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What are the negative sides of the green-spot algae? I have like a whole wall-full of the stuff in my tank, and why should i take it off? I have a grow-up tank and a show tank, and my grow-up tank has soooo much of it! The show has only a slight amount of it. I have ghost shrimp in the grow-up tank, and they occasionally scrape some off the tank. Anyhow, i like it sooo much, and i have been laboring a long time, just so i can get a bit of green algae in my tank. I am just so happy!

If there is a negative side to it, depending on the severity, i will just keep it there. Now i really dont care for asthetics, as i have an ok setup already, but will it affect water quality? Also, will it poison the fish?

I used to have a diatom algae (brown algae) infestation in my tank, and i spent an hour trying to scrape it off of my plastic cabomba plant (toooo hard) and i am so glad that it is lessening.

THX in advance.

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Hi,
The thing with true green spot algae is that if it is in a
tank then eventually it will start to grow on the plants
as the spores are carried around the tank by the currents.
These spots can grow, especially on slow growing plants
such as Anubis, and eventually take over the plant leaf
killing the leaf. You can only cut the leaf off the plant
once it starts to grow. It takes a razor blade to get it
off glass, and no fish or shrimp can scrape it off.
They may take a few cells off the wall, but won't make a
bit of a difference in the spot itself. In my experience
green spot algae soon gives way to other forms of algae
and then one has a real mess.

Increasing the Phosphate level of the tank to 0.3-0.5 is
one way to eliminate Green Spot Algae.
Frank


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Algae is not harmful unless it is in massive quantities. What is harmful is what causes the algae. High nitrates, poor tank maintenance, or high phosphates coming from the source water can lead to lots of algae. If you clean the substrate and filter regularly and do enough water changes to keep nitrates at a good level(preferably below 20ppm) then you shouldn't see too much algae. The only problem algae really causes is to aesthetics and all tanks will have a little algae. Spot algae is one of the most stubborn ones. It will show up in even very well maintained tanks that have medium to high light. I usually just scrape it off the front with a razor blade and leave the back and sometimes the sides as well. Nothing really eats much of it but it's not harmful.

In fact algae is kind of a good thing and can help fix your water quality. It will lower nitrates but it takes a very large amount to make much difference and by then your having trouble seeing in your tank. Occasionally people will setup algae scrubbers which are seperate tanks or containers with alot of light on them purposely to grow algae. Then the water is run from the main tank into the container through all the algae which cleans organics and removes nitrates before being returned to the tank. It's especially done in marine tanks with macroalgae. Usually though for freshwater tanks we just plant the main tank and use water changes to keep the water quality up.