Nothing really toxic, just stinky, musty smelling, most 1/2 dead algae
does have that low tide aroma.

Glad the method worked for you.
Seems to be a very useful method and you cannot beat the cost: free.

But some clown will come along in a few months and claim to have
discovered the "secret, just add this product for 3 weeks till the alga
puckers up and begins to slough away, then wipe".

All I'd have to do is put DI water in the bottle and tell folks it
takes 3 weeks to work:-)

And..........there is a desperate (their favorite kind) sucker born
every minute.

When you see someone selling this, and I can bet you will, rip them to
pieces for me.
I identified the species and the ecological life stage that made it
preplexing to many in the plant tank hobby. Then figured out the life
stages virulence time frame to get rid of it with a simple wipe 3 weeks
later.

Aquaschisters and arm chair aquarist love to talk, just don't be fooled
by their BS:-)
Nerites and the SAE's did not really do much to it(I've had many of
these present in GDA tanks), the alga sloughs off anyway, they just
sped it up th slouughing rather than doing any real damage, without
first going through that stage, the alga would simply grow back
rapidly.

Regards,
Tom Barr

www.BarrReport.com











Jürgen Beisser wrote:
I would like to share a good experience with everybody of this groups. For a
couple of months I fought a battle against the so called Green Dust Algae.
The growth of this harmless (?) but annoying algae was so quick that I had
to wipe the screens every other day. Sometimes, the algae reappeared within
a few hours after cleaning. Approximately one month ago, I found an older
thread where Tom Barr claimed that he knew how to get rid off these algae.
He stated that you have to keep your hands away from the screens for about
three weeks, then the algae would get into a different stage of their
life-cycle and finally die off. I was a bit sceptical but I tried this
method. After two weeks, the glasses looked already a bit different because
some algae eaters (they have been in the tank from the beginning) had
already cleaned some part. They must be more careful than a human hand with
a scrubber than it seemed that no new algae grew on the tracks of the
cleaning crew (SAE and neritina snails). I waited two more weeks, the tank
looked not bad. Then I reactivated the srubber and cleaned the last patches
of GDA. Surprise, surprise, the screens remained blank. How long this state
will last, I don't know. But I think it is a good idea to try the method
yourself if you have the same kind of problem.

I put a question mark behind the word "harmless" because I sometimes
experienced a pretty strong smell when I cleaned the screens in the past.
The smell was like ozone or nitrous oxide fumes. Therefore, I am not sure
wheteher GDA can release toxic substances.

Juergen Beisser