# Blue Green Algae dilemma



## RabiedRooster (Jan 9, 2011)

Hello i am having a problem with BGA in my 54l. My water parameters are: Ammonia-0, Nitrite-0,Nitrate-~20, Phospate-0-0.1. Lighting 1*15w daylite tube on for 10 hours a day. I keep getting BGA appearing everywhere on my sand and growing on my plants, of which i have many crypts,swords,java fern and java moss, around 80% of my tank is planted. I have a rena filster IV3 and i added an aqua flow 1 to increase flow as i thought it would solve the 'low flow' issue which causes BGA, it hasn't but my water is wizzing around quite fast now. I have enough fish in there to keep nitrate levels at around 20-30ppm which is confusing me as apparently BGA is caused by low nitrates but mine have never been below 10 for any length of time. I also add flourish fert twice a week and dose excel every two days and feed my stock every other day to keep organics low. I have done a 3 day black out with little success. I want to defeat this without using chemicals but im not sure the reason it is appearing; any help would be appreciated. 

Thanks RR


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## BBradbury (Apr 22, 2011)

Good morning RR. Most established tanks have some algae. I'm not a fan of using chemicals, so can offer some natural ways to control the algae. You can feed less often, you can shorten the time your tank lights are on, more frequent and larger water changes will help and you can also dose the Flourish Excel a little more often. Primitive plants, like algae, don't tolerate the carbon in this SeaChem product. You can add some fast growing, stem plants that will compete with the algae for the available nutrients. Water Sprite and Water Wisteria are a couple of good choices.

Please let me know how things progress.

BBradbury


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## jrman83 (Jul 9, 2010)

BGA is more a bacteria than algae. Can be treated with a antibiotic or peroxide. I had an issue with it about a month ago and a blackout worked. If that didn't work I was going to spot treat with H2O2. Search "treating cyano bacteria with peroxide" and read the results you get. Seems fairly simple.


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## hank (Apr 11, 2011)

RR, You gave all the reasons why you shouldn't have Cyanobacteria! One thing you haven't mentioned, the condition of your bulb, could be the reason for Cyano. How old is it? If one year old, change out.
Surprise the black out had no effect?


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