correlation of BBA & Organics

[charlie]

There is speculation that another cause of BBA other than low  CO2 levels, is high organics.A number of hobbyist are speculating that they have noticed a correlation of high organics as a result of feeding live food , frozen blood worms, brine shrimp etc. , this has not been proven but the coincidence is alarming , since they all report to have been on top of everything else including co2 levels.
Regards

[fischkopp]

This is an interesting thought. I noticed quite a build-up in organic matter in some of my tanks - even  when I try to vacuum most of it out during the water change. Feeding definitively includes protein rich foods. And I tend to have a bit of BBA showing up here and there ... I was going to address this with bigger filtration in the future.

Thanks for this info!

[KLKelly]

My well water I speculate is high in organics.

I have been fighting BBA from the beginning.  My ph rises from 7.6 to 8.3 because aerate it before water changes. Not sure if this makes it low in CO2.

Anyways I gave up - I can't even have plants because the thought of adding CO2 and something going wrong scares me.  I let it grow crazy on the back wall and razor the front and sides.

Questions about BBA - someone mentioned that BBA might be toxic and thats why fish don't eat it (like siamese algae eaters).  Is there any benefit of this at all - it sure doesn't help in my tanks I dont think?

[dan2x38]

I think they mean BGA is toxic.

A school of thought leans towards high pH preventing BBA or majorally reducing BBA. I was reading a lot on the topic and the author was saying you don't see BBA in an African Chichlid tank? Is the pH level also a BBA control?

[Jeff1192]

That wouldn't surprise me at all. While I pretty much solved my earlier BBA from when I started up my CO2 (we won't talk about my hair algae problem  ) I do still get the odd spot here and there on the glass. I also feed frozen blood worm regularily and frozen brine shrimp once in a while. I'm also bad for over-feeding so this could explain the odd spots of BBA that I get. Interesting theory.

Jeff

[dan2x38]

I read one contributing factor to hair algae is to much iron.

[Jeff1192]

Yeah that's what I'm working on adjusting now......slowly bringing it down but not too fast that I stop growth

[dan2x38]

Yeah that's what I'm working on adjusting now......slowly bringing it down but not too fast that I stop growth

hard to find the balance for each tank but when you do it's all good.