Blue-Green Algae (Cyanobacteria - please help
#1
Hello all, sorry for jumping in with a problem looking for answers. Never been much of a forum guy so not sure about the normal forum etiquette so please bear with me. I'm getting a bit desperate now and trying to ask around different forums for help.
I have a 145L tank freshwater tropical tank that has been going for a couple of years now, hosting a variety of plants and fish (half a dozen small tetra, a couple of guppies, a loaches, platies and a dwarf gourami) with a few drift wood and rocks as decors. T5 light comes on during the evening, enough to keep the plants going but algae had never been much of a problem. The odd bouts of algae from time to time but never enough to concern me, and all was running well until I failed to quarantine a new plant that I bought. It started off with a light dusting of green algae on front glass panel of the tank.
Almost overnight (well, not literally but you know what I mean) a sheets of green stuff was covering the hardscape, broad leaf plants, sand, wood, stones, everything.
I thought it was just an algae outbreak which I could deal with. I checked the levels, ammonia and nitrites were zero, phosphate and nitrates were low on API scale.
I did more water change than usual (every week instead of two weekly) and manually removed the algae as much as I could but the dreaded thing just kept coming back faster than I could remove them.
I then bought a team of shrimps and snails hoping they'd eat it but they wouldn't even go near it. Some of the fish (guppies) did have a nibble every so often but nowhere near enough to keep it under control. It might have been just my imagination but the fish were getting lazy and less active. They're not gasping for air, but some of them were just hovering round the top a lot more.
Slowly the more delicate plants started to die off. Lost a few fish in quick succession and I began to panic. Used a number of algae removers but none did anything other than burning a hole in my pocket.
After lots of searching on the net and looking at pictures I then realised that it's blue-green algae (cyanobacteria) that I have in the tank. So immediately I used an extra pump to increase the flow, cut down feed for the fish, turn the lights off (T5) and even used RO water for water change to get the phosphate down. True enough it slowed it right down. The trouble is as soon as I have any lights on, the dreaded thing comes back with a vengeance.
I tried the Ultra Life Blue Green Algae remover which seemed to have worked initially (never completely gone) but just as I thought it was safe to restock it returned a few weeks after. I'm now at a loss as to what to do. I've seen someone mentioning using hydrogen peroxide but from the sound of it, it's a bit tricky to get right.
I also read somewhere that Erythromycin can work (is that the same as what you get from your doctor when you have a chest infection??), although the risk of wiping out all the good bacteria is a bit worrying. Does anyone even know where I can get the treatment (specifically for freshwater aquarium) from? Don't seem to find it anywhere, not on the net, not in LFS, not even eBay.
I'm now afraid to restock any plants or fish until it is under control, and I don't want to keep the tank permanently in the dark.
Can anyone here help?