Advice On Combating Bga

[jayjay]

So today I'm starting a treatment for BGA, a 3 day blackout on my 25g.

When I uncover it I will start my hydroponics system and fill it with some type of fast growing floating plant and some fast growing stem plants if I can get hold of some. I'm hoping this will help the problem I have, after clearing most of the BGA out yesterday, it's already growing back.

To the questions, what type of plants do you recommend I use in the tank? Dimensions are 30"￾x15"x12"￾, lighting is very strong (my main reason for BGA). The plants already in the tank are slow growing this is my problem, the plants already in there include: abunias, java fern, java moss, Amazon swords, tiger lotus and moss balls. The tank is only homed to my BGK (black ghost knife) temporarily until it grow large enough to be moved. I was using CO2 but due to laziness on my behalf it was far from stable so made the problem worse. No fertilizers and just a plain sand substrate. Faster the plant growth the better really. I'm going to use the floating plants to cut down light as I'm trying to keep it as low tech as I can. Lighting is on for about 6 hours a day.

Plant ideas so far-

(floating)
Duckweed
Azolla moss
Salvinia
Amazon frog bit
Riccia
Water lettuce
Hornwort

(stem)
Hygro. Pol.
Water wisteria

I'm looking for fast growth in the plants, I'm fine with trimming them back when needed, I'll be better than scraping algae constantly. So any ideas welcomed.

For my hydroponics system I'm going to be using 3 lucky bamboo and a fairly large fern. Does anyone have experience in the matter, after a search of the forum a few people seem to have been interested in the idea and I've followed a few links people have given for advice on the setup. I'm interested to see if anyone has seen a good improvement in a tank with the addition of some kind of hydroponics system.

Do you all feel I'm going about this the right way?

Last note, if anyone has any spare plants they think would be ideal for me and live local I have a 20g (24x15x12) I could swap for a decent amount if possible.

Cheers for the advice.

 

[lljdma06]

Define "strong"?

How much wattage do you have over your 25g?

llj

 

[jayjay]

By strong I mean more than 4wpg 105watts all together. I know that this is my problem also the tank receives sunlight for around 2 hours a day maybe. I should turn some of the light off, or dose ferts etc. I know, but I'd rather do it by planting easy, fast growing plants if possible.

 

[nry]

I think 4wpg and no CO2 is going to be an algae magnet, fast growing plants or not: the lack of CO2 at that wpg level is a major problem as the plants will not be able to grow quickly enough to compete with the algae. If you can't go for CO2 then the laziest option is to reduce your lighting and not stick loads of plants in.

 

[jayjay]

OK I'll drop the lighting, but I'm still going for some fast plants I think. I had success getting rid of BGA in an 8g tank with the use of duckweed, but I'd rather not use that again.

At the moment I'm using 3, 35w bulbs, do I get rid of 1 or two?

I really want to get some type of stem plant, any suggestions of fast growing types?

 

[nry]

Dropping your lighting and having no CO2 will reduce growth noticeably, but even at lower levels (e.g. 1wpg) I have managed cabomba and rotala without much hassle.

Without CO2 I would stick to a single tube, you will have a little over 1wpg, which can grown many plants if you choose them correctly. You may be better to look for low light plants as these will do the best long term. A few members have shown off their low light tanks recently, scan a few pages back and you should find a number of examples, and many are also listed in the 'Member's Tanks' section aswell.

 

[jayjay]

I have a range of low light plants already, just no fast growing ones which is my problem. I'll have a little search around on tropica etc. to choose

After a search of Tropica, there are quite a few plants that fit what I want, so I'll have a look around at what I can get hold of.

 

[Dave Spencer]

JayJay, whilst Tropica are the best, if you are after cheap temporary stems, try Greenline as a saving. I mature tanks with Greenline stems, and plant my final scape with Tropica.

Dave.

 

[jayjay]

I was just searching Tropica for ideas as they have quite detailed information on them. Cheers though Dave. Do you have any suggestions yourself by the way?

 

[Dave Spencer]

Good old Rotala rotundifolia is the best in my experience, but Vallisneria sp. should work, particularly in harder water, and certainly Hygrophilia polysperma, which I see you have listed.

What I have done is to weigh my temporary plants down with lead weights to avoid messing up the substrate, and once the tank starts to look settled, slowly remove the bunches of stems over a period of time and start to introduce plants of choice. If any of your final choice plants are fast growers, plant them at the end because they may be too shaded by the stems, but you could add the slow growers early on just to stop several quids worth of tank looking too crappy at the start.

Dave.

 

[jayjay]

Thanks, I'm not going for a sophisticated tank really, just want it to have some form of plants in, so I'm likely to just stick to the fast growers. Thanks for the rotala suggest I may will try it.

 

[jayjay]

What sort of lighting does Rotala need?

This is the list of plants I'm looking into, any comments on plants I shouldn't use on it?

Echinodorus 'Ozelot'
Bacopa australis
Ceratophyllum demersum
Echinodorus bleheri
Hydrocotyle leucocephala
Hygrophila corymbosa ''Siamensis''
Hygrophila polysperma ''Big leaf''
Hygrophila polysperma
Lilaeopsis macloviana
Ludwigia repens ''Rubin''
Sagittaria subulata
Vallisneria americana (gigantea)
Vallisneria americana (natans)
Vallisneria spiralis ''Tiger''
Shinnersia rivularis 'Weiss-Grün'