Help! What algae is ruining my plants

[Hoplo91]

I have relatively new tank (3 months) and now this algae has been taking over for past few weeks. It's ruining all my plants and I'm having hard time identifying it. What is it?

And how to get rid of it? I have Juwel Day+Colour LED lights. Lights are on from 10am to 3pm, then off, on again from 5pm to 10pm. And I'm using Sera Florena weekly.

[Hoplo91]

Anyone? Any ideas? At least what type of algae it is so I can search for solutions?

Here's what I've learned about it now:

-It seems to be floating(see picture, the glass is clean so all particles are in the water) around in the water and attaching to plants only. Not on the stones or the glass. Pre-filter pads catch it a lot.
-Rubs off easily and is slimey like
-Doesn't have a distinct smell
-Grows only in highly lighted areas, not in the shadow

[Slaphppy7]

Welcome to the AC.

I'm having a hard time seeing the algae, but usually the first step in controlling most of them is decreasing your lighting period, try 5 hours a day instead of 10

[Hoplo91]

Thank you.

In the first picture the algae is well represented in my opinion. The plant is Limnophila sessiliflora so it should be fluffy but the dark green algae is "glueing the leaves together. It can also be seen in the plants on the right(Hygrophila siamensis) as a green coat on light green leaves. And in the other picture the algae is the specs in the water(my water used to be crystal clear before).

Now the aquarium has lights off but I'm trying to take a better picture when the lights are on again in a few hours.

[Slaphppy7]

I see what you are referring to now, in the first pic.

Definitely try cutting back on lighting...no more than 5 hours a day

[Hoplo91]

So this is gonna be a pictureful post but...

Here's what my aquarium used to look like






And here is how it's looking now after the algae got wild


All plants covered in it


The dark mass on the back and pearling like crazy


The bottom of plants is semi okay but the top gets a lot of dark green algae


Mangrove has collected some


It's like a big goop


And my luscious plants are just a memory now compared to the before pictures


So mainly I'm just looking to identify this algae. Cause yes reducing light is a solution but it may not conquer the main problem.

In my country it's recommended to have lights on 8-10 hours, 5 hours seems to be too little to me. Cause what is the point of having fish if the lights are off most of the day and you can't see them.

Many people has said that Juwel LED lights are too strong and plants are lacking nutrients because of that(mainly nitrate and phosphate). So do I need to add more fertilizer or what to do. If I knew what algae this is I could more easily google the solution. But I've been searching and searching to identify this algae with no result. It doesn't seem to match any common algae so I can't search the way to fix it.

I'd really appreciate if someone knows what is this.

[Slaphppy7]

Why would your location dictate how long you leave lights on in an aquarium (?)

At any rate, after looking at these newer pics, it appears it may be "blue-green algae" (cyanobacteria), which is not really an algae, here's a good read: https://www.thesprucepets.com/cyanob...-algae-1378628

[Hoplo91]

I've mainly read about aquariums in my language and that seems to be the lighting time in most writings but in English I've read about even 12-14 hours of light so that's why I referenced the time in my country. But there must be as many lighting directions as there is aquarists. And the lighting break during the day is most recommended in Finnish writings.

And the blue-green algae makes sense now as it is not an algae so it doesn't mind the lighting break as normal algae would. Trust me, with those lights I've had every kind of algae during this start of the fishkeeping( I had 10 year break before this, 10 years ago I had 3 aquariums with no problem). But all went away as aquarium found it's balance. This just sticks tightly. What was misleading to me was that this doesn't have a smell like blue-green algae should. We have about every beach closed every summer for like a month because of blue-green algae and I know the smell.

But thank you, now I can start to treat the problem.

[Slaphppy7]

You are welcome.

How often and how much do you feed? What about water changes?

[Hoplo91]

I change water 30% weekly (aquarium is 180L/47,5G) and I feed them twice a day. Pinch of flakes for tetras and barbs, granules for keyhole cichlids and few wafers for bottom dwellers(corydoras). They love shrimp pellets but I heard it's bad for the water so I reduced the amount of those(and it truly is messy food). I have algae wafers but fish just don't like them at all, they'd eat shrimp pellets all day long. I also give them bloodworms like once a month.

Water parameters are ok, pH 7, hardness 4, nitrite 0 and nitrate 10 measured on Aquili 5 in 1 test (not strips, drop test)