gwlee7
Fish Crazy
I have a 29 gallon that I can't break a repeating cycle of brown algae followed by blue green algae.
My ph is 7.8 +/-
ammonia O
nitrIte 0
nitrAte < 20 ppm
I have 2 watts per gallon of light. My plants are two bronze wendtii, an amazon sword, a couple of other crypts, a little bit of dwarf hair grass, and some hornwort.
I have put some root tabs in the substrate (which is pool filter sand)
Here's how it works: I started getting brown algae so I increased the amoount of light from 10 to 12 hours and the brown algae went away and I started developing BG algae. I started putting a "siesta" of two hours to break up the BG algae cycle but it did not work. Ultimately, I blacked out the tank for 96 hours (four days) and the BG algae went away so I set the lights back at 10 hours total with a two hour break.
The brown algae almost immediately came back and began covering everything. I increase the amount of time that the lights were on and now there is both brown algae and the freaking BG algae is starting to come back too.
I don't have any problems at all in my 30 gallon long that has similar watts per gallon, substrate etc. (the plants in there are thriving and have to be pruned) but I also realize that it is a shorter tank and therefore has a little stronger light intensity.
I have not been able to get an accurate measure of phosphate but have put phosphate absorber in my filter just in case.
This is driving me INSANE.
My ph is 7.8 +/-
ammonia O
nitrIte 0
nitrAte < 20 ppm
I have 2 watts per gallon of light. My plants are two bronze wendtii, an amazon sword, a couple of other crypts, a little bit of dwarf hair grass, and some hornwort.
I have put some root tabs in the substrate (which is pool filter sand)
Here's how it works: I started getting brown algae so I increased the amoount of light from 10 to 12 hours and the brown algae went away and I started developing BG algae. I started putting a "siesta" of two hours to break up the BG algae cycle but it did not work. Ultimately, I blacked out the tank for 96 hours (four days) and the BG algae went away so I set the lights back at 10 hours total with a two hour break.
The brown algae almost immediately came back and began covering everything. I increase the amount of time that the lights were on and now there is both brown algae and the freaking BG algae is starting to come back too.
I don't have any problems at all in my 30 gallon long that has similar watts per gallon, substrate etc. (the plants in there are thriving and have to be pruned) but I also realize that it is a shorter tank and therefore has a little stronger light intensity.
I have not been able to get an accurate measure of phosphate but have put phosphate absorber in my filter just in case.
This is driving me INSANE.