Will this work?

[Lukara]

Hi, I'm fighting a Staghorn algae problem which I suspect hitched a ride with one of the plants I bought a few months ago. I was wondering if I place my current fish in a temporary tank and tear down the one with the problem to bleach and disinfect everything. I would then do a fishless cycle to get things started again and put the fish back in after all this is accomplished. Basically I'd throw away all the plants and probably the substrate and start everything over.

What I'm wondering is, would I be carrying the spores to the temporary tank (via fish waste or something like this) only to bring it back into the main tank?

 

[swany]

I would try something much less drastic like a phosphate remover or cutting back on light exposure.

 

[downloader]

Hey before all the tear down, try this. Remove as much as possible by hand scraping, then change about 60% of the water, an do a blackout for 3 days.

 

[Lukara]

Ok I think I should have maybe elaborated on the things I've tried also.

First off, here are my specs:
-50 gallon tank (say about 40 gallon if you consider substrate, plants, rocks etc..)
-Tank is heavily planted with Amazon Swords, Sunset Hygrophila Polysperma, Ludwigia Repens, Java Moss and Micro Sword grass.
-PH @ 7.0
-KH @ 6
-GH @ 8
-Nitrites @ 0
-Ammonia @ 0
-Nitrates @ 5 ppm
-CO2 @ 18.5
-Temperature @ 79 degrees F
-2 40w Power-glo tubes @18000k
-25% weekly water changes
-Hagen 304 Fluval filter
-Tetratec UV @ 5watts
-Terralit in my substrate, enough for my tank size

I've had Staghorn only a couple of weeks after I put my first plant in my tank. I started my tank about 3 months ago. When I first noticed the staghorn, I removed the plants and decorations and did a 1:19 bleach treatment. Things were wonderful for the next couple of weeks, but it came back. I then decided to stop fertilizing in the water column, and added Terralit to the substrate. I later added a ton more plants hoping to outgrow the algae. When this wasn't working, I realized that I wasn't giving enough CO2, so I corrected that problem. This isn't everything I've tried in chronological order and I might be missing some things I've tried too. What I'm thinking is that I've made a ton of mistakes from the start and am paying for it now. I'm sort of losing hope that this will ever go away or diminish and am getting a bit desperate!!

 

[Tempest]

Maybe this should be moved to the plant forum so some of them can have a go at it.

 

[Tempest]

Lukara-- Have a look at Plantbrain's post in this thread for some expert advice..
http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=5105

 

[Lukara]

Thank you for responding. Tempest, I will give Plantbrain's suggestions a go as well. I appreciate the help and hopefuly several weeks from now I'll have good news to report.