# Help on BBA removal..



## wwh2694 (Aug 15, 2008)

I have a planted discus tank been running about a year now. I have been having a BBA problem on my drift wood close to the surface. Has anyone tried using hyrogen peroxide to spot treat BBA with this? Is is safe with discus fish in a small amount? The drift wood I got is an xtra large wood so taking it out will be a problem and this wood still tied down below. I know seachem excell works for BBA but will that make my discus sick? Help pls. How do you all prevent BBA growth?


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## CrownMan (Sep 12, 2005)

I have had BBA in my 40Gallon tank flare up about twice a year on average. What I do is to spot treat BBA on driftwood and my hardier plants that are only slightly affected. I turn off my filter and anything that produces a current in my tank, use a large syringe and load it with about twice the normal dosage. I then spray the affected areas, leave the filter/powerhead off for about 15/30 minutes and then restart it. In about 2 weeks I see a significant reduction/death of the BBA. Of course, I remove all heavily affected plants and throw them away.

One thing I have done recently is to add more current or flow to my CO2 tanks. I currently do not or have not had any BBA attack for about 4 or 5 months now in any of my CO2 tanks. I also will change 60% of the water whenever I pull up a lot of plants and cloud the water when stirring up the substrate.

For the record, I use the Barr EI dosing method NP and no K and add more Equilibrium (high amount of K) than he does and I keep my regulated pressurized CO2 on the low side.

On caveat for using Excel is that I have no experience using twice the recommended dosage with Discus though I have not had any fish or shrimp loss with that daily dosage amount for up to 3 weeks. A normal dosage of Excel 4 times a week is standard practice for me in most of my non CO2 tanks and in the 40G CO2 tank.


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## wwh2694 (Aug 15, 2008)

where do you get your excel for cheap? I have to buy a gallon of this stuff coz my tank is 90G..


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## wwh2694 (Aug 15, 2008)

My tank been doing great for a yr now till I have this bba. This is the only time I had this problem. I dont know why may be coz i didnt vaccumed my gravel. Does organic build up cause BBA even when your CO2 is high? I have been using PPS pro for sometime now dont know what happen. I have been using that seachem posphate removal for six months now and never changed it till now. coz my tap has high posphate. mybe that triggered it dont know.. Now I lowered my ph so I can increased my co2. They said High CO2 will stop BBA growth is that true?


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## MacFan (Jul 30, 2006)

I feel your pain. I have been battling BBA myself for a while now. 

First, you said you don't vacuum your substrate? You should vacuum it when you can. Obviously plants interfere with that, but where it's exposed, you should vacuum. Bacteria in the substrate plays a beneficial role and I believe that having no means for water to circulate within the substrate can be a problem. That's why some use substrate heating, though I only used it once and didn't replace it. Either way, your substrate will collect food and fish waste and the bacteria there can only consume so much of it. 

Second, you said the primary location of bba is on driftwood near the surface. So when you do your 50% water changes, it will be exposed to the air right? If so, you can spot treat it at this time very effectively. I drip/spray hydrogen peroxide on it. But pure excel would work well too (more expensive though.) For anything you can remove from the tank, I had been soaking it in bleach/water solution in a bucket, but when the pieces got too large I tried a 50% bleach/50% water solution in a spray bottle and it's pretty much instant which is cool. Spray it on, a few minutes later, the BBA is white foamy mass, I rinse it off and put it back in the tank. (Some white BBA remains but will break down in 2-3 days.) I even did it carefully on rock/wood with plants on it by holding the algae part down so it would drip off into the sink, not onto the plants. 

Like Crownman, I have spot treated with peroxide and excel under water. It works, but is less accurate and less forceful. My last attempt was with peroxide and it changed it to a reddish color... but it didn't seem to die back further over the following week. When exposed to the air, I've put several applications directly on it and that's usually more effective. 

Peroxide breaks down into oxygen in the water, so it's safe as long as it doesn't come in direct contact with fish or plants you wish to keep. There is a powdered chemical I can't think of the name for at the moment, but it's essentially hydrogen peroxide in solid form. They use it on algae infested ponds and lakes where it basically kills the algae on contact. Some have used it in tanks, but it's tricky. It raises KH and too much and it can eat through the plant leaves too. But a light application, watching your fish carefully, and a water change afterwards might be effective. I tried it once but haven't experimented with it much after. It ate through some anubia leaves but did kill the BBA where it fell. It didn't kill the anubia. The fish seemed unhappy after a while, but a water change remedied it. 

Excel's main ingredient is a surgical disinfectant, so it has an off-label use for fighting algae. I used it successfully to get rid of BGA. It does work with BBA as well, but you need repeated applications. The dosing lists an amount for an initial dose and then a maintenance dose. I tend to do a double initial dose and then the same amount 2 days later... but then feel it necessary to do a water change before adding more. This is based somewhat on an idea someone posted of figuring out how much you would add in a week by the normal dosing routine and dosing it in 2 doses a day or two apart instead. 

Excel will completely melt anacharis and any val species (jungle val, spiral val included) so remove those from the tank before using it. Not only will you lose the plants, but will release a ton of organics into the water in the process. For some fish, I have circumstantial evidence/experience that Excel reduces available oxygen in the water. Some fish apparently don't notice, while others are strongly affected. Amecus Splendens (Butterfly Goodeids) seem to be affected. I think I lost my Angel fish in this way. But tetras and bristlenose plecos were just fine in the same tank. I dosed tanks with Discus just fine. It may or may not have been a factor in a loss of many of my german blue rams though. 

Ultimately, I have resorted to breaking down the tanks completely, replacing the substrate (which I wanted to do anyway, as I liked the color over what I had), treating all the hardscape and in-tank filter elements, and resetting things. It doesn't necessarily solve the problem, but gets me ahead of the game. 

Tom Barr asserts that sufficient CO2 concentrations will prevent most/all algae growth. I have no reason to doubt this, though I was surprised to find BBA on the airstone inside my CO2 reactor. I imagine it's not the CO2 itself that does it, but the growth rate it allows the plants to achieve, and the ability for them to out-compete the algae. And it's not only pushing CO2 into the tank, it's circulating it around so all plants have equal access to it. That's why crownman saw benefits from increased tank circulation. 

I've been continuing EI at approximately 2/3 of the dose recommended for my calculated tank volumes. So far, so good. There is BBA on plants in a tank I just tore down and redid, but I didn't trim the plants. I removed obviously covered plants/leaves, but those with less I just put back as-is. I'm HOPING that the BBA I saw last night was largely from that, but it's hard to say. 

Oh, another remarkably effective way to kill BBA is just to expose it to the air for a couple hours. Take the item out of the tank and let it dry out, then put it back in the tank. The BBA will die. In theory this would work with the driftwood too... just drain the tank below that point and leave it for several hours. I guess you could try a hair dryer or something to speed things up. It would be a nice non-chemical solution. 

Michael


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## northtexasfossilguy (Mar 6, 2009)

I had extremely good success with using hydrogen peroxide and a turkey baster as a syringe to spot treat the stuff. I did two treatments, didn't bother the fish shrimps or snails a bit. I lost one crypto which is probably unrelated. But it works, I used that twice, and I went to look at it today and the stuff disappeared. First day it turned white, then the next it was red, and now its completely fallen off dead. Amazing and kinda fun. It will bubble profusely after you use this, thats how you know it worked. Just don't go overboard on the HP04.


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## northtexasfossilguy (Mar 6, 2009)

One more thing:

I have the exact same conditions as you described, near surface BBA. If you are using high-output lights, maybe you should kill the stuff and cover it with moss at those locations? That's what I'm trying now, things are seemingly working.


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## MacFan (Jul 30, 2006)

BTW, I found a good place to get Excel by the gallon is from Ken's Fish. They also have great foods that they make themselves, but are the only place I've found so far that seems to stock the gallon size of Excel. Most places list it but then have to have it shipped from their distributor. Last I ordered, Ken got mine out the next day.

http://www.kensfish.com/


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## wwh2694 (Aug 15, 2008)

Thanks for all your help... I have tried excel and i works great the bba is has turned white... Will those stuff go away on its own?


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