Used NSFW tag since the pictures are a little gruesome but this happened a few days ago and luckily Lotti is still alive and recovering well in his hospital tank.
So I came back from a traveling out of the country, I had a family member checking on my tanks just to feed and add RO water was water evaporated. I thought everything should be fine. I knew I had a hair algae problem but I removed as much as I could before leaving and never in a million years would I have thought it could do this!
Somehow he managed to get himself so tangled into the algae that it wrapped around his face and popped one of his eyes out. Along with some pieces of his fin. First pic is after I got him partially free (enough that I could get him to the surface for air) and was panicking on the phone with my partner trying to figure out how to best remove the algae without causing any further damage..
Anyways tldr: hair algae sucks and tank maintenance is important 🙃
https://www.reddit.com/gallery/1qqb9j5
Posted by pollywannaconna
1 Comment
I’m so sorry for your poor fish that must have been terrifying.
Do you have a lid? I’ve found that lidded tanks are just so clutch especially when traveling because you get way less evaporation (condensation stays inside) and when running your temp at 77-80F you’re bound to see evaporation.
Maybe when traveling be sure to keep your light intensity down low, run it for shorter daylight windows and also keep a lid on it (if you don’t already). Hair algae goes nuts when there’s a lot of light to photosynthesize.
I have hair algae on my Italian val but currently no betta yet as I’m still cycling, I am thinking I may actually turn the light cycle way down for a week or so before I get my fish just to get a handle on the hair algae.
It’s pretty densely planted and as of now I only have snails but will have shrimp in a couple of weeks to help keep the hair algae down.