How to Fight Black Beard Algae - 5 Easy Ways
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- Опубліковано 23 лип 2024
- I tested 5 methods for killing black beard algae (BBA) - find out which one worked the best!
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🛒 MATERIALS I USED
▶ Hydrogen peroxide (in a bottle): amzn.to/3oz2Bla
▶ Hydrogen peroxide (in a spray bottle): amzn.to/37O8sx2
▶ Easy Carbon (liquid carbon algaecide): www.aquariumcoop.com/products...
▶ Pipette: www.aquariumcoop.com/products...
(As an Amazon Associate, I may earn commissions from the links above. Also, I work for Aquarium Co-Op but do not receive commissions from their links.)
📚 RESOURCES
▶ H202 Treatment - Marks Shrimp Tanks: • How To Dose H202 In An...
▶ Defeat Black Brush Algae using liquid carbon: • DEFEAT BLACK BRUSH ALG...
▶ Oh no! BBA!!! Say it isn’t so! forum.aquariumcoop.com/topic/...
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ATTRIBUTION
Music from Epidemic Sound: www.epidemicsound.com/referra... (if you use my referral link, I get 1 month free 😀)
Wikipedia article on hydrogen peroxide: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroge...
0:00 How I fought black beard algae for 2 years
1:17 Method 1: hydrogen peroxide
2:22 Method 2: hydrogen peroxide spray
4:06 Method 3: liquid carbon
5:37 Method 4: liquid carbon spot treatment
7:50 Method 5: algae eaters
#girltalksfish #nanofish #plantedaquarium - Домашні улюбленці та дикі тварини
*Still need help fighting algae? Check out my other algae tutorials here: **ua-cam.com/play/PLlBBJ7xBuquYN1TkIpb62os9kyqB_mvKr.html*
You used 3 ml of Excel each day?
I would like to share what I did for BBA that worked...
I had it along the edges of my sword plants and anubias. I took the plants out of the tank and applied Flourish Excel with a Q tip directly to the BBA then put the plants back in the tank. After 24 hours the BBA turned red. You can easily see if you missed any areas at this point. I noticed my ramshorn snails and guppies started eating it for the first time, probably because it was now soft enough to eat. The plants did not yellow or die back. It has been one month now and I am BBA free so far. Now, I'm not sure how it would work on crypts since they don't like to be uprooted or disturbed after established and my crypts weren't affected by the BBA. So I would use caution if you tried it. Anyway, I hope this might help someone out. If you have a question, just reply and I will try to help! Thanks! 😊🌱
Great idea, I can't wait to try this
The internet needs more Irene!!!! Thanks for the update! Starting to deal with that same
Problem this week!
the hard/soft water makes sense. Cory is always saying how he uses the hydro method and it works for him, also always talks about how soft his water is. Very interesting.
You did an excellent job with this video. I'm catching up on freshwater shrimp and appreciated all of the information you've shared here. Thanks so much and thumbs UP!
This is the EXACT same way it showed up for me, barely anyone talked on the internet about this! I swear you are the only channel that fits my fish tank philosophy.
Your videos are so helpful and enjoyable to watch. I’ve learned soooo much from them! A huge thank you!
I’ve noticed that bba first forms on anubias or val species of plants. Since anubias are not planted I remove them and place them in a glass vase adding a couple drops of seachem excel changing the water completely every 3 days. If it’s on the val I cut off every affected leaf and remove them while doing a large water change twice a week and cutting the light down to 6 hours a day from 8. Seems to work if caught early enough. If let go to long or gets out of control I tear down the tank and dispose of all affected plants. After having to do this once I keep a better eye on my tanks and also bought a net and piece of hose for each tank in order to keep cross contamination to a minimum. Black beard algae is probably the cause for a lot of people giving up on the hobby. It’s the one algae that gets me upset when it appears.
Great video. Very informative. Did a great job covering all the bases and teaching everyone about the different processes you can go through to get rid of dreaded algae. My hat off to you
Thank you! I'm jumping straight to the 4th method. Just ordered from your link. ❤
My girl!!! Needed THIS!!
Thank you for this video! My tank has recently started growing this type of algae and I didn’t know what the name was or how to treat it
Thank you for the thorough detail! Your videos are awesome!
Nice video. One note is that while treating a tank I found that doing good water changes helps a lot. I’ve also done 2 wc per week on a stubborn tank while treating the plants.
Girl! I've been fighting this for months now. Nothing gets it off and forget scraping it off the plant leaves.. it damages everything. Thank you so much! You have no idea how much I appreciate this video and information. My gosh, this black hairy algae is ridiculously tough to battle. Thankfully I got it under control but it always comes back with a vengeance. Have a great day. I appreciate this so much!
Very interesting! I’ll keep this in mind if I ever have an outbreak that my ramshorn and pond snails 🐌 don’t take care of. I’m one of those people that love snails and, so far in my tanks, these guys have cleaned up that flat surface BBA you talk about. I always love your videos, Irene. Thanks for making such fun, interesting, and educational content.
I'm so glad you enjoyed it! Yes, I should've mentioned that I was fighting BBA in snail-free tanks. Glad to hear they'll eat the stuff. :)
Liquid carbon spot treatment combined with having my tank on a blackout lighting schedule was very effective for me!
Thank you for all this information! You just got a new subscriber!
I gotta sub to you!! You document everything i love the visual aids on your process!
Great video as always! You can never have to many tips to tackle the dreaded algae!
Thanks for dropping by and watching the premiere! Too bad you can't get this stuff easily in the UK; thanks for the heads up. :P
Thank You for The Awesome Information
This was so helpful! I couldn’t tell what was on my leaves because its also hard and dusty looking. I’ll give hydrogen peroxide first since it hasn’t spread much yet. Thank you!!
I agree, balancing nutrients and light is hard, but important to make sure that your treatments for algae removal are able to keep up with the growth of it.
Can’t wait for the video! Struggling with algae in a 20 I setup for my future Rummynose display tank :( Hopefully this’ll help! Love the channel Irene
Thank you so much! I hope these tips help; lemme know which one ends up working for you.
I had this problem as well, and in my case was because i was over fertilizing. I stoped fertilizing for a few weeks and the black algae dissapeard over time
This is exactly what caused it in my tank. I’m new to planted tanks and over fertilized thinking I needed to give the plants a boost. Hard lesson to learn but glad to know this going forward
Not gonna lie. Love the effort and diligence you put in for this video. See the self care you’ve been doing as well. Happy for you. Thanks for the informative information. 👌🏿🔥
Good stuff. Always good content.
Good info!!
I am excited to see the video....definitely need the tip as I think I have some forming in my tank now.
Ooo, it's good that you spot it now. Tackle it early on for faster success. I took me _months_ to finally get rid of this stuff because I had so much of it.
Yes, Amano shrimp does work very well I had a very aggressive blackbeard algae take over in my 250 gallon tank. I think this was because my CO2 bottle ran out and I didn't realize it for 2 weeks so the water changed very quickly. So I went out and bought 25 of them to start. within 2 weeks my tank was clearing up rapidly. Although this was a very expensive fix, but worked quickly.
Great video again!
Thanks very much finally a solution that worked after a year of battling it in our tropical fish tank the carbon has sorted it out. Thank you.
Floating plants and flag fish did it for me. Much Love Irene!!!
Great video! Hydrogen peroxide hasn't worked for me either and I didn't know why until watching. 8.0ph here, too. Thanks for the algacide tip!
Love your videos!
Thank you for making this video. I have been fighting BBA for years in my 180 gal and I have 7 SAE and 12 hillstream loaches. Neither of them totally eradicates BBA.
Wow, that's an awesome army of algae eaters! Yeah, once I weakened the BBA with liquid carbon spot treatment and the algae started turning yellow, the hillstream loaches completely ate it all. Pretty impressive; hope it works for you as well!
Great video!!!
Three years later… thanks for the great video. I’m having some bb algae issues and this helped.
Flourish excel method worked for me!! Beautifully.
The easy carbon worked for black beard algae, thank you 👍
I had a 10 gallon covered in this stuff too. What worked for me was the addition of 10 Nerite snails. Within a week they had it completely cleaned up.
Same! I had a bba infestation in mine from an infected java fern, nerites worked for me too!
Where’d you get your nerite snails? I want some but don’t know where to get them
Hi irene!!! You're just AMAZING!I wish I could join your membership sooooo much but I can't 😔. Awesome video!
No problem! Thanks for showing up at the premiere. Always great to see you in the comments. :)
@@GirlTalksFishAwwwwww thank youu
same with me! the point is, keep your aquarium balance.
Thanks Irene. Great video. 👍📺😎
ok my tank was a black mess..added new plants lighting and it killed my wisteria.. covered everything filter clogged every 7 days.. The cure, clean the items you can with peroxide out of tank soak them... then just turn the lighting off for 5 days... Clean the filter mine was green, just rinse in a cup.. Every other day...I have zero black beard algae... yes i soaked some of my gravel in peroxide not all for bacteria.(weekly it was just a mess).I swooshed it in a clean container and you would be amazed at the black algae on the gravel( i swooshed in clean water 5 times or so to remove the black algae still had some)...Threw out the really bad stuff... added new gravel ....all the black beard died..gone poof...back to a super clean tank now for 5 months or so... my tank was soo bad i scooped gravel out and it was black and hairy.. filter clogged... now zero black algae.. my accessories' stay white my filter goes a month or more and no clogging.. the key turn the tank lighting off, and clean the really bad algae with hydrogen peroxide... rinse really well... Never put peroxide on filter media just the canister.. So now yearly or so i am gonna turn the lighting off for a few days... added doubled over computer paper to adjust lighting taped to glass lid... Added lifelike fake plants.. really nice ones.. cut down and it looks real... one happy betta in a clean gorgeious tank.... I hate black beard algae.... It beat me down to wanting to stop my tank.. It took hours to clean weekly( my tank was 20 times worse then hers).. Now it takes 30 minutes done.. water changes and rearranging items only.. love my tank again..
Great Video!!!! Thank you!!!!!!!!!!
I didn't realize that's what that type of algae was, I thought it was hair algae. I only get it on the tips of some plants and I just scrape it off
I have lots of rhizome plants (mainly anubias and Java fern) and small rocks with BBA that are easily removable for a while to treat out of water. Not having great luck spot treatment of H2O2 (if I leave it on long enough to kill the algae some of my leaves don’t survive) but I’m think I’m going to retry my Excel after watching this. If you’re treating with Excel out of water how long would you suggest letting it sit before putting it back in the tank? Sorry to miss you live! I was all set to watch and chat when my out of town guests awoke so I had to use my UA-cam manners 😄
A coral feeder is also a good direct applicator. I find they have many usages.
I can recommend Silver Flying Fox (Crossocheilus Reticulatus) if you got a big tank with big sturdy fish or for a smaller tank Florida flagfish (Jordanella floridae) both work wonders and no chemicals.
I had some success with 2 min leaf soaks in H2O2. I also sprayed it on my decor out of water. However, I missed a tiny bit of this stuff on my tank and got another huge bloom.
Back to nature..I used siamese algae eater to eat BBA..it worked great!!
Hi could you do a video on mycobacterium? I think it's an important topic in the Hoby that nobody ever talks about
Thanks!!
I used Seachem Excel effectively to control BBA. I have a 15 gallon tank and I did overdose with 2-3 caps of excel, without harming the fishes or shrimps (I have a very heavily planted tank). I repeated it two to three times a week. The BBA turned brown and melted away next week. But, they tend to come back now and then. Also, please be careful while spot treatment with liquid carbon. In my experience, the mosses don't respond well (some of it actually got burnt)
Nuuu I woke up too late! Even though I don’t have algae problems I still watch it lol.
I fought this stuff on and off over the years, and it’s so robust. There weren’t good products like the ones you shared back then, and I have the same hard water / high ph water situation you do. Eventually, my only resort was pulling every plant to replace new, razor blading every inch of glass, and boiling the hardscape (big rocks and driftwood).
How’d the boiling work? After boiling hardscape for as long as 30 minutes, I was certain I’d be able to just scrub it off with a vegetable brush. That was not the case AT ALL. I was able to scrub the rocks clean with a wire brush, but the driftwood was too tender for that and I couldn’t get that all scrubbed off. Black hair algae held on like iron, even after being boiled! I assumed it was dead after being boiled though… was it?
The result was it never returned at the same levels, but the boiled driftwood only released where my pleco found areas of driftwood softened from boiling - removing the driftwood layer removed the algae. Firmer areas of driftwood… THE BLACK HAIR ALGAE RETURNED. Did it grow back from its “roots”? Did it just reestablish where it had favorably grown before? No idea. But it’s a perfect Hallowe’en topic, because black hair algae is the monster that won’t die!
I’m going to try these in order. My 20 gallon seems to be flourishing with this algae. =\
Thank you for the video!
My pleasure! Let me know if which method ends up working.
Great work :)
i’ve got 2 60 gallon tanks that are each covered in black beard algae, but it looks like dark grey grass covering everything so i don’t mind it. some plants like my jungle val and amazon sword can keep up with it, but anubias always gets covered and dies, as well as most stem plants
Ugh. Always seems to appear after getting a sword plant or Java fern. I hated dealing w that stuff in my brother's 100 gal I was in charge of. That's pretty genius doing the spot treatment.
Nerite snails did some damage on the alge bloom I had. Wavy green version but also the bushing black version too. That stuff would stick to the anubius. Noticed that after the tank settled for a few months and the addition of amano shrimp plus a small bristlenose pleco things cleared up slowly. Out of all the methods, including bleaching, the nerite snail seemed to do the most damage. Bleach method would work on the BBA but if the balance is off it comes back. I also did have some fish die off during this period but since then most of my livestock have been healthy. FYI this was for a 30 gallon with CO2 injection. Heavily planted from the start but with fresh filter and UNS substrate.
Where’d you get your nerite snails? I’ve been wanting/needing some but don’t know where to get em
I'm fighting the exact same BBA right now. I've found that a dry "magic eraser" takes it off easily. It's not a fix of course but you can wipe it off your leaves very easily. It's crazy how well it works. But you still have to fix the actual cause.
Perfect timing
I will try your method with excel. My BBA is also completely flat, no "beard" at all. I was starting to think it was not BBA, just some weird black spot algae. Tried hydrogen peroxide, tried bleach, tried excel soak. All it did was weakening the plants. Thankfully my tank is very very low tech and im pretty lazy with the ferts, so the bba is very slow, but it still managed to spread onto most slow growing plants. Im determined to stop being lazy this year and conquer it. Thanks for giving hope!
So I was thinking about getting Anubias Barteri, do you have any tips for it?
Hey, I have recently started a tropical 20g aquarium and I am looking for center piece fish ideas. I am open to any suggestions and any at all would be greatly appreciated.
I just kind of accepted this as part of the aesthetic of my tank, but now that I'm beginning to add live plants, I'm thinking of trying to at least keep it at a lower level (look, I really like the mossy look it gives some of my stone decor, so I'd rather just spot treat it as it grows elsewhere... yeah I'm weird)
I notice you didn't try soaking plants directly in "liquid carbon" bath.
My 55g is a Black Bear Algae tank now, I gave up fighting it because there was a lot of cherry shrimp in there. Now that I gave a lot female shrimp away, the female left must of died off, so I only have male slowly dying off now. I'm thinking about re-tanking the shrimp for a few months and go to battle with the BBA. Have you try soaking BBA coverage into a Liquid Carbon bath for a few short minutes???
spot treatment worked great against BBA
I have a weird white algae (I guess) and I can't get rid of it. It kinda look like melted marshmallows. I scrap it off everyday and it keep coming back. Don't know what to do. I read it can come from overfeeding so I reduced the food I give to my fish and I have a lot of bottom feeder to eat the leftover yet the algae is still here
My Amano shrimps have been doing well at getting rid of BBA. You can see it inside them as they eat it.
spot treatment (seachem excel) worked. I had a BBA from the buce I bought from a store and had to isolate it. Soaked it in Excel for 5 minutes and I don't see any of them anymore now.
The final solution is also how I got rid of stubborn staghorn algae too! The vallisneria I had did die, but it's growing back
AHHH, thank you so much for becoming my first member (who made a comment that I can see)!!! I'm so glad that your vallisneria ended up recovering too. Such a beautiful plant from the aquascapes I've seen.
Hydrogen peroxide dip and tank treatments controls and or eradicated most algae in my problem aquarium.
I can’t wait for this vid as my tanks are overrun with this stuff!!!
Oh man, it's a beast. Hope one of these methods work for you!
When spot treating BBA with liquid carbon, did you do a dose once then wait a week?
Hydrogen peroxide didn't work for me either, going to try spot dosing excel. Plecos did a fantastic job in cleaning up BBA , cheers
with spot treating will it affect val? of the BBA is on a different plant
Hi. Is liquid carbon safe in a monte carlo tank?
My dragon stone and anubias are all covered in black beard algae
all my plants are attached to driftwood or in small bond baskets. I remove them to a large plastic tray and place a fan over them for 5 minutes to dry the leaves and roots off. I then spray the plants and roots with liquid carbon and leave it on for one (1) minute and then risnse promptly. Any longer than the minute and I found the liquid carbon destroys the fine, feeder root hairs on the anubias and causes their growth to be held back. Does the job, but on balance I know there are bigger issues at play like too much phosphorus, too much light and perhaps not enought CO2 which is where I am now experiementing.....
Hi Irene, I'm really into rooted plants especially crypts you can almost say I have a addiction, nah just kidding, but can you do a video or an update on all your plants, i really want to see your crypt pink flamingo,, your vids are awesome super helpful, keep up the grwat work.
Can you tell me how to set up live plants in a fish tank
interesting, i may try and use a hudson sprayer
I took plants out, soaked in h202 for a couple min and it worked. But who wants to keep removing plants to soak em. Ok once, but very annoying if needed multiple times
Thank you
And this is why it's said that aquarists have a lot of patience😂
Are you able to put 5 or 6 Albino Corydora Catfish in a 20 gallon tall and them still be comfortable or is that too smushed. And with introducing a betta fish to a tank should you first buy the betta fish and then his tank mates (which will just be the Cory catfish) or should the mates then the betta fish? They would all be in a 20 gallon planted tank.
I have it in my 20 gallon. It seems like my guppies are keeping it under control with the Amani shrimp.
IMO something you can do for that spot treatment is pour your full "daily dose" of Excel or liquid carbon in a cup. Then use that full dose is a pipette to treat as many leaves or areas as you can for that dose. Then wait however long and repeat to a different area. It's no different than what you were doing when you were dosing the water column every other day.
I have exactly the same type of BBA that you had - a fine black dusting....'the process' begins tomorrow... 😮
I have snails and shrimp in my aquarium…would that affect them?
Do you spot treat daily or weekly with method 4
Yay a new videooooo wohoo
My Panda Garras will not touch the BBA that has been treated. I finally cut off all the leaves that had been infected but turned red after the peroxide treatment, the plants are growing back but like I said, the Panda Garras did not touch the stuff.
My water os very soft. The peroxide method melted my plants. I'll try spot treatment with excel.
CO2 and Siamese algae eaters did wonders for my tank. Unfortunately the timer on my CO2 got some of it's pins pushed leading to CO2 running over night killing a bunch of fish and it ended up coming back...
I got a plug with an app timer now and I'm trying hillstream loaches. I really like their appearance and they are voracious eaters, but they don't worry about detail cleaning. Unfortunately my blind cave fish hunts snails to extinction cause that sounds tempting.
(I have otocinclus as well and while they seem to enjoy the green hair algae, they are not so interested in the BBA.)
Hi Irene! any recommendations for floating plants for Red Cherry Shrimp??
Amazon frogbit is great because of its long fuzzy roots :)
Crystalwort and pearlweed are good for floating as well. Lots of surface area for shrimps.
Flourish Excel worked wonderfully for me
I feed my tanks very carefully. I don't let anyone starve, of course, but I never overfeed. My lights stay on upwards of 12 hours and I've never had algae problems. I really think this is an overfeeding/over fertilizing issue, and not having enough plants.
Would you recommend me getting fish mates for my beta? My fish tank is 2.6 gallons and my beta is a red colored male. I’m just curious to know bc your other videos said to get a bigger tank if I wanted to get other fish. If not, should I invest in getting snails then?
1. Bettas alone need at least 5 gallons. 2. It depends on your bettas personality, some can be kept with other fish, others can’t. If you want to add other fish you would need at least a 10 gallon and be ware that you may have a bunch of dead fish.
I've been losing plants that just established myself won't lie broke my heart bc my tank was starting to look great had pearling happening and everything was great!!!
Then the dreaded black death swooped in and now everytime I make an attempt it seems to come back 3 times worse.