# Planted Tanks > Fertilisation and Algae >  Where can I buy Hydrogen Peroxide?

## dasouljah

Have been battling hair algae for some time now without much success. So have decided to nuke the tank with H202 after transfering the livestock to another tank. 

Where can I get H2O2 locally?

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## Shadow

guardian or watson have it

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## reagan022

wow... must be really bad condition for you to nuke the tank!!!... :Opps:

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## dasouljah

Shadow: thanks, i will check them out tomorrow. 
reagan022: yes very bad. threads 15 cm in length can form overnight and if i leave it for another day, they become thick clumps..

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## IlOutfitter

I am starting to have that issue, IRON is too high in the water.

My MTS eat around the stuff but it doesnt grow on my new leaves only the old ones so I trim those out, I also used a toothbrush and basically wiped it off in a matter of minutes.

http://www.aquarium-pond-answers.com...ium-algae.html

that might help.

I am going to start dosing with HP tomorrow when I do the WC however I am going to scrub the decor off first and use a syringe to administer it to the plants directly.


Take all the chemical media out of the filter, as in carbon or ammo chips ect.ect. before you do this or the HP will have no effect on the algae.

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## felix_fx2

The infestation must be really bad, i scrubbed most of them off the last time and redid the whole tank. All this while the inhabitants were living in a pail.

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## seanskye

What's the size of your tank? Hydrogen peroxide may be quite expensive especially if you buy little bottles from the pharmacies to nuke a large tank.

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## EddyTing

I'm having the same problem too...now trying to dilute CO2 24hrs a day, reduce feeding to 2-3days once and larger portion of WC. Seems like it slowed down the growth. O...and also apply 5ml H2O2 on the algae once every 2-3 days, direct into my 3ft tank. All my live stock are still alive, including CRS. Hope this will clear them up...or else, I'm considering restart the tank.

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## dasouljah

> What's the size of your tank? Hydrogen peroxide may be quite expensive especially if you buy little bottles from the pharmacies to nuke a large tank.


Im running only a 5g tank so I hope 1 bottle will be enough.

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## Tristan

i think excel might be a better alternative, and you won't need to transfer your fish if you don't overdose too much

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## mozaqua

> Im running only a 5g tank so I hope 1 bottle will be enough.


Yikes! Don't add more than 5cc of Hydrogen Peroxide (3%) to such a small tank! Also, peroxide will KILL liverworts! This includes that mini-pellia (Riccardia sp.) as well as other pellia and aquatic liverworts. Regular plants and moss are ok for short duration of oxidation. Keep in mind the peroxide can kill beneficial bacteria as well, so do a water change after 1 day of treatment. Apply with a syringe directly to the effected areas. Also check your water parameters for Nitrites, Nitrates, Phosphates, as these will cause hair algae (cyno-bacteria). If you can't spread the 5cc around to all the areas, just repeat treatment after 2 days if you don't have shrimp in the tank. For Shrimp tank, wait one week between treatments. I typically will use 20cc per 100L, but use directly to the algae -NOT into the filter. Too much your plants will turn light green-white, or even die.

Regards

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## dasouljah

> I'm having the same problem too...now trying to dilute CO2 24hrs a day, reduce feeding to 2-3days once and larger portion of WC. Seems like it slowed down the growth. O...and also apply 5ml H2O2 on the algae once every 2-3 days, direct into my 3ft tank. All my live stock are still alive, including CRS. Hope this will clear them up...or else, I'm considering restart the tank.


Hi Eddy, any updates from your treatment regime?




> i think excel might be a better alternative, and you won't need to transfer your fish if you don't overdose too much


Hi tristan, I'm actually considering that at the moment after reading more about the potential downsides of H202 from bro cobalt quoted below. For excel, what is a suitable dosage over how many days?




> Yikes! Don't add more than 5cc of Hydrogen Peroxide (3%) to such a small tank! Also, peroxide will KILL liverworts! This includes that mini-pellia (Riccardia sp.) as well as other pellia and aquatic liverworts. Regular plants and moss are ok for short duration of oxidation. Keep in mind the peroxide can kill beneficial bacteria as well, so do a water change after 1 day of treatment. Apply with a syringe directly to the effected areas. Also check your water parameters for Nitrites, Nitrates, Phosphates, as these will cause hair algae (cyno-bacteria). If you can't spread the 5cc around to all the areas, just repeat treatment after 2 days if you don't have shrimp in the tank. For Shrimp tank, wait one week between treatments. I typically will use 20cc per 100L, but use directly to the algae -NOT into the filter. Too much your plants will turn light green-white, or even die.
> 
> Regards

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## GaspingGurami

H2O2 breaks down into Oxygen and pure water when it oxidises your algae. Therefore, it is harmless, in fact, good for your tank, as opposed to overdosing Excel, which stays in the tank till plants take it up.

However, too much H2O2 will also oxidise your fish, so application must be controlled to the minimum. Best is to turn off filters so that no current will take away the peroxide from the spot you apply. After bubbling stops, then you can turn back on the filters.

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## mozaqua

> H2O2 breaks down into Oxygen and pure water when it oxidises your algae. Therefore, it is harmless, in fact, good for your tank, as opposed to overdosing Excel, which stays in the tank till plants take it up.
> 
> However, too much H2O2 will also oxidise your fish, so application must be controlled to the minimum. Best is to turn off filters so that no current will take away the peroxide from the spot you apply. After bubbling stops, then you can turn back on the filters.


Yes, it breaks down into H2O and O2 but in the process it is a strong oxidizer and mild acid. This means it can strip the water of its hardness if you overdose. 
H2O2 is good stuff for water purification because of its ability to remove organic toxins (by oxidizing them) similar to the way an Ozone (O3) machine or UV purifier works. So caution must be taken, especially with the sensitive animals like shrimp.
Don't want to get too many bubbles on your shrimp, or inadvertently squirt some on the shrimplets (babies)
Due to the peroxides ability to change the water chemistry, the shrimp may require molting after dosage. They will need time to recover from molting before a subsequent dosage should be added.

Regards,

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## illumbomb

How about just adding a pack of say 50 to 100 malayan shrimps into the tank, I thought they are quite effective against hair algae?

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## mozaqua

> How about just adding a pack of say 50 to 100 malayan shrimps into the tank, I thought they are quite effective against hair algae?


Yes, I have seen them eat some. Although you need to starve them, which means some might die. If you got that many it is worth a try. Some types of Cyanobacteria (hair algae) are not eaten by any shrimp though.
Be sure to rid the tank of the harmful excess nutrients which caused the algae in the first place ( excess Nitrates, Phosphate, etc.) before introducing any shrimp.


Regards

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## dasouljah

Update:

What I did was to transfer all of my plants, mostly mosses into a 20L (red color household pails) and dosed 50ml of H202 (3%) into the pail. Left it overnight and a full WC the next day and repeated the treatment. This dosage did not cause the rapid bubbling, but slow but consistent bubbling throughout the night. 

I would have done a third treatment if not for some mosses starting to turn brown. As of now, most of my mosses survived, color is abit dull but I'm sure they will pull through. Riccia was hopeless, all melted. 

The thread algae seems dead and brown and are still attached to the mosses. The plants are back into the tank and I have introduced a cleanup crew to clear out the remaining algae. 

Will update again, thanks for all the comments and advice so far buddies.

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## dasouljah

Update:
After 2 days with a pack of 5 endlers and 5 yamatos, all thread algae seem gone. Most of the willow moss turned brown but flame, spiky and singapore mosses are all doing well.

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## Tristan

> Yes, it breaks down into H2O and O2 but in the process it is a strong oxidizer and mild acid. This means it can strip the water of its hardness if you overdose.


sorry but I don't think hydrogen peroxide reacts with calcium and magnesium ions.

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## StanChung

Of course it does- metal ions destroy peroxide.

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## Tristan

it's a catalytic reaction with transition metal ions, calcium and magnesium are not transition metals and even if they were, they would not be consumed by the reaction.
also, even if they were consumed, they'd still be present in the water in one form or another, metals cannot vaporize in an aquarium. the only ways to get rid of them are water changes or sorption to a solid/immobile phase like plant tissue, peat or ion exchange resins.

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## StanChung

No Calcium and magnesium would not vaporise  :Grin:  but become a _less_ available form to plants. To say they both wouldn't react with peroxide is incorrect.

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## Tristan

sorry for my bad phrasing. what i meant to say is that calcium ions and magnesium ions would not be affected by the hydrogen peroxide.

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## mozaqua

> Of course it does- metal ions destroy peroxide.


 :Grin:  Thanks for the backup Stan !

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## mozaqua

> it's a catalytic reaction with transition metal ions, calcium and magnesium are not transition metals and even if they were, they would not be consumed by the reaction.
> also, even if they were consumed, they'd still be present in the water in one form or another, metals cannot vaporize in an aquarium. the only ways to get rid of them are water changes or sorption to a solid/immobile phase like plant tissue, peat or ion exchange resins.



Oxidized metal ions are less available to plants than other non oxidized ions, last time I checked. Example Iron oxide or Iron sulfate, the first is practically useless to plants.
Oxidizers reduce the hardness of the water due to the precipitation of the ions. Precipitation of Ions= Stripping the Hardness in the water. This is the same way acid can also reduce the hardness of the water, although not as much as a resin filter can. No, not everything evaporates, but many organic compounds do evaporate ex. Nitrogen. 

The ability of the oxidizing agent to react with so many organic and inorganic compounds means it can be deadly to overdose in a shrimp/fish tank. Most of the higher organism such as normal plants and animals can resist a degree of free oxygen radicals. (My own experiments show liverworts are not resistant.) Bacteria can not resist oxidation, which is why H2O2 is effective against Cyanobacteria, but does not discriminate between the good and bad/unwanted bacteria. So use with caution! 
If the proper dosage is used the overall bacteria load will be reduced without causing a crash in the good bacteria. Also since Nitrogen compounds are oxidized the need for Ammonia/Nitrite reducing bacteria is temporarily reduced. 

Regards

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## StanChung

Bad news for my mini pelia. oops.
I'm tempted to nuke my tank with Potassium Permanganate. :Evil: 
Some BGA and some vile slimy black algae not to mention a mysterious plant melting condition happening in my tank. hehe- might as well do it while it's still 2009.  :Razz:

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## Tristan

Ok let me try to explain this. 
You gave iron as an example, but iron is a transition metal with more then one oxidation state. Iron (II) oxide is the usual species of iron we want to add to our aquariums, but it's usally oxidised to iron(III). What that actually means is that the iron cations have lost 1 electron to an electron acceptor (usually oxygen) causing the charge to increase from +2 to +3.
Calcium and magnesium only have 1 oxidation state, +2. The removal of a third electron would require a lot of energy and cation would not be stable at room temperature. calcium/magnesium +1 does not exist at room temperature either. in other words, it is not possible to oxides calcium and magnesium ions in an aqueous solution, no matter what kind of oxidizing agent to use. 
also, precipitation is not directly caused by oxidation. It is caused when cations react with specific anions which result in a compound with a very high lattice energy that water cannot solvate, hence precipitating is more thermodynamically favorable. In the case of iron, oxidation increases the charge of the iron cation. Since lattice energy is proportional to the charges of the ions, this increases the lattice energy of iron salts. Acid does NOT reduce the general hardness of your water, it only reduces carbonated hardness (eg the concentration of carbonate ions in your water). again, it is not through oxidation or precipitation, acid-base reactions involve electron pair transfers and redox is rarely involved.

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## mozaqua

Dude, you're killing me!

The point is not how the reaction happens! It is the end result. Adding acid, or oxidizing agents WILL effect the water's chemistry, bottom line! The shrimp will molt after releasing H2O2 into the water, which means they sense the change in the water parameters. That is all I care about here. What happens to the plants and animals. There are entirely too many variables, too many compounds for you to calculate what is happening inside your tank. Which specific chemical reaction is taking place when you don't even know the chemicals present? Really!
You would have an equation a mile long, and who really cares.

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## StanChung

LOL- it serves the interests of the community better if some interesting info comes out of it. Personally I was lost at 'lattice energy'.  :Laughing:

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## Tristan

yes, it will affect the water chemistry. it will not affect the water hardness  :Smile: 
I never said that it won't affect the aquarium, I was just correcting some wrong info given. Maybe people aren't interested, but I'm just giving the info for those who are.
btw chemical equations don't go miles long, they don't involve many species since the chances of multiple reactants colliding with the right energy and right orientation is very low.

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## Laconic

Tristan is correct. 

Addition of H2O2 will probably lower the pH of the tank, holding all else constant, due to the addition of H+ ions. 

Transition Metal ions, such as Iron, will be oxidised by the O1- ion, changing from ferrous iron (Fe2+, which is readily absorbed by plants) to the ferric state (Fe3+). 

Weak oxidising agents such as heavily diluted H2O2 cannot oxidise earth metals such as calcium and magnesium, as pointed out by Tristan.

Therefore H2O2 would not affect general hardness but the addition of H+ ions can and will affect carbonate hardness.

The moulting of the shrimp is probably due to a drastic change in water parameters brought on by the addition of a significant amount of H2O2 into the tank.

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## TyroneGenade

Dasouljah, how effective were those Endlers? Would you attribute most of the algae eating to the shrimps?

Regarding H2O2 chemistry... I doubt it will have any meaningful affect on the aquarium. If anything it will raise the pH because the extra O in H2O2 needs to find two friend to form H2O... The metal ions in the water (which will be at low concentrations) will catalyze the break down of the 2H2O2 --> 2H2O + O2 (the bubbles...). Now, if they react "with the algae" you still get O2 but also one 2OH-- and a 2H+ which will react with the neutrophilic chemical constituents in the cells like lipids, proteins, DNA etc... to produce R1-OH and R2-H (R is the residue of the macromolecule like DNA), that is, the H2O2 *breaks* the lipid or protein or DNA by inserting H2O into the molecule. You can't have an accumulation of H+ without an accumulation of something negative as well.

Even in the Fenton Reaction (where a transition element catalyzes the break down of H2O2 to oxygen radicals) the Fe3 will auto-reduce to Fe2+ after a short time unless the medium is alkaline where it will precipitate with OH- and neutralize the charge of the solution.

The hydrogen peroxide half reactions are:

H2O2 ⇄ O2(g) + 2 H+ + 2 e−
H2O2 + 2 H+ + 2 e− ⇄ 2 H2O
-----------------------------------------
2H2O2 ⇄ 2H2O + O2

The charges are balanced. There is no accumulation of H+.

tt

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## mozaqua

> Tristan is correct. 
> 
> Addition of H2O2 will probably lower the pH of the tank, holding all else constant, due to the addition of H+ ions. 
> 
> Transition Metal ions, such as Iron, will be oxidised by the O1- ion, changing from ferrous iron (Fe2+, which is readily absorbed by plants) to the ferric state (Fe3+). 
> 
> Weak oxidising agents such as heavily diluted H2O2 cannot oxidise earth metals such as calcium and magnesium, as pointed out by Tristan.
> 
> Therefore H2O2 would not affect general hardness but the addition of H+ ions can and will affect carbonate hardness.
> ...





> Dasouljah, how effective were those Endlers? Would you attribute most of the algae eating to the shrimps?
> 
> Regarding H2O2 chemistry... I doubt it will have any meaningful affect on the aquarium. If anything it will raise the pH because the extra O in H2O2 needs to find two friend to form H2O... The metal ions in the water (which will be at low concentrations) will catalyze the break down of the 2H2O2 --> 2H2O + O2 (the bubbles...). Now, if they react "with the algae" you still get O2 but also one 2OH-- and a 2H+ which will react with the neutrophilic chemical constituents in the cells like lipids, proteins, DNA etc... to produce R1-OH and R2-H (R is the residue of the macromolecule like DNA), that is, the H2O2 *breaks* the lipid or protein or DNA by inserting H2O into the molecule. You can't have an accumulation of H+ without an accumulation of something negative as well.
> 
> Even in the Fenton Reaction (where a transition element catalyzes the break down of H2O2 to oxygen radicals) the Fe3 will auto-reduce to Fe2+ after a short time unless the medium is alkaline where it will precipitate with OH- and neutralize the charge of the solution.
> 
> The hydrogen peroxide half reactions are:
> 
> H2O2 ⇄ O2(g) + 2 H+ + 2 e−
> ...


Hey guys,

Thanks for the inputs! Just was wondering if the carbonate hardness changing will cause the shrimp to molt? Or is it the extra oxygen radical?

Also, I did an experiment with my Tetra test kit. My Tap water:PH 7.5 and GH is 6) 
For this experiment I used: 
#1 vial containing 5ml of tap H2O
#2 vial of 1ml Distilled H2O + 4ml of tap H2O
#3 vial of 1ml 9% H2O2 + 4ml of tap H20

Results: Tap H20 =GH 6
#2 =GH 5
#3 =GH 4

The same thing happened when I tested with HCL as the variable.
(lower GH).

What caused this? Is this a reaction with the regent chemicals?

Regards

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## TyroneGenade

What were the pH values?

When you measure GH you measure the concentration of Ca and Mg which will precipitate out of an alkaline solution...

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