Nuisance algae, an observation

[Agu]

Living in Fl I remove heaters from my tanks in the summer and reinstall them this time of year. After calibrating one heater I installed it on my 5.5 gallon tank the other evening. This is a 5.5 gallon shrimp/goby species tank. Normal temps vary from 73 to 77 degrees F in this tank.

Got up the next morning and checked the tank. Temp was up to 80 degrees and there was a bloom of algae that looked like green diatoms all over the sand. BTW this happened with the lights off.

After unplugging the heater the temp dropped back to it's normal range and the algae bloom was gone within 24 hours.

It seems like that's more than a coincidence . Has anyone ever tried manipulating temp to control diatoms, cyano, dino, etc ?

 

[Fredfish]

Interesting observation agu. I wonder if you can get the tank to repeat when you plug the heater in again.

Do your other tanks go through similar temp shifts when you plug your heaters in?

Fred

 

[Dwayne]

Could it be something other than the temp change?

If possible try a different heater, different model and make would be even better.

 

[Agu]

Sorry but I can't replicate it.

I cleaned the tank, scraped all the green off the glass, did a water change, and added carbon. I've changed the parameters, because I wanted to make sure it didn't happen again.

I'm just wondering if temp has a documented effect on growth of nuisance algae. Could be a different approach to some algae problems..............

 

[Kurt03]

well higher temp increases most metabolisms doesnt it? you probably made it grow faster then your cleanup crew was used to taking care of with the higher temp. Why dont you set your heater closer to what your tank is now? Then you wouldnt have the large jump. Or if you kept it high your cleanup crew would eventually eat it or get some more snails. Just wondering, what was tests at when this happened?

 

[ScottT1980]

No chemist, but I do believe temp will decrease oxygen saturation, thereby increasing CO2 satuarion. CO2 could potentially cause an increase in plant growth...

Just musings based on no research...

Take er easy
Scott T.

 

[wrassie86]

I think it is pretty safe to say that higher temps increase algae growth.Living in MI i always seem to have alittle more algae growth during the summer.but come winter when i drop the temp of the tank the algea growth pretty much go's to nill
But as far as Dino's are concerned i'll let ya know,i just had a small outbreak start last week.Altho i'm also hitting the tank hard with daily water changes (5g's and cleanings) i'm also dropping the temp, last night i dropped to 77-78 from 79-80 for today and really there was no new growth during the 8 hr PP. in another a day or so i'll go to 76-77 and see if the growth stops+ thats my normal winter temps.I think the Dinos will be done as fast as they popped up.