Setting Up Planted Tank, Have Staghorn

[dave_m13]

Hi All

Ok I have been reading through numerous articles etc but I am up against Staghorn Algae at the moment, now I am not sure but I am pretty sure there is some imbalance with my set up.

I have 29 US Gallon tank, 2 nutrafin co2 units, using 2.5 yeast in both, each are probably producing 1 bubble every 5 - 6 seconds.

My lighting is 18" 15W freshwater bulbs with reflectors.
I add a liquid plant grow every water change and every other day add Flourish Excel.

Is there anything else I need to be adding checking.

Amm 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 5
PH 6.8
KH or GH is 160ppm cannot remember which way round. basically medium hard water.
Phosphate was very low, probably between 0 - 0.25 could this be the problem?

I do not have an Iron tester, would this be required?

Thanks
Dave

 

[jimbooo]

Hi dave, how many tubes do you have on the tank, just the one 15W or more?

 

[dave_m13]

Hi

I currently have 2, 15W bulbs with 2 reflectors.

Thanks
Dave

 

[jimbooo]

hmm not sure, at 1 WPG the light isn't the cause (do you know what kelvin rating they are?) low phosphate will not cause algae, nitrate is a little low but should not effect anything with 1WPG,

i'm a little stumped, can you get a full tank pic?

the only things i can think of are too much daylight on the tank or too much fertaliser going in versus the growth rate. your not overfeeding if phosphate is low.

i'll keep thinking.

 

[dave_m13]

If the article is correct I believe they are 7500K possibly not entirely sure however.
I will try and get a pic of the tank, basically I have 4 amazons which have grown pretty quickly but are not covering any other plants. Have some ludwiga I think and some hair grass stuff and other plants, most of the plants are growing quickly, new shoots come out of plants, must admit though some of the larger leaves on some plants have become yellow. Is this to do with Iron?

I do not put that much Fertilizer in the tank, I did regularly then stopped for a week or 2 then restarted again.

To be honest the staghorn appeared to get worse the day i added normal yeast to the first Co2 unit rather than pack that came with it, I then added a second but so far has not appeared to get worse.

I will do another lot of testing of water tonight to see what water parameters are.

The tank does not get any sunlight on it at all, right at the back of the room.

Any help would be great, its not too bad yet just not very nice to look at, not that easy to remove either and nothing eats it, have 3 otos and 5 amano shrimps

 

[jimbooo]

yellow leaves can be iron deficiancy but that wont cause algae. too much iron can cause it but not too little.

still stumped i'm afraid, a picture may help.

have you measured the co2 via PH and KH?

 

[zig]

Hiya Dave

Just a couple of questions first if you dont mind

How often and how much water do you change in this tank?

How heavily stocked is this tank?

How heavily planted is the tank?

 

[dave_m13]

I have not tested CO2, but ph is about 6.8 and kh 160,

I have been doing 20% water changes every 1-2 weeks.

I have 2 Rams, 3 kulhi loaches, 6 cardinals, 3 otos, and 5 shrimp. All are pretty small at the moment.

To me I think that the tank is heavily planted, as I do not see much open space for fish and I am always cutting the plants back. I there is too many Amazons in there as they have grown so big.

Thanks
Dave

 

[zig]

Staghorn algae is usually a sign that you are not dosing enough macro nutrients it can also be a carbon dioxide issue but that is unlikely in your case as this is a low light tank and you are using both co2 and Excel.

The apperance of the algae definatly shows you have a deficiency of some sort (Obviously) so given that your phosphate readings are practically 0 this is more than likely the culprit, although your nitrate levels are also quite low at 5ppm and could easily have bottomed out at some stage, the fact that you are useing high levels of co2 on this tank along with the Flourish Excel means you are driving the growth rates in the tank higher and therefore the plants are useing up the nutrients quicker, so i would say this is more than likely where the problem lies, your plants are under fertilised and hence the apperance of the staghorn algae.

This tank does not require both the DIY co2 and the Excel, both are providing carbon for the plants, the excel alone would be enough given the amount of light over this tank.

The amazon swords will outgrow this tank, especially the fact you have 4 of them, and i would imagine the hairgrass will also struggle given the amount of light you have (only 1 WPG) they usually require quite high levels of light.

Generally the idea of low light tanks is that you dont have to fertilise them very much at all, once the fish load is aqequate it should supply the plants with the fertiliser they need, either through the fish waste or the excess food you may feed them this also breaks down into forms the plants will utilise.

For the above to happen in low light tanks you would generally not inject co2, the co2 injection will make the plants grow faster and throw the equalibruim of the tank out of balance in that they will require more food than the fish alone can supply, so it means you will have to add additional fertiliser to keep up with this extra growth, also the fact that your fish load seems very low at the moment this also means they are not supplying enough food for the plants, so you could also add more fish.

Anyway the good news is that staghorn algae is very easy to get rid of, once you increase the nutrient levels in the tank the algae will simply disappear, so just increase the nutrient levels and manually remove any algae you can see.

Have a look at this link below as well it gives a good idea about non co2 low light tanks and how to fertilise them properly.


Non co2 methods

 

[dave_m13]

Many Thanks Zig

Do the reflectors make any difference to the WPG as I have 2 on each bulb.
I think the Nitrate readings were 0 at some point as I have had BGA slowly growing on some plants but every water change I remove it and does not seem to be growing back very much.

I did water tests last night

Amm 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 5
Ph 6.4
Gh 180 ppm
Kh 60
Phosphate 0.25

You say nutrients, I have some Nutrafin Plant gro, would this be good or would you recommend getting individual bottles such as flourish, F Trace, Phosphate, Iron etc. and maybe some plant root tabs?
What would occur if I added another light, would that make any difference at all?

I know that I need to add some more Iron as a few leaves are turning yellow but not many at the moment.

If I remove some of the Amazons what plants would you recommend for this sort of set up. I am not sure what is called but the hair grass is growing pretty well, it is shooting out roots every where and is sort of covering the front.

Would I have to remove the CO2 units to stop the algae growing as well, or if the nutrients are added then I should be ok.

I have tried to added a pic of tank sorry very blurred but I think it is too large to upload what is the limit as the pic is only 441Kb



Thanks
Dave

 

[dave_m13]

Hi Could anyone recommend plants to replace amazons swords, also please see above reply.

Thanks
Dave

 

[SkiFletch]

You might want to look into forms of Anubias, Java Fern, or perhaps some Hygro. I'm using a low-light no-CO2 setup myself. 1.8WPG for me and no algae thus far. I've got no fish in it (still fishless cycling). The only things I do is add some Nutrafin Flourish per the reccomended dosage once weekly after a 50% water change. Only plants i have thus far are Anubias Nana (dwarf anubias) covering approximately 1/4 of my substrate. Tank size is 20 gal.

My water stats:

0 Ammonia
5+ Nitrite (still cycling)
40 Nitrate
1 Phosphate
7.8 pH

forget the exact GH/KH for me but its REALLY high

Thats just my personal experience, might be of some help to you. I'm still new to this whole plant thing though so maybe the experts here can point out some good courses of action for ya