# GSA, but PO4 is good!



## BigChuckP (Oct 8, 2005)

I have learned a ton from this site in the past couple months and have finally had success! After I set up my tank I had lots of brown algae which I attacked vigorously, mixed in with the brown algae was some GSA. I tried scrubbing it off of my background but it didn't come off easily. I have a diy'd bg and I don't want to scrub too hard because then I will scrub off chunks of my bg. Now the brown algae is completely gone yet the GSA has spread. The strange thing about this is when I set the tank up my PO4 was through the roof, +10ppm, I have it under control now 1 - 2 ppm (Calibrated test kit). So how is it GSA grew when my PO4 was high and remains when my PO4 is within the target range?
Tank Specs:
38 gallon
96 watts of PC, 7200K
EI dosing
KH2PO4 - 1.94 ppm per week
KNO3 - 20 ppm 
K2SO4 - Just discovered I am dosing only 10ppm, thought I was dosing 20ppm, error in calculation
Fe - .15 ppm per week
CSM+B - 9 ml 4 X per week
Injected CO2, turned up until fish was breathing at the surface and then tuned down a little, plants pearling nicely
4ml of excel per day, fighting some BBA spot treatment style.

Thank you for any help!


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## Laith (Sep 4, 2004)

I'd say that you don't have enough plant mass. Add more and see if that helps after a couple of weeks.

And off the subject, but a pet peeve of mine (  ), tanks with a rim should always be filled to at least the rim level. Preferably above it...

Looks *alot* better that way!


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## BigChuckP (Oct 8, 2005)

Laith said:


> I'd say that you don't have enough plant mass. Add more and see if that helps after a couple of weeks.
> 
> And off the subject, but a pet peeve of mine (  ), tanks with a rim should always be filled to at least the rim level. Preferably above it...
> 
> Looks *alot* better that way!


I'll get some more plants, The back looks empty because my jungle vals aren't growing that fast  
The water level thing bothers me too, the water evaporates really fast from my tank and I'm just plain sick of adding more water to my tank to keep it above the rim.
Thanks for the reply


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## titan97 (Feb 14, 2005)

I find that I get GSA when a couple of things happen:

1: Poor water movement. Whem my filters get clogged and my water flow suffers, i see more of it.
2: Low PO4. I keep my PO4 higher than most, above 4ppm on a LaMotte kit. When I forget to dose for a couple of days, the GSA starts back up again.

Other than that, I've found that it never really goes away unless you manually remove it. In may case, minimizing GSA is more of a preventative-type thing, than a after-the-fact corrective action. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, I suppose.

-Dustin


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## BigChuckP (Oct 8, 2005)

titan97 said:


> I find that I get GSA when a couple of things happen:
> 
> 1: Poor water movement. Whem my filters get clogged and my water flow suffers, i see more of it.
> 2: Low PO4. I keep my PO4 higher than most, above 4ppm on a LaMotte kit. When I forget to dose for a couple of days, the GSA starts back up again.
> ...


I feel like I have good water movement with a fluval4 and a powerhead that is pretty strong for my brandtii. I'll clean out the filter just for precaution and try going with 4ppm of PO4. Tomorrow is a WC day so I'll take care of all that then as well as order some more plants.


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## Simpte 27 (Jul 16, 2004)

If PO4 is good, the next culprit is CO2.


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## yildirim (Nov 25, 2004)

Hi,

GSA is a real pain when it once occured. It requires longer terms than any other algea to see development once you start to change some parameters. In past I had the same problem and made continuous tests trying to keep PO4 levels ad 1.5-2 ppm. But it didn't make any change and GSA was winning. Later (1 year ago) I suggested that whether test kits are not reliable enough or the target value of 1-2 ppm does not apply to all tanks. I went with the second suggestion and tried to increase PO4 gradualy. Currently I dose 1.5-2 ppm of PO4 daily to have a PO4 reading of app. 5 ppm. I never let it drop to 4ppm. In two months time I ıncreased PO4 from 1,5 to 4.5-5 ppm and there I noticed a slowing in the GSA and since then I'm going with the same dosage. Also having less plants increases the occurance of all types of algea as well as GSA, so increasing the plant amount is also a good idea. But you have to keep in mind that increasing PO4 alone may cause crushes on other nutrients. They might as well require to be increased and the CO2 of course.

YILDIRIM


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