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Algae in high intesity tanks




Some months ago I decided turn one of my low- to medium lighted plant tanks into a high intensity one with 1 Watt/liter MH-type lightning (10 000 K). Since then this tank has had a constant problem of green hair algae.

At first this 145 liter tank was inhabited by a
giant amazon sword plant taken from my much larger
tank. I was unprepared by the tremendous amount of
nutritions this plant required in the bright light
and did a huge misstake in dosing far to much Fe
in the bottom substrate trying to save the sword
plant from severe iron deficiency. After this I had
to throw away the sword and all other plants, I
cleaned the bottom substrate and restarted the
tank with a new set of plants (many fastgrowers).
Now also using some clay under the gravel.

Besides CO2-addition I now add KNO3, MgSO4, K2SO4,
Micro+Fe and KH2PO4 every second day. Trying to
keep levels at recomended values. This feels a lot
compared to how much i dose in my other tanks
but if I leave the tank for two or three days the
levels for (Chelatet) Fe and NO3 are both zero!
(This is the only two test I've got for the moment)
I've tried going from 10 to 9 hours of ligth and
now up to 11 h.

This procedure has limit the algae growth in some
extent since the plant boost their growth and
photosyntize like crazy but i still have to
manually remove a lot of algae at daily basis (!)
not to lose control it. I've recently tried to half
the Fe dose but the plants do not like that.

How do I get rid of the green hairy stuff without
removing the MH!

Peter N

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