# Using bleach to get rid of beard algae on plants?



## asincero

I was reading an article on tank cleaning, and it said you can get rid of algae on certain live plants by bleaching them. The article wasn't too specific on what kind of algae this technique works on or which plants would survive the bleaching other than that stem plants most likely wouldn't fare to well. 

Anyway, I have a bunch of amazon swords whose leaves are completely covered with beard algae. Would bleaching work in helping me get rid of this algae?


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## david lim

if you plan to do this in the tank, using hydrogen peroxide would be safer. Using a pipette you can add the peroxide in the locality of the algae.

David


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## HeyPK

Three minutes of immersion in 5% liquid bleach (50 cc in 1 liter) will do in the hair algae, and do some damage to the leaves. The plant must not be returned to the aquarium from which it came. If that is done, the hair algae will just climb right back on the plant. The plant should be moved to an aquarium which is free of the hair algae. Sword plants are quite tough and will recover easily from a three minute bleach treatment. Black beard algae seems to be quite sensitive to the bleach treatment, turning pale after only 15 seconds in 5% bleach. You want to be sure you get it all, so you go for three minutes. Rinse well and place the plant in it's new hair algae free home.


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## Sully

Maybe cut off the leaves to the amazon? The leaves will grow back and the plant will be fine. I dislike bleach baths. My plants always died from too long of a dip or something. Never did an amazon bath though.

I would just remove the infected leaves.

-SULLY


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## banderbe

Flourish Excel wiped out all the algae in my tank. Beard, hair/thread, etc.

Buy a 250 ml bottle (costs about $4.50 from bigalsonline.com) and triple dose. Be patient. Seems like it doesn't do anything for a few weeks. My tank is 29 gallons so if yours is larger you probably want a bigger bottle. I recommend triple dosing daily for at least a month.

Now my tank looks amazing.


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## mrbelvedere138

How about getting your lights, ferts, CO2, and water quality in order?


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## banderbe

mrbelvedere138 said:


> How about getting your lights, ferts, CO2, and water quality in order?


Well, that's a given. 

I do not believe however that simply getting your variables in order will eliminate the algae. It will only stop it from spreading. At least that has been my experience.


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## mrbelvedere138

Yeah I feel you banderbe. Sometimes you just need to hear it, and fight the problem not the symptom. I think my experience falls somewhere between you and everyone else. My algae stops.....and then disintegrates very slowly. It's just a lot easier to not get algae in the first place.


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## lifetapestry

I was successful at removing hair and BBA from plants by giving them a bleach bath (5%, or 1/2 cup bleach to 10 cups of water). This is a quick dip (1-2 minutes) and then a soak in treated tap water (about triple the dose of declorinator) for about an hour). Plants did fine (the worse "victim" was wisteria), this also worked on a piece of driftwood with spreading BBA. I have also used regular strength excel in my 55 galloon religiously since then. It's been about 6 weeks now, and I have no more algae (except a sprinkling of GSA on the glass). 

The algae infestation occurred after overdosing phosphate (and, probably potassium and magnesium too, although I've never seen those implicated in algae bloom). I had a minor problem after dosing CSM+B, but I have since brought things into better balance by dosing that (micronutrients) just a little pinch per day, rather than the weekly dosage. I dose about 1/2 the recc dose of magnesium and potassium, and don't dose phosphate or nitrate (my nitrate level is between 10 and 20, anyway).

HTH,
Karla


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## djlen

BBA infestation has little to do with over-abundance or lack of balance of nutrients. It has little to do with amount or duration of lighting. Blackouts will have no effect on this algae.
It is caused by spores that were probably introduced into the tank on new plants. 
BBA does not like acid. Therefore, the use of Seachem's Excel can be a very effective deterrent to it's growth rate. High CO2 levels also have shown to be affective in the fight against this algae.
It does like water current (the heavier the current the better it grows), and slow growing plants or leaves that are old or not growing well. Therefore it is a good idea to get those plants growing well, keep the tank clean and raise the content of carbon within the tank.
A bleach bath can be very effective and safe in removing this algae if used properly, as outlined above by Karla. I have killed BBA on plants at a ratio of 25:1. Keep your time down on dips of tender plants, such as Vals. 1 min. should be the max. on them, rinse well and immediately into the fresh water treated with tap water conditioner. Anubia and Java fern can go up to 2 mins. without serious damage to them. However if a 1 min. dip will kill it on tender plants it always seemed silly to go longer just because some plants are hardier than others.
Once you've got your plants and wood/rocks etc. clear of the algae you need to start working on upping the carbon content in the water table and feeding the plants in order to get them growing well. This will control BBA as well as anything.

Len


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## redstrat

Have you thought about getting some SAEs, I had some BBA show up on my Anubias in a 20Gallon tank, after putting one SAE in the BBA was gone, without a trace, in a couple days. No changes in ferts, CO2, lighting, or scrubbing, the SAE took care of it all and I haven't seen a sign of it since.


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## djlen

IMO, SAE's are not a good option in a community tank.
IME, when young and small they are terrific BBA eaters of NEW BBA GROWTH.
They would not eat the old, hairy, crusty stuff. Also as the ones I've had matured they got lazy, would eat regular fish food, and got very aggressive with other fish in all of my tanks in competition for the fish food.
They caused a lot of stress in my tanks.
I have removed all of them from my tanks and would never have them again.
There are better options for BBA, IMO.

Len


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