# need some help with a couple of problems



## ben2309 (Aug 9, 2007)

im new to this web site and fairly new to planted tanks so if you need any more info let me know.i have a 75g planted tank that i cant get rid of alge in and some of my plants are getting brown spots. i have 1 350gph hob filter and 1 350gph cainster filter. my lighting is a 48" 2 bulb overdriven light fixture. the fixture was 40 watts before overdriving so now it should be about 160 watts the bulbs are 6500 kelvins. i run my lights for 8 hours per day. i have a co2 injection system running with 1-2 bubbles per second. as for the plants i have some dwarf sag, some sowrds and im not sure exactly what the other is. oh and i have aquatic planting soil but i dont rember exactly what kind it was but it came in a big ass bucket. my nitrates stay around 20 ppm and i have no idea what the co2 level or micro, macro levels are. the alge is green and stringy and sticks to the glass and the plants. my dwarf sag is starting to turn brown too. here is a pic of the alge and the brown spots.


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

That last plant is almost sure to be a terrestrial, not aquatic plant. So, it will die in water. You don't have nearly enough plants, that I can see, to ever expect to prevent algae from taking over. You don't mention dosing nitrates, phosphates, potassium, trace elements, but all are needed for plant growth. And, you need to get a drop checker, load it with 4 dKH distilled water, and use it to make sure you have about 30 ppm of CO2 in the water, which will almost certainly take more than 1 -2 bubbles per second.

Once you get all of that taken care of, you need to clean out as much algae as you can, replace about half of the water, then, if you can afford it, dose about 2 times the recommended dosage of Excel, to try to inhibit the algae from restarting. If you add a big bunch of hygro or other fast growing stem plants you have a good chance of defeating the algae.


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## Laith (Sep 4, 2004)

I have no experience overdriving lights but is it really possible to turn a 40w fixture into 160w just by overdriving? Seems like a stretch.

Even if the overdriving managed to double the watts to 80w you wouldn't have enough light over a 75g.


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## ben2309 (Aug 9, 2007)

it would be enough because each bulb would be 80 watts. thats 160 watts total which is 2.1 watts per gallon. 

thanks for the help i just ordered 100 plants and will post a new pic when they are all in the tank.


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## Laith (Sep 4, 2004)

Now I see.

Welcome to APC by the way!


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