Getting rid of Green spot algae

If your tank is experiencing green spot algae on plants, likely its due to low phosphates. If its on the glass but not on the plants, then just clean the glass, you are doing fine :P

Heres several ways to treat the problem.

Tank treatment, increase Phosphate dosing slightly in your EI fert regime.

Spot Treatment. Turn off filter, use a, b, or c. wait 5 minutes, turn on filter.

a) If you have your phosphate mixed into a solution, you can turn off your filter and dose your phosphates directly on the area thats affected.

b) If you have dry kh2p04, mix your EI dose with tank water just enough to make it dissolve. then pipette/syringe it onto affected area.

c) If you you do not have a phosphate solution, your alternative is Fleet Enema. use 0.3 ml of enema per 10 gallons. Do this daily until its gone since you have no fert regime. Water change every third day 50% to help keep the phosphates from getting out of control during this treatment.

For options a and b, if it keeps coming back on said area quickly, then you need to up the phosphates in your dosing regime. unless you are fine with spot treating the area every dose.
for option C, you run a risk of bottoming out on nitrates during the treatment sue to your lack of regular macro dosing. A high fish load counters this affect. If you have java ferns, this can cause them to blacken at the tips and melt a bit if the nitrates keep bottoming out. The plus side is the baffled look you get from the store clerk when you say, "no im not plugged up, its for my fish tank"

neven, how long would it take to find out if the phosphate dosing is working using the tank treatment? i just increased the amount of my Kpho4 dosing today.

Theres never an exact time frame. For EI dosing, i always recommend doing your normal dose like a spot treatment over the areas that keep getting green spot. Anubias and Alternanthera reineckii are a couple plants prone to green spot. Often that is enough to keep it at bay. Sometimes its the spot treatment combined with increasing phosphate dosing permanently, if nitrate deficiency issues develop from this, consider doing one larger dose once a week routinely. This is all just a guideline for people to know where to start, let them know there is a reason it appears so easily sometimes.

Personally i have Green spot develop on three of my plants, the rest of the tank is well balanced so i just do my daily dose over those areas. If it doesn't work, i'll give it a one time double dose then repeat the regular dose spot treatments. Really old leaves on slow growers sometimes need to be trimmed. With time you'll figure out what works for you.

thanks neven for that insight... will try your recommendations out. currently its mostly on the aquarium glass and on some driftwood and the older leaves of my crypts and some anubias. as what you guys mentioned it could be an imbalance in my tank. what should be the ideal range for phosphate concentration in a tank? my green spot algae became rampant after i added a phosphate remover to my HOB filters which gave me a phosphate reading of 0.

Cleaning green spot algae off your glass is for suckers. Put some nerites in the tank and they'll keep the glass green spot free. It seems to be one of their favorite foods!

awesome post i need to try this. i have so much green spots in my tanks

Yea nerites work well, but sometimes toddlers love to get them to fall, I've had it a couple times where they hit a rock and died. Ended up rotting I a hidden area of the tank and wiped out my cherry colony

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I dosed liquid phosphate after cleaning the tank and its been about 2-3 months and i got very little growth now. Mayb 2 or 4 spots here and there compared to the 100s of spots i had prior to dosing phosphate. its like magic!!!

im glad it worked for you! And to think many people still think phosphates are the cause of tank crashes :P

Where do you get nerites from?