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black beard algae

1310 Views 7 Replies 8 Participants Last post by  thelub, 
ozzychas
does anybody know the best way to get rid of black beard algae, looks cool on my wood but now it is getting on my plants.
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PhilipS
#1 Pick it off with the long tweezers.

#2 Then do a very good vacuuming on the soil and remove dead leaves.

#3 ADA trick-
Do step #2 and…
Lastly, drain the tank 50% and sprinkle ADA Nitro Bacter onto the affected areas like you were salting a pretzel.

Let it sit and hour before gently refilling the tank and not disturbing the powder.

Crank the CO2 to 3 bubbles per second.

You should see a lot of dead BBA the next day. Pick it out rather than vacuuming the nitro bacter, it'll boost the plant growth of Lotus and Lilies.
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S
You can also buy a flavor injector syringe and use it to inject excel directly to the effected areas. The BBA dies (you can tell its dead because it turns a red color) and fades away).

I have been doing this to get rid of mine and so far it seems to be working. I do it when my filters and power head are off on maintenance/ water change day so the excel can stay concentrated around the bba for a few minutes.
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greaser84
Hydrogen peroxide in a syringe followed by excel in a syringe. Figure out why you got it in the first place then fix that problem or it will come back.
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Aqua Newbie
i got amano shrimps, I was sceptical at first but it went away after almost all of my thread and BBA was gone in 1 night!


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S
Here is a good yet long thread on it.
http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=20172&page=9
Notice it is about 27 pages long.
I used Excel with better luck than HP but I am still using Excel to keep it away. Be forewarned that Excel can be hard on some plants like vals. They can melt away with the first big dose. You can acclimatize them to it over a bit of time as mine now don't seem bothered at all by it.
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Shawn123 said:
You can also buy a flavor injector syringe and use it to inject excel directly to the effected areas. The BBA dies (you can tell its dead because it turns a red color) and fades away).

I have been doing this to get rid of mine and so far it seems to be working. I do it when my filters and power head are off on maintenance/ water change day so the excel can stay concentrated around the bba for a few minutes.
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I do something similar. It usually takes about 4 tries to get my whole 55 gallon tank pretty close to algae free but it seems to come back from time to time. I'm pretty sure it is a reaction to when I clean out all the duckweed and trim everything so there is more light.
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thelub
Read the WHOLE thread before diving into the 1 - 2 punch idea. It works, but has its dangers.

True SAE work, florida flag fish work and I've heard amanos do too.
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