Black Beard Algae

[adblair]

HELP! I've got an outbreak of BBA in my little tank!

I've read throught the old BBA threads, but wanted some reassurance on what I'm about to do.....

Here's what hapened.....
I got a new 10 gallon tank that came with the standard 2 bulb fixture for which I bought 15w CF bulbs. I know that is a lot of light, but the 15's were the lowest I could find at that time. The new hood would not fit where I needed it to fit, so I took the hood off my old 10g and "swapped them" - this meant I also had to use the old filter because it was too big to fit in the space allowed on the new hood.

So far we have 1 new 10g - with the old hood with one 15w st. fl. bulb and the old filter
and one old 10g. with the new hood with 2 15w. CF bulbs and a new filter

The old tank is moderately planted with java moss (a lot), 2 java ferns, bacopa (probably 20 stems), med. bronze crypt, med. lutea, anubias, micro sword, and a small amount of hortwort

The new tank is extremely lightly planted with lutea, bacopa (3 or 4 stems), a java fern plantlet, and a small amount of java moss.

Now for the problem, I went out of town for 4 days and came home to a huge BBA outbreak in the old tank - I've never had BBA before. I immediately removed the hornwort, and most of the bacopa. I think it was mainly on the bacopa, but they were a bit intertwined, so I wanted to be sure. I had a SAE in another tank, so I moved him temporarily to this tank hoping he would take care of the remaining algae. 2 days later, more BBA, I removed the rest of the bacopa and unscrewed one of the 15w CF bulbs.

Now, I have it growing (in small amounts) on every leaf on my bronze crypt and maybe even a little on the java moss. From what I have read, I need to do a 19:1 bleach dip.

My questions are - how long do I dip the plants? do I need to do ALL of the plants or just the ones that obviously have it on them? I have been using Flourish Excel every other day - do I need to reduce or eliminate the amount for a while? Was this caused by the increase in lighting? Will I have to add CO2 before I can increase the light again? I want to move a few of these plants to the new 10g, will that make the BBA spread to the new tank or will the bleach dip prevent it? Sorry, I know this post is long - I just want to be sure I am doing this right so I don't kill off all my plants with the BBA.

 

[djlen]

Are you sure it's BBA? Long black/brown tendrils growing mainly on edges of leaves. Very difficult to remove.
If it is, it is not caused by lighting. By spores imported to your tank from infected plants or possibly from water with newly introduced fish.
I use 25:1 bleach dip. 1-1/2mins for hardy(javas,anubias etc.)plants, and 1min. for more tender varieties.
Prepare a bucket of fresh water treated with a 5X solution of tap water conditioner. After dipping in the bleach, rinse well under the tap and then into the conditioned fresh water tub. Leave them in there while dipping all the others.
Inspect everything in the tank closely and if it's present, dip it.
This includes heaters, siphon tubes, filter returns. BBA loves flowing water. Filter returns are prime areas.
As long as you've got the solution prepared, dip everything you see it on. Your SAE will take care of any new stuff, but won't eat the old stuff.
I would not move any plants into another tank until I was sure it's gone off of them.
Gravel siphon as much of the substrate(not deep, but cover as much area as possible) while you have the plants out of it.
Then you are ready to re-plant. Make sure you dip your hands into the treated water to get all traces of bleach off of them before putting them back into the tank.
Once replanted, get the CO2 going(or the Excel) and fertilize. Plants that are growing well will fight off a re-occurrence along with the SAE. Hopefully, it's a true SAE.
You will still see the BBA on the plants when you re-plant, but the tendrils will be either red or gray, and will slowly dis-integrate over a few days time.

Len

 

[adblair]

I'm pretty sure it's BBA - it looks like black "hair" - I guess it might look like a beard, but facial hair wouldn't be the first thing that I'd compare it with.....

I have now done the bleach dip..... and when I was rinsing under the tap I ran my fingers along the edges of the leaves of the anubias and the crypts and what was left rinsed right off. I ended up with only 4 bacopa stems left, and just trashed the microsword - it wouldn't stay together in the dip - it went everywhere

I dipped everything except the heater and the filter - neither had any signs of the stuff. None of the ornaments did either.

While I had everything out I removed most of the flourite substrate (I left about a cup), and replaced it with profile since I had been planning to do that "when I got around to it" anyway.
I also changed 85% of the water. The tank is now reassembled and there is no sign of any algae. Both lights are back on..... hopefully I have seen the last of the black beast....


The SAE really doesn't belong in that tank..... would you leave him in there for a while anyway? I don't want to overcrowd that tank too much.... it has a large male beta, 3 small cories, and two 1.5" otos. It also still has two gold snails (about 1/2" each) that I saved from the bleach dip.

 

[djlen]

Because of the ease with which you removed the 'BBA' I'm a bit skeptical that it was BBA, but the bleach will kill all algae, so it's no big deal.
I would definitely keep the SAE in the tank for a while. As I said, this algae is a spore borne plant and will show up again in small(initially) amounts, but the presence of an SAE will keep it at bay. If you remove him, you run a large risk of a recurrence of an infestation.
I don't quite understand why you would remove the Flourite, but everyone has their own ideas.

Len

 

[adblair]

I had the large size flourite..... it was difficult for me to get my plants planted in it because it didn't really "pack" around the stems (but it may have been more of a planter issue ), but the bigger issue for me is my little cories - I was afraid that the sharp edges of the large flourite were not friendly to their constant hyperactive cleaning Yes I know I'm a sucker....