Algae eater

[jtl]

What would be a good fish to eat hair algae? 100 g with a mandarin, two clowns, midas blenny, anthia and a fire fish? I am getting tired of fighting this.

 

[lapin]

My lawnmower eats some. My snails eat a lot more than she does. There are a lot more of them. The long stuff I pull out if it gets on a coral.
The rest I let wave in the current.

 

[cracker]

Hello Jtl. You have a bigger size tank How about a tang of some sort? These tangs come with their issues though. What does your Cuc consist of? Do You want a fish? More snails will help.

 

[dwest]

What would be a good fish to eat hair algae? 100 g with a mandarin, two clowns, midas blenny, anthia and a fire fish? I am getting tired of fighting this.

Yellow tang? How long is your tank?

 

[jtl]

I just ordered a new CUC to replace the snails that died. Long story short is that I just removed 60+ dead snails and only had 6 that were alive so I ordered 15 each of FL cerith, dwarf and Nerite. The die off in my opinion was using Vibrant and then trying to kill the resulting cyano using h2o2. Who really knows?

 

[jtl]

My tank is only 4' which limits the tang options.

 

[EmdeReef]

Foxface could work. They’ll try just about any algae IME, keep in mind that no fish is guaranteed to eat it or be enough to control so make sure whatever you get is a fish you’d like to keep.

 

[lapin]

I just ordered a new CUC to replace the snails that died. Long story short is that I just removed 60+ dead snails and only had 6 that were alive so I ordered 15 each of FL cerith, dwarf and Nerite. The die off in my opinion was using Vibrant and then trying to kill the resulting cyano using h2o2. Who really knows?

In my opinion, I have better results trying copy nature than throwing a bunch of chemicals at a problem. A lot of unexpected things can happen when you add chemicals. Adding cuc snails usually does not create any problems. If your tank has hair then there must be a reason. Maybe its the only thing in your tank that is taking up nutrients. If it has no competition and / or natural enemies then it will rule.

 

[jtl]

No argument on the chemicals but sometimes one has to resort to drastic measures. Anyway the chems weren't the worst. The first thing most experienced reefers would say is reduce nutrients, well my nutrients are very low. po4 at .16 and no3 at 2 and this is the high side. My cheato is even shrinking to nothing. I have been in this hobby off and on for over 30 years and this has been my most difficult tank. Maybe my expectations are too high. This particular tank is only a little over a year old so perhaps it is still going through growing pains.

 

[eatbreakfast]

Amblygobius species eat hair algea. Seahares are the best algae eaters.

 

[KenO]

+1 on the sea hare. I have a species of Caulepra that I thought I killed off using 2 treatments of Fluconazole. Then it came back. I put in 1 sea hare and this thing went to town munching down the algae. It is now almost completely gone and my rocks were fully covered. Get a sea hare.