. Both sets purchased from Dan at Gulf Coast Discus. If you look hard, or click on on of the pics to pull up a larger shot, you can see that one of the Leopard’s tails is a bit raggedy. I’ve got two fish that get beat up by the other fish. The ragged tailed Leopard, and my runt Cobalt. I’m not sure the runt can be seen in these pics - he’s hanging to the background where it is safe.

Anyway, here’s some pics.

I’m tired of cleaning green dust algae. Tired of trimming plants. So I’m taking a break from maintenance this week.

Usually I’ll clean the tank on a Friday evening if we don’t go out. Or Saturday afternoon/evening if we do. But last night we didn’t go out, and I was tired. Didn’t feel like farting around with the tank. And this afternoon we are going to the SimplyDiscus.Com 2008 Northeast Meeting and Cookout. So it won’t get cleaned then. I’m sure that tomorrow I’ll feel compelled to clean. But I’m not doing it on schedule.

Actually it didn’t get cleaned last week either. So the plants have been at least two weeks without a trim. So some old leaves are getting algae - that’s natural. Others are rotting. Natural too. But that’s why regular maintenance is required.

And the green dust algae (GDA) is getting bad in some places. Here’s a pic. Not very good, and clicking brings up a larger one. In this you can see that the GDA really does need attention. And the crypts need old leaves trimmed off.

I chose this pic because it reminded me of something disconcerting this week…

Earlier this week I came in to feed the fish one morning, and there was a bunch of foam on the surface of the tank, up against the tank wall. Uh oh. Looks like protein film. Hmmmm. I wonder what died?

All the discus were there. But a couple of days ago I noticed that one or two of my cockatoo dwarf cichlids seem to be missing. I had four males and two females. This pic is a typical feeding shot. When I drop in frozen blood worms everybody comes out of the bushes in a hurry! Dwarf ciclids, corys, biota striata (zebra loaches), and ghost shrimp. They all love bloodworms. But now, no more than two or three male cockatoo dwarfs. At least one is gone. If I can get them to hold still long enough maybe I can count.

I’m not really up on these fish… I suppose one or two could be guarding a brood. I’ve got breeding caves hidden in the plants. I wouldn’t know. I just hate to think that one or two died. They were young, and apparently healthy. I quarantined them for almost six weeks, and hit them with all sorts of prophylactic meds. If that didn’t kill them, I’m concerned that tank conditions would.

But it has been hot this week. The tank temps have been climbing as high as 85-86 degrees F every afternoon. Maybe it’s time to turn on the air conditioners and bring the ambient temperature in the room down a bit. It’s definitely killing my Ludwigia repens. Could be giving my poor cockatoo dwarf cichlids a hard time too.

And speaking of hard times… my favorite plant forum plantedtank.net has been down for two days. And I notice that aquaticplantcentral.com is down for repairs. I wonder that there has been another attack on aquatic plant sites? Hope not. And I hope that whoever it is that does that discovers in a nasty way that there is karma in the universe, and that what goes around comes around. But mostly I hope everything is ok.