Re:White fuzzy stuff

To: Aquatic-Plants at actwin_com
Subject: Re:White fuzzy stuff
From: krombhol at felix_TECLink.Net (Paul Krombholz)
Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 12:37:57 -0500


Olga <olga at arts_ubc.ca> wrote, May 2:

>.......................BTW does anyone know what this is? Some form of
>protien? >Plant life as in fungus, mold?

My guess is that it is a colorless cyanobacterium (bluegreen alga).  I have
occasionally seen a white fuzzy growth on top of the mulm in my tanks
usually near a piece of cat food  that I put in a day or so earlier for the
snails to eat.  I once looked at some of it with a microscope, and it
looked just like a colorless Oscillatoria.  It was quite active, bending
and gliding slowly in the same fashion that Oscillatoria does.  What I saw
seems similar to what you and others have reported collecting around the
outlets of fermentation CO2 generators.  Probably it is living on alcohols
or other organics that get in along with the CO2.

>

Paul Krombholz                  Tougaloo College, Tougaloo, MS  39174