Brown Algae (snot) and GH Subculture (pics)

I have 4 gal. DWC buckets pic'd below. I had been running RO water, GH 3part, and 3% H2O2. Then the brown algae showed up. It looks like snot dripping from the roots. If you know this stuff you know it's nasty. None of the usual control measures (light tight, oxygenated, low res temps, high H202, H202 dips, daily res changes) had any effect other than slowing it down.

So I went surfing posts and found some scattered info on this brown algae. The answer seems to be beneficial bacteria. I added GH Subculture M about 24 hours ago. As you can see in the pics it has glommed onto the roots in a thick mud looking gel, especially at the points where the snot was thickest. If I hadn't added this stuff I'd swear my plants were going to die for sure by the look of the roots. But, it seems that people have had white roots forming again in only 2 or 3 days. I'll update and pic as this goes along...

The water in my res can only reach the bottom of the cups. Is that enough for this stuff to thrive? Can I provide a better home for the BB? What about molasses to feed it?

Thanks

I'm having a similar problem, but with much smaller plants. From what I've read, the Subculture-M is not BB, but is beneficial Fungi, and enzymes. Subculture-B has the BB in it. Right now I'm trying Subculture-B, I just put it in about 15 minutes before this post. I also gave them a teaspoon of Hydrozyme. How about you and I use this thread to compare notes?

My res symptoms are this:
1. After two days my water turns cloudy. At first I thought this was a problem with FloraNova nutes, so I changed to Maxigro. Maxigro doesn't leave the roots brown like FloraNova, so for this test it is a good change for me to go to MaxiGro.

2. After the water turns cloudy, PH goes up and up and up. I can get it to go back down for a while, but it just climbs back up again within a few hours.

3. Something grows on my airstones. It seems like oxygen is something that it loves.

4. Total darkness does nothing

5. H2O2 does nothing.

6. I can clean the stuff off my airstones, and change the water, and it comes back within two days.

7. Physan 20 does nothing to kill it.

8. If I remove the airstones, and plants from the res, and let it set for a day, whatever is growing will float to the top, and form a clear snot looking stuff, that also traps air bubbles. I'll post a pic later.

Does this fit the description of what you have?

I've read that it is a bacterial bloom. But it also turns the roots brown like yours. My roots have turned brown, but hasn't gotten slimy yet, mostly because I keep changing the solution when it happens.

Hey Dr. - Glad you're in on this and sorry to hear about your plant probs. It sounds to me like we have the same stuff. Could be a bacterial bloom.. I'm not sure at all that it's 'brown algae' - just a name somebody else was using. A guy named panamajuice chronicled his battle with this shit about 5 years ago. http://www.gardenscure.com/420/hydroponics/83897-brown-slime-roots-2.html

Your'e right about the B and M distinction but I'm clueless as to which product is right for this. Probably B... #%&#

My pH would rocket up too and I had to keep knocking it down. The only difference with your description is that I never noticed the water get cloudy - but then I was changing daily trying to keep the stuff down. The bubbly grey snot that would float on top describes it to a tee. That happened regularly until my roots got long enough to really get in the water and then it started accumulating on them. It does seem to love air and darkness and pisses on H202. The effect has been an almost total freeze in growth. Sucks not knowing if I'm even helping the problem but on the plus side it's really cool to have you alongside trying something else.

I'll update when I see anything change - or not change. How'd you come across your info and settle on B and hydrozyme? Good luck brotha.

jestermite said:

"My pH would rocket up too and I had to keep knocking it down".


"love air and darkness and pisses on H202. The effect has been an almost total freeze in growth."

Click to expand...

Exactly!

And the only difference I see in yours is that mine don't have the large buildup of slime, maybe from slower growth and me changing the solution. I think this stuff has been the kill off of my plants because I've had to constantly adjust the PH.

I look for this to start stinking, and then the smell goes away after it kills all the other bacteria. That's what I've read. I did some searches and came across something about that. I'll see if I can find it again.

Yeah that brown muck came on after I added the Subculture. Before that the roots were just whitish to brownish and there was some clear slime but nothing like what's on them now. It seems that the -M is attaching itself the thickest to where there was the most slime. Man I hope that the -M doing it's thing.. Is the -B doing anything noticable yet with yours?

Looking at your pictures... I have a question. First of all, do you use a separate resv. for your nutes so that the roots are not constantly sitting in the nutes? (Picture shows full of nutes) If not, then you are drowning them.

I bet its algae build up that is collecting nutes on the roots. I bet both of your problems, in one way or another, could be from leaks in the water. Looks like you have a tough battle. I was sure I didn't have light leaks when I started but after further examination of my setup, I found some. I didn't have much but the little I had was enough to allow algae to grow. Once I fixed the light leak and changed the water the problem went away and never returned.

Good luck!

jestermite said:

Is the -B doing anything noticable yet with yours?

Click to expand...

I remember what I've read, I just don't know the url, and the page got closed before I bookmarked it. I read that it could take four days. Actually it could take longer, that's just how long it took for that person. I figure on giving it six days. I have noticed that my PH seems to have dropped and stabilized at 6.4 - 6.5. I put in a small mount of ph down to see if it drops to 5.9 and stays there. I plan to log everything that I notice. The water is still cloudy though.

Am making my way through this right now... http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=55259 Highly recommended. Came off of a link at the bottom of this page of all places. If you don't want to make your way through this 59 page post then check back and I'll pass on the best of the info. So far at page 10, Physan 20 and Dutch Master Zone will kill and control for a period of time but the shit will come back..

There's already a mention of BB's and I'm sure that the post will go that way. Cool reading people who have had this prob find eachother and actually figure this out. Dude keeps marvelling at how many people have this EXACT prob. and how shitty it's been. Some people have been fighting it for years trying to eradicate and run a sterile res with no luck.

@roka - ? You'd have to convince me dude I never even heard of that. I have heard of people running their innoculated water levels high enough to allow beneficial colonies to establish in their medium... Also, I just ran 2 successful grows as is. Before the evil snot aka brown algae aka f+#%king plant herpes showed that is.

Thx lulu but this is not the garden variety algae that comes from a light leak.

I've been where you are. Took me months but I fixed my problems completely.

Roots must be sterile before adding any bennies. If physan didn't kill it, then you aren't using the physan right, probably needs to be a little stronger. Roots sit and soak in physan for about 12 hours, then they get rinsed really really well. Rinse all the dead glop and dying roots away. Then inoculate new water with the EWC tea for 12 hours before adding nutes back in. It may seem as if the physan didn't kill it because, even if the roots are sterilized, the slime can come back in just a few hours.

Here's an older post of mine,
When a clear snot forms on roots in a DWC, and the normal course of treatment for root disease doesn't work, you probably have something called brown slime algae, which actually isn't algae at all, but a cyanobacteria. It loves oxygen and doesn't need light to grow. It doesn't care if your res is chilled or not. Safe levels of H202 slows it a bit but doesn't cure it. It can show up for DWC growers for no apparent reason even after years of successful grows, tho one common way to get it is to have it introduced by a clone from an infected garden. Having some sort of organic material in the res, especially a sugar based additive, also seems to be a common factor for those infected. Enzyme products like cannazyme feed this slime and cause it to explode. Once it shows up it's often a nightmare to get rid of. It WILL eventually spread to other DWC tubs, although it almost never gains a foothold on older well developed healthy plants/roots.

People who get this try the normal stuff... More bubbles in the water, cool res temps, and h202 treatments. Most of the time this does nothing at all. Most root disease will cause the ph to drop but the slime causes it to rise, which is one way you can figure out if you have it. It starts out subtle like a clear coating of mucus on the roots with no odor. Plants often still appear healthy for a while. In a very short time it will cover the entire root base and become thicker and sometimes turns yellow. Eventually it strangles the roots which causes pythium to set in, and at that point turns brown and finally has an odor.

The treatment is to sterilize the roots with a product like physan 20. Some people just let the plants sit in a really strong h2o2 bath for a few hours. Once the roots are cleaned up and sterile, you have two choices. You can try to run a continuous sterilizing product in the res, OR you can immediately try to inoculate the roots with beneficial microbes, which if done right will displace the slime and keep it at bay. You also need to sterilize any equipment and testers that contacted the water.

You will find most of the information on this stuff from orchid growing forums and aquarium communities. Trying to sterilize the res is often a losing battle. In fact, since no hydro products kill this stuff, when you sterilize the water you are removing all competing microbes except this one. There are people who use RO filters and then run their water through a UV sterilizer and still end up with the slime. The answer always seems to be beneficial microbes.


How to breed your own bennies

OK, I might have something slightly different than jestermite. I have the same symptoms, but the difference is where it is growing, and now the color. Guess I need a different thread. After switching from FloraNova, the slime is no longer any kind of brown. It is yellow and clear. In case I'm wrong about it being the same thing, here is a couple pictures:



I have no light leaks, I use a cooler, with foil over the lid to block the light. No medium, just neoprene inserts, I also put peice of foil with a hole cut out for the plant, the foil covers both the top of the netpot and the neoprene insert, just to block out light that might leak in little cracks between the neoprene insert and the netpot. I have covered everything there is to cover. The light would have to be penetrating the cooler.

Also need to mention, the PH did drop with that earlier PH down that I mentioned. It does not seem to be climbing but we'll see. Jestermite, with these pictures, do you think we have the same thing? Check your airstones and see.

I hope not doc. Follow the link and you'll get a feeling pretty quickly. http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=55259

Still no climb in PH. PH is 5.8 for the 1st cooler (same as an hour ago), and 5.5 for the second cooler (almost the same). Cooler 1 has the worst infection. Whatever it is, grows slower in Cooler 2.

I get the impression from this thread that you posted, that they have figured out how to cure one type of slime, but not the second, with the exception of the people who already do BB. I think I'll order that ZHO shit.

Any change in your res?

Some signs of hope this morning.. My tallest grew about half an inch and my littlest has produced a nice new white root through all of the muck. pH is holding steady with no changes.

I know Heisenberg is saying that you have to try to kill the algae with Physan before adding the bennies, which I would have done, but since I didn't know I'm hoping the Subculutre will just overwhelm the algae. By eyesight, that seems to be what's happening. It's still early though - not yet been 48 hours since adding the -M.

Am going today to find 'koi filter matting' or something similar to attach to the side of the res and give the bennies another home in addition to the roots. Also will find out more about giving the bennies a head start before adding the plants, ph, and nutes. Also from what I'm learning it seems you can re-use some of the res water and not need to add more Subculutre at every change.

I guess I'm in your club now!
Check it! I only have a little bit of this brown algae on the top of my roots...everything is fine PH is 5.8 - 5.9 Temps at 20.5 C PPM at around 550

THis brown algea issue can easily be solved with subculture B.. had the same problem and now I have flawless white root's like on the label... I've noticed that the subcultures stick to the roots really easy, so if you change your rez water alot I would start using smaller amounts... and the subculture M will give ur root ball a brownish look also.. but that's just build up.

If you make the EWC tea you wont need any sort of housing for the bennies, and your products will last longer. You would only need a single dose of sub-b/m every 10 days. (aquashield and ZHO are cheaper) They will breed in the tea which then can be used to inoculate multiple res. You wont need to save any old water, just add more tea to the new res. Since the bennies are already active in the tea, you will only need to wait a couple hours before adding the nutes. Good luck!

It's recommended to add more tea to the res every 3 days. I have personally found I can wait a week or even longer, which means I don't have to constantly have fresh tea on hand. I had a really aggressive case of the slime and since using the EWC tea, I haven't seen any sign of it.

Awesome Heis thx. I'm gonna try it. I'm wondering about the mix of EWC tea and sub - The sub only goes in the res right? So tea every 3 days to a week few cups added to res and then sub every 10 or so? Could I get along without the Sub when I run out?

You would put the sub-b/m in the EWC tea so that they can multiply. If you look at my recipe, it calls for ancient forest EWC, Aquashield and ZHO powder. In your case the sub-b is the same as aquashield and the sub-m is the same as ZHO, so just substitute them in the recipe. The really important stuff is the EWC, the other stuff just fortifies it.

I make the tea, which keeps about 10 days in the fridge. I add 1 cup per gallon of res initially, and one cup total every three days or so after that. After 10 days the tea goes bad in my fridge, but rather than make more right away I wait 4 or 5 days then make a new batch. This way I only make the tea about twice a month. I never add anything to the res besides the tea, nutes and water. Never try to feed the bennies in the res, never add anything organic to the res, once food is present the slime will outgrow the bennies.

Never, never add any enzyme products when dealing with the slime, it's like super food for it.

Ah cool - thanks for clearing that up. I just got back with the castings have the tea bubbling right now.

Coming up on 72 hours since I added the Sub -M and things are about the same. Plants are for the most part still stunted. I manually removed the goop (sub + algae) from the roots last night and it hasn't come back. I'm gonna add the EWC tea regularly for the next few and see if it can starve out the last of the algae and hopefully allow some new roots.