[FishermanJack]

Hello,

I am looking for some advice, my specs are as follows.

Cycled Fluval EGDE 6 Gallon
4.5 WPG Light Fixture (27 watts) run on timer from 1:00pm-9:00pm, then blue LED's kick on till 12:00am

Tank - GH: 12, KH: 7
Tap - GH: 11, KH: 5

I run co2 on a timer from 7:30am-7:30pm at around .3 bps
Drop checker reads a dark green at about 5:00am and stays lime till about 2:00am the next day.

Inside I am growing HC, Ammania Gracilis, Rotala Macrandra, Hygro sp. Tiger. Plants are growing in nicely.

So here's the dilemma, I've noticed Green Hair Algae growing since I've introduced co2. For nutrient dosing I had mistakenly, dosed EI however I dosed with Seachem products - Flourish for micro's, Flourish Phosphorus, Flourish Nitrogen, Flourish Iron, and Flourish Potassium.

I realize now that I should dose according to instructions on the seachem bottles rather than EI, and that EI is meant for dry dosing.

I have been dosing Flourish Excel to hopefully aid in the removal of the hair algae, but it looks like its still continuing to grow (very slowly, not nearly close to an outbreak).

I noticed the largest growth of Green Hair Algae when I had been "overdosing" with the seachem products.

I am curious as to what the community thinks the cause of my Green Hair Algae is

- Overdosing of Seachem Products?
- GH/KH levels?
- Too much light? (Do my blue LED lights that kick on towards the end of the photoperiod add too much light?)

Should I blackout the tank for 3 days to slow the algae and hope that my plants eventually out compete the algae?

I've seen small amounts of BBA growing on my Co2 diffuser, anything to worry about here as well?

Thanks for any advice, I realize I've asked a ton of questions which will most likely not result in obvious answers. :icon_conf I am essentially trying to confirm that the Green Hair Algae was caused from the Seachem products, (perhaps Seachem Iron)

Inside the tank is a single betta fish, I've never seen any ammonia,nitrite,nitrate issues.

:icon_cool:icon_cool:red_mouth

 

[pferris]

You could get some otos or shrimp to clean up the green hair algae

 

[FishermanJack]

Already had some oto's and shrimp unfortunately. They had to all be removed (stressed out the betta to the point of fin rot.)

 

[theericafish]

No inverts in the tank you could use algaefix and then fix the root issue causing your algae. Otherwise it will be a long battle of toothbrushing strands out for weeks(months?)

Hard to tell but some of the algae looks like clado, might not be killed by the algaefix. Manual removal for that one.

 

[ipkiss]

Sounds like you got a lot of confusion going on. Perhaps first on the list is too much light. Check out Darkblade's Primer if you haven't already yet. It'll make you rethink how much light you're putting in there.

Secondly, EI with Flourish is possible. You just need the right calculator http://rota.la/. If you use the Flourish amounts on the bottle, it might be less than what you need. Then again, do you really need EI? What about 1/2 EI? Either way, it's something you'll have to think about and stabilize.

Are you doing regular water changes? While it's not set in stone to do weekly water changes with EI, it's required to be regular to make it work. You choose the frequency to match up with the amount of EI you're doing. The calculator I gave earlier would help with that too. Regular water changes will fix many ailments.

What kind of CO2 are you using? DIY? pressurized? Did you really mean 0.3 bubbles per second? That sounds a bit low. What kind of water did you use in your drop checker? Is your drop checker located close to the diffuser in that it's corralling too many of those miniscule co2 bubbles to give you a false co2 reading? Here's some ways to measure co2 http://www.theaquatools.com/co2-calculations but know that it's notoriously hard to accurately get a right figure. However, it'll help you stay consistent and that's the most important part.