Journal Soil is not your problem

[raj]

So today’s post is all about GDA.
Tom has in past said that GDA is best left alone and let it cycle out, and that has always worked for me.
I have provided same advice to many but most people lose patience or don’t understand how to cycle a tank.
I usually donate changes, as I have been documenting here. I don’t change my dosing or light periods.
As tank stabilizes you will see signs of GDA browning and that is your hint that it’s going in the right direction..
I never clean my glass unless there is GDA and in a well run tank you should never have too. Well not never, only if you have GSA

So as you have seen in the past posted the amount of GDA I had. Also had green water for which I put UV.

Since the last water change the algae cleaners are up most of the dying GDA. I cleaned up the rest off the front glass during water change. Pics of progression attached.
Greenwater has lowered I think it will be another week or so.
Kleb has remained and will be next focus once I get rest of algae sorted.last pic shows its condition at present.

Plants are getting happier

So I hope this puts the GDA algae management to rest and people hopefully learn for this. Also while you have GDA or other green algae do not use ammonical sources. Will only make things worse.

 

[raj]

Didn’t let me attach more than 5 pics so here is the last 3, incidentally they are before water change, after water change and Kleb.

 

[raj]

Water changes are now fixed to weekly.
The glasses are all clean of GDA. Some still remain on plants but this will also get cleaned soon by the crew.
Green water is also almost gone. I’ll monitor a few more days and then the UV comes off.
Kleb has also kinda changed. Still around very much but has compacted instead of being fluffy and stringy.

Xiaozhuang recently commented on my post on FB that much of this proves nothing because if I defeat this algae or any algae ifs because of my talent. I appreciate that he thinks I have that kind of talent (I really don’t) but what I do know is how to observe and read my tank and plants quite well and managing light and co2 balance. That does come with experience and I hope to be as open as here on this thread and reasons for why I do so, so hopefully someone else can follow and learn.

So, with that, so far all I have done is try to cycle the tank fast. New soil especially new volcanic soils lower ph quite drastically and while bacteria of different types exist in low ph, their growth is quite slow. So I like to supplement my new tanks with buffers and GH to help bacterial growth to cycle the tank and accelerate plant root zone development. Bacteria play a huge role in the root zone for plant growth.

And today what I saw with was my TC bacopa salzamani which was covered by kleb still lives and is starting to take off. In fact all my plants had new growth. This usually means the tanks is starting to stabilize and plants are finding the conditions to be right.
So I decided to trim the rotala bush before it gets out of control and rearranged some others, replaced a couple, going to be adding more plants slowly.
When I start seeing such signs of growth and receding algae, I usually take a chance and bump the lights, which I have. The reason for that is, i want the plants to have what is non-limiting for growth and I think once the substrate is shaded with plants, most of the algae will struggle. Identifying that moment in your tank is not hard because 50% of your plants or more will show signs of growth.

Pics of before and after water change and state of most visible Kleb location

 

[Art]

what I do know is how to observe and read my tank and plants quite well and managing light and co2 balance. That does come with experience and I hope to be as open as here on this thread and reasons for why I do so, so hopefully someone else can follow and learn.

This is awesome. Thank you.

Bacteria play a huge role in the root zone for plant growth.

This is an area of little study in the aquarium. I agree with you 100%. They do in nature, how could they not in the aquarium setting.

Some companies make bacterial products that are intended to be spread into the substrate with this in mind. The 2Hr Aquarist's APT Start is an example of this. ADA also has a product.

While I realize that getting the plants into a healthy growth mode will be the most effective way to combat algae, even Kleb, have you ever thought about bacteria's role?

A long time ago, I had a BBA problem. I took the opportunity to test out a theory I had about bacterial populations assisting in combating algae in the aquarium. So, I began to feed the tank vodka to carbon dose. This should increase the overall bacterial population in the aquarium.

I increased aeration to offset the increase bacterial respiration and I added more nutrients to offset the increase uptake due to bacterial growth.

What happened was that I got a massive cyanobacteria outbreak that covered everything like sheets of translucent green. It was UGLY. However, before attacking the cyano, I let it go for about a week. Then I hit it with erythromycin to kill off the cyano and stopped dosing vodka.

Wouldn't you know it, the anubias that had BBA ended up clean after the cyano was gone. I'm not sure it was the bacteria, the erythromycin or improved plant growth, but the BBA was gone.

Sorry to hijack your wonderful thread. Just thought I would add the bacteria story given your comments on how important they are in the root zone.

 

[raj]

This is awesome. Thank you.


This is an area of little study in the aquarium. I agree with you 100%. They do in nature, how could they not in the aquarium setting.

Some companies make bacterial products that are intended to be spread into the substrate with this in mind. The 2Hr Aquarist's APT Start is an example of this. ADA also has a product.

While I realize that getting the plants into a healthy growth mode will be the most effective way to combat algae, even Kleb, have you ever thought about bacteria's role?

A long time ago, I had a BBA problem. I took the opportunity to test out a theory I had about bacterial populations assisting in combating algae in the aquarium. So, I began to feed the tank vodka to carbon dose. This should increase the overall bacterial population in the aquarium.

I increased aeration to offset the increase bacterial respiration and I added more nutrients to offset the increase uptake due to bacterial growth.

What happened was that I got a massive cyanobacteria outbreak that covered everything like sheets of translucent green. It was UGLY. However, before attacking the cyano, I let it go for about a week. Then I hit it with erythromycin to kill off the cyano and stopped dosing vodka.

Wouldn't you know it, the anubias that had BBA ended up clean after the cyano was gone. I'm not sure it was the bacteria, the erythromycin or improved plant growth, but the BBA was gone.

Sorry to hijack your wonderful thread. Just thought I would add the bacteria story given your comments on how important they are in the root zone.

Carbo (glut) is effective against BBA and Staghorn.
Vodka is freshwater is not used tho it’s use in saltwater is well known.
You can just use any sugar complex to achieve the same.

I dose a bacterial supplement used in hydroponics which has at least one strain of purple non-sulfur bacteria. I want to try the PNS sold for saltwater sometime for same purpose.

 

[Count Krunk]

There is a company that will compare your reefs tank biome vs natural reefs. I wonder if they could do it for fw planted tanks as well?

 

[Ed Wiser]

I will see them at MACNA this year the owner is doing a talk

 

[raj]

So there have been 3 waterchanges since the last update. The Kleb has stalled and turning brown. Snails are trying to eat up any of the dying algae.

Bad news is Hair algae has taken over. I do not like to fool around with hair algae types and I am gonna do a dose of Algaecide. It’s a common algaecide easily available at Walmart and is my favorite one. (Pic attached)

As for the Kleb. I think I have got the upper hand. However I had mentioned that I have encountered this algae in past and that was in my 120p. After I restarted the tank (same soil, just deep vacuumed and replanted) it started to rear its head and since it was snowing and quite cold I didn’t do waterchange on the tank, Kleb took over and engulfed many of the plants. Had to pull plants out, rinse it, replant it and for now I am keeping a close eye on it.

What that tells me is that the algae is very opportunistic. In fresh started tanks or tanks which had a lot of disturbance, it could lead to the right conditions for it to come back. No different than any other algae but since it had the capacity to engulf plants it can make the bad situation worse in unstable tanks.

But like all algae it can be beaten and kept at bay if you keep up with your routine.

 

[raj]

Also to note, and as the thread was named, it’s not a soil problem or a specific type of soil problem.

I have had this with ADA and I have had this with master soil, and now Landen.
Is soil a carrier for it, could be. But algae can get introduced in many ways.

 

[raj]

I can with confidence say that the algae is gone for now. Tank has been looking better and better each day. I have moved around lot of plants and added more.
The light is now 400+ umol.

Not sure what’s next. I guess leave it for couple months and see if it comes back?

 

[GreggZ]

OK Raj so all in all what would you say is the most important thing you learned or reinforced from this experiment??

Also have you measured that 400 PAR? Not doubting it just wondering if you have metered it. I am a little over 200 PAR and can't imagine going much more. But who knows might be fun to try some day.

 

[Yugang]

OK Raj so all in all what would you say is the most important thing you learned or reinforced from the this experiment??

Love these questions @GreggZ . And especially coming from you we know that it will take us all further in our learning and understanding.

 

[GreggZ]

Love these questions @GreggZ . And especially coming from you we know that it will take us all further in our learning and understanding.

You know it's funny I see someone post a pic of great tank and people ask "what light?", or "what substrate?".

As if that is the reason their tank is spectacular.

What they should be asking is what do think is the secret to your success? Trouble is it's not a sexy discussion and usually involves lots of hard work.......which few are willing to put in. It's rarely as simple as light, substate, or ferts.

 

[Ed Wiser]

It’s the balance of all factors.

 

[Burr740]

Good recovery. Im curious to see if the kleb reappears for a while. Just nagging tufts popping up here and there thats not really a problem with continued good maintenance, just annoying.