One Project Closer

That’s a picture of our tank.  We’ve been raising discus and angelfish (along with neons, corycats, and other tetras) for about 4 years.  At first, we were very diligent about water changes in the tank.  We changed out 1/3 of the water each week.  (We weren’t willing to do the 10%/day change that the discus would really love - that would be too time consuming).  Over time, we got lax on water changes - pushing the envelope to 3-4 weeks, and in worst cases, to 5 weeks or more.  

During times when we didn’t change the water for extended periods, green and brown algae would begin to develop on the walls of the aquarium, and all over our plastic plants.  We were fearful of trying chemical algae preventers due to the harm they might cause the fish.  For those who don’t know, Discus can run anywhere from $10-$200 at retail stores, with prices only slightly better from wholesalers.  At those stakes, it’s not like killing a feeder goldfish; these fish are an investment.  Of course, we weren’t worried about harming plants; we prefer the low-maintenance aspect of the plastic ones we’ve picked.

We finally had a friend recommend Algae Destroyer Advanced by Aquarium Pharmaceuticals.  We added it to the tank.  Wow!  We were impressed.  Algae Destroyer worked almost immediately (2-3 days).   Both the green and brown algae have abated.  In fact, the algae used to be our warning sign that we were overdue for a water change, now we don’t get any algae - even if we don’t change the water for 6-8 weeks.  I haven’t noticed any distress among the fish (nor have we lost any in the last 6 months since we’ve been using Algae Destroyer).

You may want to use caution if you have young fish or live plants.  I have not tried this algae preventer under those conditions (although AP claims it will work for that situation).

What do you think? Has Algae Destroyer or another product worked for you?