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hair algae?


Merth

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This stuff has got to be the biggest pain ever! It doesnt matter how long lights are on, how often I do water changes, how long tank has been runnng, or how heavily its planted. Hair algae always shows up especially in my mosses. Anyone else have this problem? If so how do you combat it? Ive heard best treatment is to pull the moss and just replace with algae free, but it still shows up eventually. I dont want to use excel or peroxide as the mosses dont seem to recover well from this treatment. I dont use ferts for fear of killing shrimp. I've heard amano shrimp will eat it but I dont think I want them in my shrimp tank which means they need a tank of their own and constantly moving mosses into their tank to clean it up. 

 

 

Anyone else have any ideas?

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oh also was curious if possibly it grows faster in hard water? Possibly using rodi or an active substrate would lessen the chance of getting it?

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I know I don't have any in my crystal tank.  Ph is usually 6.3ish and under.  Ammonia (ammonium?) isn't achieved as quickly in a low ph environment, so that may have something to do with it?

 

Also, about the only thing they'll eat is snowflake, so not very much other food left over to infiltrate the substrate and cause rotting, which may also contribute to it..

 

I do see tiny black beard tufts under some moss, but not very big and the lower the ph is, the quicker it shrinks.

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These algae grow well at low and very high nitrate levels. A nitrate level between 5 - 10 mg/l is a good target. They also thrive at too much light exposure (intensity and duration, as Soothing wrote). I would try 8- 10 hours of light. Also CO2 helps.

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A real pain in the ass. Sorry but that's the only way to put it.

I finally pulled all the plants and gave them a quick peroxide bath. Laces that were really bad just trimmed and discarded. Ended up being the best thing. Mosses just pulled it off. BTW - I fert with flourish and excel without ANY issues - after a bad outbreak I did the above along with ferts and tank looks great. Lights are only on for 7 hours as well

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I had issues in the past with it in all my tanks. The solution I found was to increase water movment. I did this by buying the smallest power head I could find, I then pointed it at the plants they were plagued with it. I have not had an issue since. I keep my light on 12hrs a day. I'm running 2 T5 bulbs and a coral life LED fixture. My substrate is mineralized top soil so it's full of nutrients. I don't dose and I don't run CO2. This is in my 75 gallon tank.

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Actually I did the same thing only with filtration - had it baaaaddddd in a community tank - added a AQ 70 to go with AQ 110 for more flirtation and ALSO more movement. Took all plants out minus miss - dipped plants with preroxide and major league trim. Pulled all I could off moss - reduced light to 8 hours. Fert with Flourish and excel. (A little less than on label). Haven't seen a lick of it in 5 months since. - I do same in shrimo tanks with moss - and no ha whatsoever. Population is going very strong and moss is as healthy as ever.

Might as well try it. You don't have much choice really

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