[APD] RE: bad Hair day

["Thomas Barr" <tcbiii at earthlink_net>]

> From: Shireen Gonzaga <whimbrel at comcast_net>
> Subject: [APD] hair algae questions
> To: aquatic-plants at actwin_com
> Cc: Shireen Gonzaga <whimbrel at comcast_net>
>
> Hi ... a couple of questions.
>
> I've been battling a bad case of hair algae. Finally, I decided to 
> cover the tank for a week. Most of the algae is now gone. So I'll be 
> starting back on the weekly water changes, and eventually turn the CO2 
> back on. However, instead of dosing the water column with PO4, K2SO4, 
> and Mastergrow like I usually do, I inserted some old laterite balls 
> and Seachem Flourish plant tabs in the substrate (and bought more 
> Seachem tabs to add). The idea was to feed the root system more, and 
> minimize nutrients in the water column till I have the algae situation 
> completely under control. Does this make sense? If it doesn't please 
> tell me why.

The algae are NOT limited. If you have plant growth, you will have enough
for the algae, even if you do not have plant growth, you will have enough
for the algae.
The best method is to use plants as the focus, not the algae. 

These methods might tip the scales slightly for a few people, but it's
subtle and specific for each case.
Methods that are not subtle and work, focus on the plants. 

Algae goes away in a week or two maybe 3. 

> At my LFS a couple of days ago, someone told me that algae has a 12 
> hour cycle. If you interrupt the light duration, for example, turn the 
> lights off for an hour to divide a 14hr light duration into two 7 hour 
> chunks separated by an hour of darkness, it would help kill the algae 
> faster. Frankly, that's one of the most bizarre algae-eradication 
> methods I've ever heard.

Tell you what, try it and see, also see ther siesta method some folks claim
works.
If they use their CO2 correctly(CO2 accounts for 90% or so of all algae
related issues), thery no longer have these results or issues.
You can also simply black the tank out, that will cause more damage to the
algae than smaller changes to the lighting rotuine.
Plants have a 12 hour cycle as well, some do fine with 7, so do many algae.
I have no idea where they get this information nor know of any support for
it. 
Plenty of folks have reduced their lighting down and done other things, to
no avail.

If you try non limiting conditions and then use the light as the variable,
I think you will find this does not work.
Good thing about this approach: it reduces the other confounding issues,
poor nutrients and CO2.

Then suddenly most of the issues go away.

 Algae seems so opportunistic, I can't believe 
> it would need 12 hours or more of continuos illumination to thrive. Has 
> anyone else heard about this weird method?
> Thanks,
>   shireen

Yes, I would not call it weird, I'd call it cheap and easy to try and
ineffective, I've tried it, so have others. I suggest trying it with known
conditions to see if there is merit to any snake oil or lights out method.

Green water, BGA are the main two algae most influenced.

Regards, 
Tom Barr 


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