# Hydrogen Peroxide Dip?



## zabak80

I'm restarting my tank and would like to kill all the algae I have on the plants I will be reusing.

I'd rather not use a bleach dip, but I know people have used hydrogen peroxied to treat algae.

The algae is everywhere so spot treatment over a week isn't possible. Is there a hydrogen peroxide dip formula that anyone has used and how safe is it for plants?


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## mhoy

The Krib - H2O2 and Algae


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## zabak80

That helps, but there wasn't a mention of any specific type of dip.

I am planning on treating quite a few plants in the 20 gallon, not just "spots". So I figure a dip would be most efficient while I tear it down and rebuild.

Any specific proportions like the bleach dip?


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## rs79

The best piece of advice in those decade olf krib postings was "People, please don't arbitrarily dump this stuff in your tank.".

I experimented for a year with H202. My conclusion? It has no place near a fish tank.

I have one tank right now that last had a water change in 2005 and was a half empty green sodden mess for a year. I changed half the water twice, added fast growing plants and fertilized them. Not it's quite wonderful.

The bleach dip sets plants so far back you may as well buy new ones.

Just physiclly remove what youi can, fertilize properly and the algae will go away. You can use flourish excel in the tank to speed up algal death if you're impatient.

While I wrote an article about the bleach dip for TFH that was before I knew better, and if I oculd take it back, I would.


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## spypet

with all due respect, 
all TFH/TRN knows how to do are pointless blackouts.

H202 or Bleach work great if administered correctly.
I've used H202 directly on my growing plants with a dropper or syringe,
and I've 1:20 1min Bleach dipped hundreds of plants over the years,
and both solutions worked better than advertised.

granted, none of these solutions should be depended on
over good tank keeping and water filtration/light balance.


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## DanikaLea

I have been looking into this peroxide dip thing myself. I bought a large bottle of 3% H2O2 today just to make a dip. I am not putting it in my tank. I have some kind of algae on a few of my plants. Its not too bad though. The problem is that I am setting up a new tank and I have plants that I want to transfer to it. The problem is that they have either staghorn algae or something similar on them. I would hate to transfer this stuff into the new tank. But these plants are really healthy other than the few small spots of algae so I hate to throw them out just to buy new ones for the new tank. I have been saving these plants just for the new tank anyway. I'm not to worried about the algae in the other tank because I have been pulling it out with tweezers. I increased my fertz and started dosing excel again (I had run out and that is what caused the problem to begin with). I just want to make sure I don't kill any of my plants. I looked at the Krib info on H2O2 but as mentioned above there is no info on making a dip, just info on amounts to add to tanks so as not to kill tank inhabitants. I think that I will just try and calculate a dip based on the numbers provided there and see how it works as a dip. I'm just not sure how long to leave them in the dip. Does anyone know how long an H2O2 dip should last? Another question I have is can you use a tank additive algae killer as a dip? Or could you use some on a Q-tip to get rid of small areas on plants that you have removed from the tank? I have thought about doing this as well since I am too afraid to add anything to the tank except excel because of the shrimp and snails. Any input on these ideas would be helpful.


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## johngfoster

I just got a new order in today from AquaBotanic, and the H. micranthemoides has clumps of fine hair algae intwined around the fine leaves. I've spent probably 2 hrs picking the stuff off just 1 bunch (I got 4 bunches of this plant and 12 bunches of other plants). This is going to take forever if I'm going to pick the stuff off. Isn't there a better way?


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## Raul-7

How about potassium permanganate?

http://www.aquariaplants.com/plantdipsbaths.htm


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## rs79

> with all due respect,
> all TFH/TRN knows how to do are pointless blackouts.
> 
> H202 or Bleach work great if administered correctly.
> I've used H202 directly on my growing plants with a dropper or syringe,
> and I've 1:20 1min Bleach dipped hundreds of plants over the years,
> and both solutions worked better than advertised.
> 
> granted, none of these solutions should be depended on
> over good tank keeping and water filtration/light balance.


With all due respect I wrote the article in TFH about bleach dip.

Algae never occurs in a properly fertilized tank. Killing algae with checmicals is like taking asprin if you're being hit over the head with a hammer. It'll fix the sympton but won't cure the problem.

Feed the plants properly and the algae will die. Honest.


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## neilshieh

what about clado? that's an algae that you can't kill. i agree with spypet and rs79. i use the chemicals to kill the algae first so I don't feel so bad about my tank, and then i fix the nutrient/co2/light problem. I like to kill my enemies swiftly, not cut off their supply lines and watch them slowly die


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