An enlightening observation on lighting

[julielynn47]

I do not know if this is the source of my issue with the diatom/brown algae in my 55, but it is an observation that is very real, in my tanks anyway, and I thought I would share.

In my 10 gallon, I have had a lot of algae, but the green kind does not really bother. But I have had it since the tank was set up pretty much, to some extent.

In my 75 gallon I had no algae at all. I had the stuff growing on the driftwood that I have posted pics of. And I have had a small diatom issue, which is expected in a new tank, nothing bad at all. But I had no green algae of any kind until...I changed the light.

I had an Aqua Glo light, 48 inch T8, if that matters. I thought that the Life Glo might be a little better for the plants. So I got another light and I started running the Life Glo for 5 hours a day. The other 5 hours the Aqua Glo runs. I wanted to give the plants the light of the Life Glo, because it worked so well in the 10 gallon with my plants. But I wanted the color that the Aqua Glo brings out in the plants and fish too.

Almost immediately upon starting to run the Life Glo bulb green algae of just about every variety I know of started to grow. The only thing that was done differently was a light change. I have the Life Glo in the 55 as well, so I can connect Algae with the Life Glo bulb, no doubt about that.

Now I understand that algae is a plant of sorts itself, but it is not one I wish to cultivate. So since this is happening in more than one tank, and did not start in the 75 until I added the Life Glo, well, I believe the Life Glo bulbs, although good bulbs, did tend to grow algae.

Just an observation. Has anyone else experienced this? I will be running the Aqua Glo again in the 75 by itself and I will post the results, if the algae goes away or doesn't.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

Interesting. If I may posit an hypothesis...

Algae takes advantage of an imbalance in the nutrients to light ratio.
The old light and nutrients were in balance, just the right amount of nutrients to go with the amount of light they were getting.

The new light probably caused the plants to increase their growth, but some nutrient (or more than one) was a limiting factor, and once that was gone, the algae got its foothold.

Increase the nutrients available for your plants, and I would bet the algae would subside. The big question is which nutrients are out of whack. The type of algae that took advantage is the clue.

http://www.theplantedtank.co.uk/algae.htm
This link might help figure out what is out of balance.

 

[julielynn47]

That makes sense. I was using Flourish Comprehensive. Maybe if I increase the amount of Flourish...hmmm....

I can take a picture later of the algae. I am not sure what to call some of it. All I know is it is not the kind that adheres to the glass. It is on the wood and the substrate, but not really on the glass. I will do that later today

 

[eaglesaquarium]

CO2 is also a 'nutrient', and that is just as (if not more) likely as anything that Flourish comprehensive could add.

Too long a lighting period is also a possibility, especially if you are running two different lights on the tank.

 

[julielynn47]

It is the same amount of hours of lighting. But different lights. I always thought that algae grew when you had either to much light or too many nutrients

 

[eaglesaquarium]

A simple solution to give your CO2 a little boost (and I do mean little) would be just to add an airstone. This will take air from the room, and will replenish a bit of CO2 taken up by the plants. The best news with this type of set-up, there's no way to overdose it! When adding CO2 through DIY or fire extinguishers, etc. there is a danger or overdosing. This is completely foolproof, AND it won't cause 'fluctuating' CO2 levels, which is worse than insufficient levels and leads to more algae. The CO2 levels would be almost perfectly constant throughout the day, at any ever so slightly higher level than without the airstone.

NOTE: This is just for a very, very minor boost. To get the maximum result, you would want to get an airstone with the smallest holes possible, and if you can get the airbubbles to actually get taken up into the filter... it would chop them up and give the water a little more time to absorb the gas.

Other alternatives to increase CO2 involve:

• the liquid carbon stuff, (which is actually a 'poison' [glutaraldehyde - similar chemical structure to formaldehyde] and there are varied opinions about the ethics of using such a product)
• CO2 set-ups - either yeast, sugar, water and soda bottles (cheap but a pain to babysit, and really only effective on a small scale - like the 10 gallon) or full fire extinguisher/gas tank set-ups which means some serious research and tinkering to get 'just right'.

Personally, I wouldn't go that route.

I'd start by adding an airstone, if you have one on hand - or just increasing the disturbance at the top of the water where it meets the air (anything you'd normally do to increase oxygen levels will also increase CO2 levels, just at a lower percentage based on the ratio of O2 to CO2 in the atmosphere.

And I'd look to boost the fertilizer a little, maybe a 50% increase and watch for changes. One side note: the product you are using is not a significant source of nitrogen. That might be whats missing as well.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

It is the same amount of hours of lighting. But different lights. I always thought that algae grew when you had either to much light or too many nutrients

Well, its really all about balance... so those two scenarios are pretty accurate:
too little nutrients is just another way of saying 'too much light', and too many nutrients is another way of saying 'too little light'.

10 hours where its 5 hours of one and 5 hours of the other isn't the same as 10 hours of just one. You added a more 'powerful' (meaning more PUR - photosynthesis usable radiation) light for 5 hours... that's an increase in overall lighting. You could try cutting that back to 4 hours and see how that works in addition to the recommendations above.

 

[AbbeysDad]

Algae, especially green is not such a bad thing. In the past, I have encouraged it to grow on one wall (side wall or rear) while keeping the other walls clean. This acts as an 'algae scrubber' to use excess nutrients while providing a food source for fish and snails...just some 'food' for thought.

 

[cowgirluntamed]

My lights are definitely part of my imbalance issues. That and the wrong type of fertiliser. I will be working in that more down the road when my health issues are better though. Keep up the good sluething work!! You'll get there!!

 

[Byron]

I have used all the tubes in the "Glo" series. The Life-Glo is the best by far, and it is almost double the intensity of the Aqua-Glo. [At this point, I should say we are assuming T8 lighting.] So when you changed from the AG to the LG, you immediately increased the intensity of the light by close to double. That caused an imbalance with nutrients, and algae took advantage. We don't know the plant species, or how many, nor the fish load. These are factors in the "balance" as well as additives (Flourish Comprehensive), light and your GH.

The LG is much better light for plants. It is high in the red, blue and green; the AG is primarily red and blue which is why it gives that purplish hue. Green light added to red and blue has been shown to improve plant growth, probably because of the increase in intensity, since green light is primarily reflected (which is why the leaves appear "green").

I only use the LG over my single-tube tanks, as it is the only tube that has sufficient intensity to allow low and moderate light requiring plants to manage. The ZooMed UltraSun is basically identical. Either of these are about your best light.

Provided you find the balance and maintain it, you will not see algae problems. Algae will be present, that is unavoidable, but not as a problem. Algae however is always able to take advantage because it is not as fussy about light or nutrients as higher plants. I have had problem algae (brush in my case) with too much light, too little light, too many nutrients, and too few nutrients. These are really all the same thing in a sense, since you could theoretically restore the balance by adding this or that. But where this "theory" falls apart is by not including the other factos in the balance, such as the plant species, their number, the minerals in the source water, and the fish load/feeding. This is why a better approach as Tom Barr has often said is to decide on your lighting for the intended plants, and then add nutrients until you balance.

As a couple examples from my own experience. As fluorescent tubes burn the intensity slowly decreases. It will come to the point where it is no longer sufficient to balance, and at this point you will often see algae begin to increase. I experimented with this a couple times, using a single Life-Glo tube over the tank, and I found that after 12 months the light had decreased sufficiently to allow algae to take advantage. I got to 15 months before it was very obvious, and I replaced the tube. Algae stopped increasing, and not surprisingly the plants rebounded. During this period, the plant additives were the same, Flourish Comprehensive weekly.

In another tank, I discovered that brush algae increased from dosing Flourish Comprehensive twice a week; I went back to once, and it stopped. I did this test twice, over several months each, with the same result. The second dose of FC was increasing nutrients that the plants could not make use of under the light, so algae did. Going back to my previous comment on the balance, one might say in this scenario that increasing the light to balance the second dose might work, but actually it would only have made things worse. This is because the plants in this tank were making use of the light as it was, and any increase would have raised the bar, so to speak, and other nutrients, primarily CO2, would not be sufficient for the new level. CO2 is something to factor in to the equation too, as eagles noted. Given the issues with CO2 addition, it is best to work with the natural level of CO2 occurring in the aquarium. In my tanks, I have found that I can have 8 hours of tank lighting per day, no more, without algae problems; one tank is only 7 hours. Additional daylight entering the room during summer, which is also brighter daylight in summer, can be all it takes to throw this balance off; covering the windows completely solved this annual summer problem (easy to do with a fish room). It only shows how many factors are in the balance.

Byron.

 

[julielynn47]

Okay, so I think I am hearing is that I have added about twice the light that the tank was used too. Which caused the algae to grow. That pretty explains it. I know it has something to do with the Life Glo bulb, T8, I just didn't understand the "why" of it. I think I will cut the amount of the Life Glo back to about 3 hours and let the Aqua Glo cover the rest. I will see what happens from there.

Edited to add - there are no fish yet. I am cycling it now. So fish do not play a part in the balance yet.

I don't mind the green algae all that much as long as it does not take over. But it was just weird to me the way that it took off just when I added that Life Glo bulb. So...with a Life Glo bulb, maybe I need to fertilize more or no? Or who knows just give it shot?

 

[eaglesaquarium]

Yup... start journaling about it. Try cutting the time of the Life Glo and then wait a week. Watch and record observations. Then start to boost your ferts a little. Watch and record.
Change ONE THING AT A TIME and give it at least a week to see if things are improving or not.

Incidentally, when you add fish, you will be adding nutrients every time you feed them. So... that is an extra variable that will need to be considered.

 

[StandbySetting]

If you're cycling I'd actually bet good money that it's the ammonia causing your algae issues, especially as you have diatoms. its best to keep the lights off when cycling. But obviously with you having plants you need some lighting, what species do you have?

 

[Byron]

Yes, the cycling issue is a major factor here. There is actually more nutrients in the form of organics in a new tank than some might expect. Tap water can be very high in organics; this is why you see bacterial blooms in new tanks. Algae is photosynthetic so it will readily make use of any light.

To the combination of AG and LG and the duration. This might cause more trouble. Overhead light should be consistent if the plants are to use it and algae be kept at bay. The better plant light when the LG is running would be useful to the plants, but when this is off and the AG alone is running, the plants are suddenly finding it more difficult to photosynthesize and algae again has the advantage.

We also don't know the plant species of numbers. Having more plants should result in less advantage for algae. And of course, floating plants are ideal for this. And all fish prefer them, so a double win situation.

Byron.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

How did I miss the 'cycling' part of this?! That's definitely a major contributor to this entire process.


Incidentally, if you are cycling and you have an established filter in the 10 gallon, you really should seed the larger tank with some (up to half) of the media from that tank if at all possible. This will dramatically decrease the duration of the cycling process. Secondly, how much ammonia are you dosing in the tank with the plants. Many plants will be ok with ammonia up to the full dose for cycling (3ppm), but others will be damaged by it and this will just open the door to more algae to take a foothold.

Finally, I agree with Byron that you would likely find that simply going with 6-8 hours of the LG lighting would be sufficient and would greatly reduce your algae issue in the future. Adding more plants will help also. More plants is better, and using root tabs will keep the nutrients available to the plants through the roots while keeping it away from the algae in large part.