help with algae identification please

Hi,

I needed some help identifying some algae growing in my tank. Ways to
get rid of it would be helpful as well.

Its dark greenish in colour, coats the parts of the gravel in the tank and
some of the plant leaves.
It looks like a dense web sometimes a bit stringy.
Has tiny bubbles forming under it.

Some stats on the tank.

1. Moderate light - 260W for a 135 gallon tank. The light is on for 12 to 13
hours a day.

2. Plants are mostly large Amazons and Anubias, with a few Wisteria and
Vals. No CO2 added.

3. Fish load is very light - 4 Otos and 2 very small SAE's. They are doing a
great job cleaning up the brown algae that coated the sides and leaves of
some of the amazons. They don't seem to touch the green stuff mentioned
above.

4. pH is neutral.

5. Once a week, I add 60 ml of "leaf zone" fertilizer, which is mostly Fe
and K.

6. I do not feed the fish as there seems to be plenty of the brown algae to
go around.

Thanks for your help.
Philip

Sounds like BGA (Blue Green Algae). Fish won't touch it so it's up to
you to manually remove it. My most recent BGA outbreak was due to too
much PO4 and traces. I did a couple large water changes withuot adding
any ferts and it didn't come back. I'm obviously back to dosing ferts
again however keeping PO4 and traces at more commonly used levels now.
It was more of a test for myself but BGA was quick to come out when I
exagerated things. Not quite sure if PO4 or traces alone were to
blame, I wasn't trying to figure out what caused BGA so I didn't test
them individually. Sounds like you have slow growing plants mostly so
I'd suggest using Flourish Tabs in the substrate as your main source
of nutrients for the plants. A larger fish load will also go a long
way to providing macros for the plants. Keep the water column lean
until the problem goes away and then slowly try liquid ferts again,
KNO3 if you have a small fish load and Flourish would be my choice.
For a moderate light, non CO2 tank I find substrate fertilization and
a large fish load to work very well.

Hope that helps
Giancarlo Podio

"PHILIP ABRAHAM" wrote in message .. .
Hi,

I needed some help identifying some algae growing in my tank. Ways to
get rid of it would be helpful as well.

Its dark greenish in colour, coats the parts of the gravel in the tank and
some of the plant leaves.
It looks like a dense web sometimes a bit stringy.
Has tiny bubbles forming under it.

Some stats on the tank.

1. Moderate light - 260W for a 135 gallon tank. The light is on for 12 to 13
hours a day.

2. Plants are mostly large Amazons and Anubias, with a few Wisteria and
Vals. No CO2 added.

3. Fish load is very light - 4 Otos and 2 very small SAE's. They are doing a
great job cleaning up the brown algae that coated the sides and leaves of
some of the amazons. They don't seem to touch the green stuff mentioned
above.

4. pH is neutral.

5. Once a week, I add 60 ml of "leaf zone" fertilizer, which is mostly Fe
and K.

6. I do not feed the fish as there seems to be plenty of the brown algae to
go around.

Thanks for your help.
Philip