Golden algae eater trouble

[Boyam]

Well despite all the nay's i heard about golden algae eaters i bought one in a desperate attempt to rid the string algae off my plants before it was too late. although he has knocked it down withing the last few days i have caught him multiple times trying to "clean" the fish. he even got in between the discus eyes right on the forehead for a second. i haven't seen any physical marks so im not too stressed yet. nor are my discus, in fact i think one of the discus like it... as much as i wish he would peck at his lil' slime hungry mouth :-p

i'm not looking forward to catching him its going to be a mess. seems like im running out of natural options. may have to use flourish excel as much as i do not want to. water changes wont do it, tank is to large.

[Greggy]

Yes get him out ASAP as Discus slime is much tastier & easier to eat than algae!

To help get rid of the grey/black coloured 'hairy' algae that grows on the edges of the plant's leaves (especially in areas of high water flow), a higher nitrate level will often help, but don't just slack off and change the water less often, because this also lets other undesirables build up in the tank water. A better way is to keep doing large regular water changes, feed less processed/flake foods (often high in Phosphorus) and consider manually adding Potassium Nitrate (KNO3) which will keep the Potassium and Nitrate levels up which helps the plants to use up the excess Phosphorus in the water which makes it harder for the algae to grow.

If however the algae is the long thin green version (often several inches in length) then adding a a few true SAE fish can help as they often eat it, but a better way is to reduce Nitrates in your water (via more water changes), reduce light and reduce the amount of plant fertilisers added.

CO2 injection can also help (even the cheap DIY versions) but that is for another topic.

Regards,

Greggy

[lpiasente]

I had a golden alge eater and he ate a nice little hole in the side of 1 platy and 1 male siamese fighting fish. It was a cruel cruel death. What about a uv steralizer. It took all the hair alge out of my old tank in a couple of days.

[stormhenge]

and my 2 golden algae eaters have yet to even touch my discus.
they seem more content pigging out on beef heart, blood worms, poop, fish flake, and algae (of all kinds)

and on top of that, my discus scare the crap out of my golden algae eaters, so that is another discouraging factor.

hope you catch the little bugger 'boyam' =]

[1fish2fish3fish]

so you knew the risk from the sounds of it..
Id get him out of there for sure!!.. even if they find other things to do for now you never know when they will attack!

they, I have been told ( I dont keep any) get agressive when they are bigger and might disturb a Discus tank, Discus are to slow moving and peaceful ..
UV is the way too go!

[DiscusEden]

When you say Excel isn't "natural", just to be clear, it's a plant fertiliser, not a poison.

I've had great results using excel daily for 2-3 weeks, where the UV made no difference on my tank.

HTH

[Boyam]

wow lots of feed back, thanks!

[Boyam]

well, finally got him. took me nearly 2 hours to catch him and fix the tank after mucking about in it trying to get the lil' bugger!