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[Cgy_Betta_Guy]

what kind of filtration do you have on that 5G? I had cyano on my tank waaaay back when I started my first tank and black out and then increasing the water circulation seemed to help with getting rid of it. Didnt do any chemical dosing besides the usual ferts. I did increase KNO3 a bit as mentioned as well. i think once your tank gets balanced the cyano will be less likely to appear.

[creekbottom]

It's a ZooMed 501, with spray bar. There looks to be lots of circulation.

[jcgd]

Dirty tank. Organics in the water is a big inducer. Dead spots are places it likes to colonize, so it does well around the substrate and under it.

You need to be doing manual removal of any visible cyano, as well as removing the dead stuff. Hydrogen peroxide or Excel will help if spot dosed. I find H2O2 much better than Excel as it breaks down to water and O2 and really does a number to the cyano. The blackouts can help but if you don't fix the root of the issue it will easily come back. I find a drop KNO3 helps induce the cyano, but I've found the organics to be the root cause. Circulation helps keep it at bay, but I haven't found the lack of circulation to be a cause. If you have a sponge filter you will have very gentle flow, but you don't see cyano in every tank with a sponge filter or under gravel filters.

Clean your filter, get all the dead, dying plant matter out, and vacuum any mulm settling on the substrate and that should help. Also get your KNO3 levels up and do lots of water changes to bring up the water quality. Purigen or carbon will help as well.

I do 50% water changes once per week and I still need a nice cleaning after 1.5 months. Generally, if you fix the root issue the cyano growth will stop, but you usually have to manually remove it. If you use the erythromycin it will KILL the cyano and you really need to do lots of water changes so you don't foul up the water as it releases all the proteins back into the column. Use the erythromycin as a last resort, but it's pretty easy on the filter. It kills MOSTLY gram positive bacteria, like cyano while most gram negative (in your filter) bacteria will be fine.

I beat the cyano in my tank without antibiotics or a blackout. Personally, I don't recommend blackout for much. They weaken the plants and if you don't kill the algae/bacteria then, your weakened plants open the door for everything else after a blackout. Stem heavy tanks also don't fare well with 2-3 day blackouts whereas ferns can do weeks.

[cainechow]

Would bigger water changes once a week help more or just go one big plus some more small ones in your experience?

[creekbottom]

Thanks for the advice. It is a conundrum though. I tested my TDS last week, it was around 200, pretty much what it is out of the tap. And that was before a water change. I do regular water changes on this tank, but hardly any ferts. The water test last week said everything was 0. I'm sure 0 nitrates was helping.

I'm not keeping this tank running much longer, in fact if I didn't have to get rid of the BGA it would already be dismantled. Since I'm moving all those plants into another tank I don't want to take IT too. Could I manually clean them and then H2O2 dip them? Either way I'm going to be keeping a close eye on things in the new tank, just trying to lessen my chances.