# Threaded Algae? - Help identify and cure



## gtrewjr (Feb 4, 2006)

Greets all..

Noob here, back in the hobby again after about 15 years of getting married and starting a family. You know how that goes I suppose. Anyway...

This algae is just taking over my Mayaca. I noticed it about 3-4 days ago and was just a very small "tuft" about midway up the plant stems. It's grown very quickly. Any suggestions on ridding my system of it? And what exactly it is?

I can upload pic's taken earlier today at work earlier today at about 400x phase contrast, and standard (I just don't have a floppy drive at home to upload the pics *sigh*) It is a single thread structure. That's about all I can say about it, this isn't my field of study at all.

I'm guessing it's something very simple, please point me in the right direction as I get my feet wet int he hobby again.

Details:
75 gal + 15 gal sump
Open filtration system (5gal bio tower) <- ya, not needed and soon passing away.
230w 6700K CF Fixture
KH ~48ppm
Ph 7.0-7.1
CO2 Injected running only 6-7 ppm currently (I plan to up this to about 15ppm once I change my filtration system out in the next couple of weeks. I'll miss the sump though.)
Seachem Flourish (5mL 3x's per week)

Pictures:


----------



## John P. (Nov 24, 2004)

You need to add macro nutrients (Nitrate, Phosphate, Potassium) and get your CO2 up to 30ppm. The thread algae will then subside.

Manually remove it by twirling a toothbrush. You may not want to use the toothbrush again on your mouth.


----------



## trenac (Jul 16, 2004)

Welcome to APC  

From the pics it looks like thread algae. Keep as much removed by hand as possible. Crank up your C02 to between 20-30ppm. Make sure that the water parameters are balanced (10ppm N03/1ppm P04). Keep the lights on for 10 hours daily. Add more fast growing plants.


----------



## gtrewjr (Feb 4, 2006)

John P. said:


> You need to add macro nutrients (Nitrate, Phosphate, Potassium) and get your CO2 up to 30ppm. The thread algae will then subside.
> 
> Manually remove it by twirling a toothbrush. You may not want to use the toothbrush again on your mouth.


Well, I got in there last night with a junk toothbrush and got a lot of it cleaned out; it looks a lot better but still a lot of algae.



trenac said:


> Welcome to APC
> 
> From the pics it looks like thread algae. Keep as much removed by hand as possible. Crank up your C02 to between 20-30ppm. Make sure that the water parameters are balanced (10ppm N03/1ppm P04). Keep the lights on for 10 hours daily. Add more fast growing plants.


I'm curious, if 10 hours of lights is good, is 12 hours better or worse?

I plan to hard plumb the RO/DI into the sump tomorrow, weather and my back permitting. Once that's in I'll start Monday on following the EI fert program with water changes regularly. I don't currently have test sets availalbe to me for accurate testing for PO4/NO3, etc. but I suspect doing EI with regular water changes will balance it out pretty quickly.

Thanks for your assistance!

Grady


----------



## John P. (Nov 24, 2004)

I wouldn't go over 10 hours if you're having problems. 8-10 would be prudent.


----------



## John N. (Dec 11, 2005)

I have/had green hair and thread algae, does it turn brown before it dies?

that's what's happening now...I pumped up co2 and it's turning green to brown threads..

Whoo hoo!


----------



## gtrewjr (Feb 4, 2006)

My case of the thread algae seems to be reducing it's self extremely slowly. I was reading elsewhere that H2O2 injected in the algae blooms will kill it right off. However, that does not take care of the underlying reason for the algae growth. In my case it is getting smaller, just being extremely slow about it and I'm tired of picking at it.

BTW - It got a LOT worse then the pictures above before I started getting it more/less under control.

Grady


----------



## MatPat (Mar 22, 2004)

Once you start adding ferts, you may notice the algae increasing it's growth so keep up with the manual removal. The toothbrush works great! It does tend to turn brown when it is dying off and with ferts, daily (or even more frequent) harassment with the toothbrush, along with good CO2 levels (30ppm+) the plants will begin to outgrow it. Then you can simply prune the algae free part of the plant and toss the rest! 

Mayaca and other fine leaf plants seem to be magnets for thread algae in my experience. I think the fine leaf structure makes it easy for the algae to cling to it. I have had similar issues in the past with Myriophyllum mattogrossense and some of the finer leaved Rotala species.


----------

