Freshwater Algea Reef

[duanes]

I wonder how the algae growth fares on calcium carbonate rock...the line of sight breaks remind me of the shelf rock the BRS sells...and I bet that they'd also buffer the tanks to a higher pH as well

Since the Yucatan is basically an ancient coral reef (aragonite, calcite)the video below shot in a Cenote in Riviera Maya is a great indicator of how algae grow on that rock. Near shore, there is lots of overhanging vegetation so the algae is often red (orange), or brown, but get away from the shade, and algal fields are green.
Azul imovie edit

 

[markstrimaran]

Do you know the types of algae growing in your tank?

The common names.
Red beard, short soft filliment. A Rhodophyte type. "Purpleish"

Green short filliment.
Green long strand, turf algea, touph,

Some type of a north American amphibious moss.

This tank has a whole variety of other algea. The LED, nm seems to help some types out compete others.

The purple hair algea will only grow within the area illuminated with actinic light. 453nm

The long strand algea needs more 640nm

The short strand does best at 660nm.

 

[markstrimaran]

Augmenting my lighting with spectrum specific light to encourage desirable algea growth, and to grow more food. This is something I recently started doing.

 

[cockroach]

The common names.
Red beard, short soft filliment. A Rhodophyte type. "Purpleish"

Green short filliment.
Green long strand, turf algea, touph,

Some type of a north American amphibious moss.

This tank has a whole variety of other algea. The LED, nm seems to help some types out compete others.

The purple hair algea will only grow within the area illuminated with actinic light. 453nm

The long strand algea needs more 640nm

The short strand does best at 660nm.

This is very interesting work you are doing.
Are there any plans to build more experimental tanks and gather data? I would love to see more done with this topic.

 

[dan518]

+1

 

[markstrimaran]

The 30 cube, test tank.
90 gallon fluidized algea scrubber.
The 29 gallon. Hyponics/ gallon jug vultures.

I have been dabbling with this for about 2 years, mostly in the winter. Started out testing leds, for use in algea scrubbers, but have found that some leds work better than others.

 

[cockroach]

Do you think, if you got a few small tanks outside and covered them with different colored acrylic sheets would this help give the right spectrum for the different types of algae?

 

[markstrimaran]

It's the color created at the electrical circuit. Wavelength of the photons.

Rose colored glasses only block all the color except the ones you see.

 

[markstrimaran]

Current growth on T 5 tubes.

 

[markstrimaran]

Red algea under inexpensive, led , T8 conversion shop light.
The cube tank prototyping some " full spectrum " 380nm -840nn" white grow lights.