why is algae such a big deal in planted tanks?

well because of the high amounts of light and nutrient imbalances...

I have a small army of Mystery snails (untill it rade them) probably about 30 in my 20 gallon medium sized too and otos and I still have some algae, but playing carefully with ferts and number of plants etc It's not a sever problem anymore.

My plants were sucking up all my Nitrate, so be ready to supplement Nitrate if needed.

I don't plan to dose Phosphate any time soon, the way things are going now with dosing KNO3.

Make sure you add fast growers first and slow growth plants second.

One thing is that some people don't like the look of algae. Green water which is algae that grows in the water can make it so you can't see more than half an inch into the tank.

The biggest issue is algae growing on the plants. If the plants don't get enoug light they can die, and algae growing on them greatly reduces the ammount of light that gets to the plants.

Not all algae eating critters will eat all types of algae. I have 2 oto's and they don't quite get all of the algae, and they seem to prefer to eat algae growing on the glass than algae that is growing on the plants.

Some of us have planted tanks with fish that doesn't allow us to have otos and shrimps.

They wouldn't last the night in my tank. I've thought about bristlenose plecos as they stay small but I'm not a pleco fan. Not to steal from the thread, but are BNs rough on any certain plants? I have a chance to buy an Albino BN for like 10 dollars if I want it.

Conditions that are good for growing plants are good for growing algae.

The more light you have the greater the risk. Fish only tanks are barely lit compared to most plant tanks. 2 wpg is very high for FO but decidely on the moderate side of the coin for plants. WPG is the thing folks bandy about but its not really a great description of light intensity: a lot depends on what sort of bulbs you're sending those watts into, what sort of reflectors, etc.

Fauna is particular about what it'll eat and not every algae eater will eat every algae. If you're thinking about a handful of otos and some shrimp you haven't seen algae in all its rampant glory: runaway algae can kill every plant in the tank and hide every fish. Algae on every surface and growing in sheets across the gravel until you can't see the gravel. I had some algae recently that actually lifted a nymphaea up out of the substrate and floated it (they have heavy bulbs that normally sink); when I killed the algae it sank again.

Flourish is good for traces and Excel is a decent enough carbon source but macros are necessary: BGA (Cathy G's nemesis and a familiar plague to me) frequently shows up when nitrate is too low. Fish don't eat it (I don't think anything eats it).

Neglect your macros at your peril.

gagaliya said:

hey can you expand on the nutrient imbalance part? why would a planted tank be nutrient imbalanced while a fish only tank is not? What exactly does nutrient imbalance mean that can cause an algae outbreak?

Click to expand...

A good planted tank is held up by three legs: light, nutrients, and CO2. If these three are balanced against each other then everything should work out. If there is an imbalance then there is a niche and an algae waiting to exploit it.

If you have low light, low nutrients and low CO2 you're not going to have a problem: this is the case in most fish only tanks and its why you don't really see algae in them. If, through neglect, nurient levels get too high you'll see algae in a FO tank.

If you have medium light, medium ferts, and low CO2 you'll have algae.

If you have medium light, medium micros, Excel for carbon, some macros naturally occuring in your water but no nitrates because the hornwort ate it all you will have algae. Or, more likely, Blue Green Algae, which is actually not an algae (cyanobacteria).

The whole thing needs to be balanced.

Yup what carpguy said...I'm still in the middle of figuring it out myself but no real serious problems other than an outbreak of hairalgae...But my plants are mostly fast growers so trimming the leaves off that had alot of hair was no big deal.

I think live plants are definatley worth it though!