# I hate you algae!



## halonine (Jun 7, 2010)

Well, seems that algae has found a new home in my 33g long tank.

Half of my rocks are starting to get quite covered in BBA. The rocks nearest my diffuser/powerhead are totally spotless, but the rocks on the opposite side of the tank are nice and hairy. I'm assuming it is due to a lot of the co2/circulation not quite reaching that side of the tank as well as it should be. The drop checker is on the same side of the tank as the infected rocks, and it is showing the proper color, so I'm at a loss right now.

A lot of my Dwarf Hairgrass is algae covered as well, not BBA, something else.. not sure what it is. When I did my last water change, i swirled the siphon around the hairgrass, and a lot of the algae came off and got sucked up. I trimmed a lot of the longer pieces of the grass today, to remove the bad looking parts. 

I will try to post pics soon of some of the worse areas.

Any suggestions on what I should do to remedy this?

I'm dosing EI religiously, as well as pressurized co2. Since it's a 33 long, I only have about 9-10" of water depth, the tank itself is 12" deep, but I have a lot of substrate.

I have 108watts of T5HO lighting, hung off brackets about 11-12" off the surface, they are on for 10hrs a day.

I never had much of a problem until the last week or so, all my parameters are the same as they have always been, don't know what's causing the problem now 

Thanks, Tyson.


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## neven (May 15, 2010)

if it's hair algae would be high iron or high phosphates, try dosing less phosphates and see how it goes. Try treating with metricide/excel if you don't already, try a 10-14 day treatment cycle to be rid of the brush algae, then see if it grows back. Also if your drop checker is green try increasing co2 a tiny bit more to get light green yellow (give it a couple hours before setting it even higher). What time does the pressurized start up also, or is it constant. If its on a solenoid, i recommend starting it up 30 minutes before lights on,

Also what are your bulbs? how long have you had them? I'd definately say you have them a decent distance.


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## Brisch (May 13, 2010)

easiest way to get rid of hair algae is to buy a couple Siamese flying foxes, I had hair algae on 80% of my decor in my 20 gallon and 1 flying fox fixed my problem


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## halonine (Jun 7, 2010)

Thanks for the suggestions. I will try a little less dosing for the next while.

My bulbs are only a couple months old, so they should be good still. My co2 turns on at the same time the lights turn on (same timer). Maybe i'll plug in another timer and try to fire it up earlier.

Brisch: I really do not want to add any more fish to this tank, thanks for the idea though.

Tyson


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