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Ok so I have officially thrown in the towel in the fight with bba... I do 2 50% water changes a week and it has overrun ALL of my plants. A month ago I had a bout with worms coming out of my female guppy’s anus I put her down in the hopes that I have caught the spread of the parasites in time. Alas, my efforts were in vain. My apistos (cacs) had the same worms coming out the back end. I treated them with the additive you can put into the food 6 hours later the female apisto and her fry all had perished! The male was not doing so well I moved him to the sick tank. Let me be clear I understand that this is a strong med. I under dosed by half and am aware that the fish more than likely died due to their weakened state. The male is still alive and seems ok but the worms are still present.

It is at this point I want to start the BBA infested tank over again.

Question 1: Is there a way I can keep the plants from dieing but KILL the BBA. I have about $250 in plants which is allot for me.

Question 2: Is there some way I can make sure all the parasites are dead without killing the rest of my fish. I don’t want to start the tank over and put fish with parasites back in it.

Question 3: I was told that the only REAL way to get rid off BBA is all the equipment, gravel, plants, aquarium glass, etc. all get a chlorine bath, and scrubbing. Would this be true?

Question 4: Could I cut all the leaves off all of my plants and hope to god it doesn’t put so much shock on them they don’t come back to life?

Thank you so much for your time in advance and sorry for the rambling.... Justin

Ok so I have officially thrown in the towel in the fight with bba... I do 2 50% water changes a week and it has overrun ALL of my plants.
water changes won't solve the problem, but it's always good to change water of course

A month ago I had a bout with worms coming out of my female guppy’s anus I put her down in the hopes that I have caught the spread of the parasites in time. Alas, my efforts were in vain. My apistos (cacs) had the same worms coming out the back end. I treated them with the additive you can put into the food 6 hours later the female apisto and her fry all had perished! The male was not doing so well I moved him to the sick tank. Let me be clear I understand that this is a strong med. I under dosed by half and am aware that the fish more than likely died due to their weakened state. The male is still alive and seems ok but the worms are still present.
You have to keep treating
it is a 13 week process.
We have 2 types of de-wormer medicine.

It is at this point I want to start the BBA infested tank over again.

Question 1: Is there a way I can keep the plants from dieing but KILL the BBA. I have about $250 in plants which is allot for me.
I would just pinch off every thing except the firm roots/bulbs/rhizomes.

Question 2: Is there some way I can make sure all the parasites are dead without killing the rest of my fish. I don’t want to start the tank over and put fish with parasites back in it.
best to seperate the infected ones
but maybe treat all
...

Question 3: I was told that the only REAL way to get rid off BBA is all the equipment, gravel, plants, aquarium glass, etc. all get a chlorine bath, and scrubbing. Would this be true?
probably, yes
see
aquaticgardeners.org
(there are alot of smart guys & girls there)
...if using bleach
be very careful
very long exposure to bleach can weaken silicone rubber (the tank joints)
also of course rinse VERY well
and use a strong dose of dechlorinator
before putting fish back with the bleached equipment

Question 4: Could I cut all the leaves off all of my plants and hope to god it doesn’t put so much shock on them they don’t come back to life?
if the roots are healthy
and the conditions are good
...yes, they will sprout new nice leaves in days
to collect light

sorry to hear about the nuisance
...years ago we almost never saw black brush algae
here at the store (we had super-alkaline water)
...now I don't see it on our plants
but I do see it on our old filter sponges and airlines
(we have medium alkaline water now)

there are some good
black brush algae eating fish
> SAE's ... best when small and young
> American Flag fish ... pretty good and a pretty fish
> Ilyodon livebearers ... great eater but eventually gets big and aggressive
> the best one was Sicidium Algae goby ... ugly fish
(from West Africa) very rare
...but slowly died out after not having ENOUGH gunk algae

> and Japonica algae eating shrimp
(the fancy small shrimp don't do that much)

we are experimenting with Panda Garra
expensive but pretty and very hungry

I had a tank of Multi's with a horrible BBA problem. The algae stuck on shells (about 75), glass and other equipment like glue. A stiff, filter cleaning brush worked well for getting the algae off shells,rocks etc. I would scrape the algae off the shells while they were still in the tank. Then use a brine shrimp net and swished it around to collect all the free floating BBA. Pain in the @%s. I used a glass scraper w/ a steel blade for the tank. Careful not to scrape/damage the silicone seams.
This got old after a while and the tank was broken down.
Some of my softer water tanks get BBA but nothing like the Multie tank. Ned had some good advice and the AGA will definetly have info. on fixing/controling the problem too. Good Luck

In my experience, BBA tends to cycle through my planted tanks when they are first getting established. It seems like there is some nutrient available that it loves, but then uses up. What I've done in the past is just pick it off of the plants/rocks and whatnot, and eventually it just went away.

I also have SAEs in one of my tanks. People claim they eat BBA, I'm not sure if I believe it, although their tank with them is free of BBA (so are my others though). I'd say you'd need a lot to contain an infestation, but once you get it under control it might be worth adding a couple to keep things algae-free. Just make sure you get true SAEs, not false SAEs or flying foxes. They're fun fish to watch too, but they do eventually get pretty big.

You can also dip hardier plants in bleach. I've dipped anubias in a 10% solution for 60 seconds, then a thorough rinse with dechlorinated water. The algae stays on the leaves for a little while, but within a day or so will turn white/gray and eventually fall off. I've tried to avoid dipping the roots.

Finally, a lot of people on planted tank forums seem to have luck using Florish Excel. It's a liquid carbon supplement, but apparently for some reason BBA hates it. Probably worth a google.

Good luck, and let us know how everything goes.

i've read about excel working in other forums as well.

Sorry it’s been a couple of days... So this is now where I am at. I removed all the fish and put them in my 20 gal sick tank. None of them seem to be getting any better in fact they are starting to look worse. I honestly feel that it would be better to just put the fish down (4 guppies 2 pandurini 2sae's and one dwarf indian puffer) I'm not sure I have the ability to bring them back to a normal state of life.

I've use the sae's and they are efficient at keeping the problem at bay. They got sick and have since stopped. I have used excel, the problem if you use that to overdose like the web sites tell you is that it wreaks havoc on your bio-chemistry. It looks as if the water starts re-cycling. This works to cull the problem for a short while but I find that once the bba is gone I then get an outbreak of stag horn algae. The cycle will then repeat itself. in 2 month intervals.

The one glimmer of hope is that 9 of my apisto fry that I thought were dead are now swimming and growing at an alarming rate all look healthy and undisturbed in the 45gal tank by themselves. I added a protozoan killer to the water again assuming that if it didn’t kill the fry the first time all will be well. It is a seachem product that is a powder I can’t remember the name of it for the life of me right now but it says it works in two days. I’m not sure but I dosed for 2 cycles (it says to dose every 2 days) have done an 80% water change on Sunday, and a 50% change yesterday. I have also added a power head to move the water around more and get more oxygen into the tank to help make sure that the bio-filter keeps up.

So should I put the sick tank down?

If I do put the sick tank down how long should I wait to start the tank up or add new fish in the assurance that the parasites are dead?

What is the probability of the parasites making it to the tiny fry?

How long should I wait to add new sae's to the 45gal fry tank?

Thanks again for helping and listening....

How much do you charge for the de-wormer? my fry are still growing they are about 1/2" but now they are scratching on rocks and plants..... This _

... but now they are scratching on rocks and plants

if they are scratching it's not exotic parastic worms
it's more likeky common ick or similar bugs
that are easily treated with clout / quick-cure / salt etc.

just use 2 teaspoons of salt per 1 gallon of water and turn heat up to 81 degrees
(don't salt plants 'tho)

the de wormers are expensive but powerful
I have
paracide X
and
paracide D

you probably don't need them

im just going to get the dewormer for my other tank i still have the guppie's, sae's, and one male pandurini in the tank. i will more than likely be in this weekend.

On a better note the fry are getting their colors. How long will it be untill i can tell the difference in the sexes?