How do I get to this stage? full of algae? startup

[torque6]

Hello everyone,

I've mostly done planted and have kept shrimps before, but haven't exactly breed them. I am seeing alot of this type of start up lately.

Is this done by just dosing Bacter AE and trace elements?

 

[jayc]

Is that green hair algae?

Definitely the trace elements. You don't have enough plants in there to require trace element supplementation.

Trace elements are only needed in ... trace amounts. One drop once a month is going to be enough for those plants you have. Anymore than that will result in algae. You could cut out trace altogether with no detriment to the plants.

 NPK (Nitrogen, Phosphor, Potassium) is probably going to run out before trace.

 

[torque6]

2 hours ago, jayc said:

Hello Jayc, I think you are mistaken. The tank is setup by a breeder and the "algae" is largely intentional. This is it's 28 day of cycling the tank. I am looking to replicate it but not sure how. He has some good looking algae infested tanks before adding shrimps.

 

 

Edited October 24, 2018 by torque6

[jayc]

7 hours ago, torque6 said:

I think you are mistaken.

Well, I was mistaken then. Never would have thought anyone would want to inflict themselves and their tank in that much algae. Is algae the new plant scape for tanks that I didn't know about? LOL

Still not sure why you would want to replicate the over grown hair algae. Growing Biofilm on the walls of a new tank, I understand, but full blown hair algae?

Note: shrimps wont eat that algae, if that was the intention - to grow it as food.

But growing algae is not hard. Getting rid of it is the hard part. 

Ingredients you need are:

- 24 hour light, the brighter the better. Direct sunlight is also an algae booster.

- overdose on fertiliser, the macro NPK I mentioned above. All-In-Ones are good for this.

- a warm 25deg C temp.

That's pretty much it. Add those together and you are guaranteed algae in a few weeks.

 

 

7 hours ago, torque6 said:

He has some good looking algae infested tanks

Not by my tastes ?

[torque6]

Coming from a planted tank background, I thought so too, 24 hour light, overdose on fert, overdose on EI etc, but no. The breeder informed me that he used some sort of enzyme from Taiwan "Growth Enzyme from 虾虾叫". Lights on 10 hours a day, no ferts added so as not to increase TDS. The above algae fested shrimp tank was done in 20 days. Some of his tanks were incredible. The shrimps and shrimplets have high survivability in his tanks.

The algae were all gone in about 60 days and his shrimp population exploded during that time.

He keeps high quality CRS. So from a small initial capital of 35 USD per piece, say 10 pieces, he got a good yield of about several hundreds in a relatively short time.

 

Edited October 24, 2018 by torque6

[torque6]

I also noticed his algae is consistent every single time, it is always this fuzzy algae and not the brown diatom which we get during cycling. Given the photo period and the lack of plants in his tanks, there isn't any BBA,  BGA,  Staghorn algae, hair strain algae, nor GSA, just this fuzzy algae....

 

 

This is what his tank looks like after 1 month after the shrimps have had their algae buffets. You can clearly see many shrimplets in the tank and half the fuzzy algae has been eaten.

Edited October 24, 2018 by torque6

[torque6]

Looks just like candy floss at the carnival.

[jayc]

@torque6, is that your tank? Did you successfully grow this bouquet of algae?

[torque6]

Nope, pics from someone else in the taiwanese FB group. He just setup his tank a few weeks ago.