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Re: Some Pictures and Question
Steve Bansee wrote:
>Hi again,
>
>Last night I took some pictures of my 25gal planted tank. I posted them on
>http://www.icenter.net/~tvg/fishpics/ , just click on the little pics to
>get a bigger pic, (pretty crude page, but it has the pictures :).
>
>Question: Picture Furry1 and Furry2 are pics of the algae I have in my
>tank, picture furry1 and furry2, is this BBA?.
>
>If you all have any comments on how to make my tank better, I'm all ears,
>(or is that eyes)...
>
>Thanks
>Steve
I had an infestation of this same thing in my tank, I call it BBA for black
brush algae. I read somewhere that BBA likes iron. I controlled it by
decreasing the PMDD dose, that I figure now was way above the reasonable
level for my tank. I was overdosing based on iron test kit readings that
were too low.
With the lower PMDD, the BBA died quickly, in a matter of days, but the dead
pieces are hard to rid. They stick like glued to stones, glass and plant
leaves. I removed whatever I could manually and now I just wait until the
hardier parts eventually decay and detach by themselves. The tank is
practically clean of algae now except for the green spot variety in high
lit areas.
Because of the decreased PMDD, some plants developed iron deficiency symptoms
that I'm correcting by *SLOWLY* increasing back the dayly dose. The first
plant to show deficiency was E. tenellus, followed by new leaves of
E. bleheri. They are slowly getting back to their previous colors and no
algae came back so far.
I notice that your chain sword shows the same deficiency symptoms that mine
showed, whitish new leaves, so I'm not sure what you should do. Maybe the
iron level in your tank is already low and not the culprit for the BBA
bloom ? Is the BBA clearly taking over the tank or is it in a sort of
steady state regime ?
Btw, nice tank !
-Ivo Busko
Baltimore, MD