# plant not looking so good.brown hair & some weird algea



## mos90 (Jul 7, 2009)

to start off. tank is a 130gal, 400w cp 6700 bulbs run 8 hours a day. co2inj run 24/7 with ph controller and ph set tp 7.0. temp 79deg. if you need anymore info let me know.
ohh and 18w uv run when lights are off. 

im noticed most of green plants especially my java ferns and dwarf grass, having a brown hairy algea on them and it doesnt wipe off at all. not like green algea. seems to grow mostly on the side facing the lights. there is also some strange looking algea, kinda resembles a solid spiderweb that grows mostly on my moss. ill try to get some pictures tonight. 

i get my usual amounts of green algea and clean the glass once a week. 

also i do regular doses of iron and fert. twice a week. 

i really dont know. what direction to go at this point. maybe 6 hours of light instead of 8?
could the uv sterizer hurt the plants? more fert? 

any input would help.

1st algea looks like Rhodophyta.
looks like the second form of algea is bga..


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## armedbiggiet (May 6, 2006)

Stop the fert first. Do the fert after you figure out the problem. 8hr a day is fine. 400 w sounds okay.UV kill some of the algae that only flow in the water. How often is your water change? and did you feed alot latly?


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## mos90 (Jul 7, 2009)

i change 30% water a week. usually feed once maybe twice a day. no more then normal. 
im going to keep the lights off for a few days. see if that helps.


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## jmontee (Feb 7, 2008)

Is the pH of the water that you use 8.0 after sitting out overnight in a bucket? It seems to me that your CO2 may be set too low if the target pH is 7.0. You are usually looking for a drop of about 1 pH unit. So the ideal would be from 8 to 7.0 in your tank right? 

I would suggest a drop checker with 4d kH solution and pH indicator. This would really be the only way to know that you ar getting to your target CO2 concentration in the tank. Also what method are you using to get the CO2 in the water, reactor, pollenglass etc?

Also what kind of plants are in your tank, if you don't have many fast growers then the amount of light in your tank is too much IMO. In a 130 with low low light plants, like anubias, java fern and mosses then I would go with at most half of the light your using, maybe less.


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## armedbiggiet (May 6, 2006)

jmontee said:


> Is the pH of the water that you use 8.0 after sitting out overnight in a bucket? It seems to me that your CO2 may be set too low if the target pH is 7.0. You are usually looking for a drop of about 1 pH unit. So the ideal would be from 8 to 7.0 in your tank right?
> 
> I would suggest a drop checker with 4d kH solution and pH indicator. This would really be the only way to know that you ar getting to your target CO2 concentration in the tank. Also what method are you using to get the CO2 in the water, reactor, pollenglass etc?
> 
> Also what kind of plants are in your tank, if you don't have many fast growers then the amount of light in your tank is too much IMO. In a 130 with low low light plants, like anubias, java fern and mosses then I would go with at most half of the light your using, maybe less.


that does not work all the time on different cities water. Rockville, Maryland's water take about 1.5 to 2 bubbles to drop the PH while Seattle only need 0.5 to 1 to do the same.


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## armedbiggiet (May 6, 2006)

mos90 said:


> i change 30% water a week. usually feed once maybe twice a day. no more then normal.
> im going to keep the lights off for a few days. see if that helps.


lights off sounds like away to deal with it. every thing sounds okay. do you have a pic of your tank? Maybe is like Jmontee said... whta is your CO2 setup? Is it consistant?


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## mos90 (Jul 7, 2009)

the light off did help out all bga gone and 75% of hair algea gone. . my tap water is 7.0 out of tap. i use a greenleaf system with ph contoller so it is consistant. i think the main problem was lack of ferts. i started an ei dosing regamine. seems to be more new plant growth and less algae for sure. looking better. no3 was almost 0 and irons was low. now p04 is too high but i can fix that. changed to 50% water changes every monday. i have a drop checker reads medium green in day little darker at night when air stones turn on. 

i cut light to 200w for 8 hours with 2 hour 400w burst midday. plants not pearling yet, my need another hour of burst light. well see.


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## mos90 (Jul 7, 2009)

narrowed it down to being mostly brush algae. seems that opposite to my test kit my n03 was close to 80ppm and p04 was over 5pmm. on top of that my kh and c02 is low. 

looks like im going to have to stop dosing kh2p04 and kn03 for a while. raise my c02 to an acceptable level and reduce lights back down. im going to try 6 days at 200w @8hours. and off on 7th day.


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