Plants not growing and covered in algae

Hi all,

Long story short I have been running a low tech tank for years and shortly after adding co2 to the tank it sprung a leak so I had to replace it and thought I'd make some "improvements" and get a bigger tank. This was about 5 months ago now and i've had nothign but issues.

Tank details:

• 180 litres - 140 litres of water after deducting substrate rocks etc.
• pressurised Co2 at 4 bps. intank diffuser ( Light green drop checker and 1 pH drop) co2 comes on 2 before lights on and off 1.5 hours before lights off.
• 2x eBay Led lights (30 watt each, no par rating) on for 8 hours
• 2x filters totalling 1700 litres an hour so just over 10x capacity per hour.
• Wave maker to add flow.
• temp has been high around 26 degrees Celsius.
• inert substrate with API and flourish root tabs.
• Recentl started EI as per this post.

Ok so with the old tank I started to get really good healthy growth of hair grass and Val's. Infact the Val's where spreading unbelievable fast. These were in a substrate of black iron sand that had been in tank for years. Root tabs and no fert dosing.

When moving to new tank I was advised against getting dirt due to catfish and told to get black diamond quartz. So I laid my old iron sand at bottom of new tank and placed new substrate on-top creating hills etc. I inserted both flourish and API root tabs and I replanted all my plants and have had some interesting results.All my vals died off and only hair grass in the centre of my tank (lowest part of the substrate) was growing. the rest was covered in algae.

Months went past, i removed all algae infected hair grass and i decided try some easy to grow plants including Limnophila Sessiliflora, pink baby tears, green baby tears, riccia, s. Repens and duckweed (which should also help cut out some light incase my light intesity was too high)

Plants were in for acouple of weeks with out much change and i recently decided to start EI dosing to ensure i finally could get some plant growth and enjoy this tank.

After the first week of EI dosing, no change. Did my first 50% water change yesterday and woke up this morning to find my plants some what covered in algae and looking the worst they have since putting them in. I have attached an image of the plants on saturday 16 april and today 23 april.

is it a case of it gets worse before it gets better? do i jut stick it out? any other advice would be greatly appreciated.

Its getting to the point were im ready to shut this tank down and give it up completely. i thought going to pressurised Co2 and ferts was going to help, but it has been nothing but a nightmare. i knwo that may seem bad but i've got a new born and a two year old and the i'm not sure the tank si worth the extra stress for absolutely no results.

Greg

 

Hmm apart from the duckweed I wouldn't label those plants as "easy". If the stem plants have only been in for a few weeks you can try giving them some more time.

Easy plants would be something like rotala rotundifolia, hygrophila corymbosa

 

I would add some phosphate removing media in the filter to help with the algae issue. Algae is a sign that something is off in the tank. A lot of the time it’s too much phosphate although there can be many other issues where there is too much of something in the water.

 

Welcome to Fishlore. If you're going EI, you'll need more plant mass. That is, get more fast-growing stem plants. In my experience, you'll want more than half the substrate planted in them (something more similar to a Dutch style aquascape). The EI method works great if your tank is full of fast-growing plants, otherwise you're just inviting algae on everything that's not a fast-growing plant.

If you're strapped for time with the little one and all, starting a high-tech EI style aquarium may not be the best option. Tanks like this can take a lot of maintenance, especially when you're first learning how to keep one. Perhaps you could try and make your tank low-light with easy, low-light plants. You could keep the CO2 system if you like, as it would still be helpful. Switching to a low-light tank would take a fraction of the maintenance and be easier to keep algae free.

As Cherryshrimp420 said, your tank is still young. If you want to stick it out, it will most likely improve a great deal once everything gets settled in.

 

Your tank is lovely. I am sure your young one is too! Just let the tank evolve and see what happens. Give it little correction on the way. A new planted tank takes many months to stabilize. Just let it happen. Make changes maybe once a month.

Algae is not really any issue.

I have planted tanks that need maintenance every few months only. Simple water changes, and no algae.
Aquariums can be very peaceful once you get the hang of it.

The growing plants and C02 keep the algae from growing. This is a balance.

Too much light makes the algae grow. Too much light means either the light strength or the amount of time it is on. You control these. So control is easy.

Just reduce the time the light is on to control algae.
Keep your C02 drop checker in the green.
Don't stress the tank. Let it go. Give it little corrections along the way to make it come out the way you want.
Take care of baby. (Fish are very similar to raising kids). They just need basic survival stuff and to be pointed in the right direction with love. You are natural suited for this task.

 

Your tank is lovely. I am sure your young one is too! Just let the tank evolve and see what happens. Give it little correction on the way. A new planted tank takes many months to stabilize. Just let it happen. Make changes maybe once a month.

Algae is not really any issue.

I have planted tanks that need maintenance every few months only. Simple water changes, and no algae.
Aquariums can be very peaceful once you get the hang of it.

The growing plants and C02 keep the algae from growing. This is a balance.

Too much light makes the algae grow. Too much light means either the light strength or the amount of time it is on. You control these. So control is easy.

Just reduce the time the light is on to control algae.
Keep your C02 drop checker in the green.
Don't stress the tank. Let it go. Give it little corrections along the way to make it come out the way you want.
Take care of baby. (Fish are very similar to raising kids). They just need basic survival stuff and to be pointed in the right direction with love. You are natural suited for this task.

Thanks every one for your replies.

Frank you have given me some confidence to stick with the tank and make those slight corrections along the way and not get too worked up about it.

In the interest of reducing light I wired up one of my two led lights with a spare PWM I had lying around. I have now set that light to 50 percent brightness which should theoretically reduce the total brightness 75%.

Hopefully this is a large enough reduction in light to see some progress.

Cheers

Greg