Hydrogen Peroxide: blue-green algae chemotherapy (long)

This sounds like a better way to go with the BGA in my tank than using
erythromycin - I only have small patches of it at the moment. I just
did a small test patch and it's bubbling nicely. Weirdly, several of my
cories seem to be trying to eat it

In my tank, quite a bit of the BGA is at the front between the
substrate and the glass, which I gather is quite a common site for BGA.
Do I just poke the dropper right down into the gravel to get to it, or
are you only supposed to use the peroxide on the surface of the gravel?


--
newtankgirl
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Heck, why even bother.
Black the tank out for 3 days and be done with it.

Works every time.
See many old post on BGA/Cyano from me.
H2O2 works as a spot treatment.

UV's do NOT help, only the water passing through the UV will be
affected, not anything in the tank.

The genus is Oscillitoria, non heterocystic. Unless you plan on having
bubble like sterile procedure BGA will enter your tank again from the
air.
After a Volcanic eruption/severe forest fire, this same genus will
colonize the soil in roughly 20 days. It might take a bit longer being
inside in a house, but not that much.

Scaping the front edge of the gravel line is fine.
But generally if you have BGA along the gravel line, this means
there's some light coming in from outside the tank.

Add more KNO3 if you have BGA appearing, see my old post regarding
this. You cannot limit this algae by low PO4/NO3. It will laugh at
you.
Every single sample I have ever seen from a planted tank has had this
genus.

Don't bother testing for iron, the kit does not tell you what you need
to know, how much Fe your plants need. Even the 90$ Hach kit had
several issues.

Try this:
50% water change and a good algae scrub remove as much as you can.
Add 1/4 teaspoon of KNO3
Turn lights and CO2 off, increase surface movement. Drape
towels/Blnakets/trash bags etc over the tank so that no light gets in.
Wait 3 days.
Remove and turn CO2/light/reduce surface movement and add:
1/4 teaspoon of KNO3(maybe a tad more than 1/4)
1/2 teaspoon K2SO4
3 rice grains worth of KH2PO4
8-10mls of trace mix.

Add KNO3, KH2PO4, traces 3x a week.
You'll want to add around 20-30ppm of CO2. So at KH of 2, you'll shoot
for a pH of 6.3-6.4 or so. You may want to add more GH, MgSO4 and
CaCl2 are good for this, add about 1/4 teaspoon of CaCl2 and 1/16
teaspoon of MgSO4 after water change. CaCl2 can be found as pool
calcium hardness increaser.

Each dose of KNO3 will add about 6ppm of NO3 extra.
I do not trust NO3 test kits especially and I use a Lamott NO3 kits
which is reliable, but you might not want to spend this much on a kit.
PO4 BTW does not cause algae. I would have had algae for the last 15
years if so.

Rather than focusing on limiting algae, try growing the plants and
addressing their needs. When the plants don't grow well, something
else will, algae. So the focus should be on the plants.

Regards,
Tom Barr

Newtankgirl:
I'm the one who wrote the BGA chemotherapy piece. You can squirt the H2O2
directly into the gravel. You want to get the peroxide in contact with the
BGA. Peroxide is a very powerful oxidizing agent. It does very similar
things as bleach (but without the chlorine, obviously). The point of using
a dropper, as others have noted too, is to get the peroxide into intimate
contact with the BGA in a fairly undiluted state. It's not difficult, and
as long as you don't use too much, you really can't screw up.

My advice is to go slowly and treat a little at a time (say a few square
inches (*6.25-ish square centimeters).

Jeff
"newtankgirl" wrote in message
...

This sounds like a better way to go with the BGA in my tank than using
erythromycin - I only have small patches of it at the moment. I just
did a small test patch and it's bubbling nicely. Weirdly, several of my
cories seem to be trying to eat it

In my tank, quite a bit of the BGA is at the front between the
substrate and the glass, which I gather is quite a common site for BGA.
Do I just poke the dropper right down into the gravel to get to it, or
are you only supposed to use the peroxide on the surface of the gravel?


--
newtankgirl
------------------------------------------------------------------------
posted via www.GardenBanter.co.uk



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Newsgroups
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Can the blackout be done with the fish still in the tank?

Anything bigger than 2cm or .78" can survive for 3 long nights quite
comfortably. I haven't got anything smaller than that in my 4' tank atm so
can't comment on smaller fish.

"Cam" wrote in message
...
Can the blackout be done with the fish still in the tank?

2 SAE'S and 4 threadfin rainbows!!




"Tasslehoff" wrote in message
...
Anything bigger than 2cm or .78" can survive for 3 long nights quite
comfortably. I haven't got anything smaller than that in my 4' tank atm
so
can't comment on smaller fish.

"Cam" wrote in message
...
Can the blackout be done with the fish still in the tank?